The Ouachita telegraph. [volume] (Monroe, La.) 1865-1889, 1880-11-26
A GREAT MAN IN HIS DECLINE.
The closing Days of Thomas Carlyle.
[rrom the Baltimore SUM-

| [Erona the Baltimore Sun.1
| LONDON, Oct. Isl have heard
much about Thomas Carlyle being a
sufferer from insomnia. He is not.
He is gradually going down the hill OF
life and into ssthe valley of the shadow
ofdeath" by slow and easy stages, with
clear and rested brain. He is ap-
proaching So years, and may well af-
ford to look back, as Dante did, and
be proudly remembered in the future
as one sswho whipped vice with Il
scourge of steel, unmasked stern muir
der, shamed lasciyious lust, and pluck
ed off the visor from grim treason's
face" I made up my mind to call
and personally learn at Carlyle's house
his condition.
Years ago / had a letter of introduce
tion to him from literary light of
Boston, and I recalled with some mis-
gfvings my chances of seeing tthe old
man of perpetual fame" Then it took
me days to see the Usage of Chelsea"
How could hope to see ssthe philoso-
pher of Cheyne Rowe'' now in mo-
ment? But I went my way toward
this noted abode, so quaint in its sim
plicity and so true in its snug, quiet
retreat. I learned from the trusty SER
want that Mr.. Carlyle was very ill, and
not able to see any one. ssTake my
card, and let him say through you
how he really is," I remarked. The
servant did SO, returned, and to my
delight was ushered up stairs to a
sort of semi-boukoir, where, seated in
a large, square, half-recumbent chair,
I found the great writer, thinker, re-
former. We were soon Joined by his
niece, a calm and thoughtful looking
little lady, who said might talk, but
ahe must not" Thomas Carlyle
could not be silent, however, and said :
uAh, / cannot work much more, and
that of all gricves me before going"
The same persistent idea of work that
marked the young Scotch lad as he
came into the world was with the
European octogenarian philosopher as
he was going out. Work to Carlyle
true work-has been his gospel of life.
By his side, on a little table, also of
cane or bamboo structure, like unto
the chair in which he reclined, there
We're slips OF paper,as if notes on some
thing of the past, or perhaps of the
future, by this brave old man.
He looked from out and under his
shaggy eyebrows with the deep fire of
his departing soul, earnestly, seriously,
and almost savagely. His thin, scrag-
y 4
grizzly beard, his compressed, deter
mined lips, made dual picture of the
inner man of youth fighting with the
outer one of decay. His thin, bony,
expressive hands make all his sledge-
hammer sentences come to my MEM
ory, and 1 could then and now quote
pages of them by sheer enthusiasm.
Presently his niece re-appeared and
Said:- stDa me, you've taken off the
mittens ~ Thereupon she encased
those wiry hands with knitted woollen
mittens SO large and so loose that all
the electrical eXpressiveness of the
hands was instantly gone. remem-
bered at once all the force of what Sir
Arthur Helps wrote on etgreat hands
and their greatness of expression"
Not large and loose hands; great ones.
Carlyle wore black velvet skull
cap, which did not improve his ap-
pearance. and around his body had his
favorite plaid shawl. "I am not ill
/ never was ILL.," said he, in his en-
phatic and broad Scotch accent, some
what pettishly, if not peevishly. "I
am only g-going-going."
And his eyes lost their grim fire of eX-
preston, his emphatic, rasping voice
fell into lower tone, and I sat silent
before the only living man worthy of
my loud admiration The room was
small, and the fire made the tempera-
ture oppressive, yet the icy manner of
the Sage of Chelsea relieved the atmos-
pheric pressure on our lungs,
1 saw some few books around chiefly
in the German language. a small
bust of William of Orange and one of
Peter the Great were readily discerni-
BILE, while an engraving of two of
Scotch scenery made the rest of the
ornamentation of the close and we'll
closed room. In taking my leave of
the, great old man he said feebIy: "Go
on and work with all your will-up-
root error" 1 shook the feeble and
mittened hand and left Thomas
Carlyle, who in the flesh may soon
leave rs hlt in the SDirit will evnr rp-