The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1890-09-28

the rank OF the person occupying 1t. Car
lyle attended few dinners. but when he
did accept such an invitation he always
led the march to the dining-room, was
recognized as king. and SO took prece-
dence of everybody.
"This lionizing of Carlyle was indirectly
one of the chief causes Of his wife's unhap-
piness. Lady Ashburton conceived great
admiration for Carlyle and he became
part of the literary circle which surrounded
her. He became fascinated with Lady
Ashburton, and though / am sure that he
was true to his wife and that Lady ASH
burton was true to her husband. still the
fact that he was invited to many places
where his wife was not was one of the
causes of her misery. Jane Welsh Carlyle
was most extraordinary woman. She
was Intellectually the peer Of any wo-
man of her time, but the English
nobility who feted Carlyle merely
tolerated her and she felt that
her admittance 10 their society was upon
sufferance. Mrs. Carlyle was far the SUI
perior of Thomas Carlyle in culture and
refinement. He was peasant with the
ideas of peasant in regard to woman.
His mother. whom he esteemed, was an
ignorant woman, who had washed the
clothes of her family and brewed and
baked for them. Mrs. Carlyle came from
the professional classes of England. Her
father had been possessed of q good in
come, and she was brought
up with plenty of servants about
her. She was delicate in frame
and remarkably sensitive in feeling. After
she was married she discovered that Car
lyle expected her to do the same things
that his mother had done, and she MUIR
INJURED not, but attempted to do them. In
the days of their poverty she did all the
work about the. house and Carlyle uncon-
sciously imposed on her. He was very
irritable and his stomach was such that he
was often in bad humor. He would eat
no bread but that which his wife baked.
and he said no marnalade agreed with
him except that which she made with her
own hands. He often wounded her
feelings without knowing 1t, and
he was filled with remorse when his eyes
were opened by her diary, which he first
saw after her death. He authorized the
publication of the diary more from q wish
to do justice to her memory than from
anything else, and he gave it over into
Froude's hands with the Injunction to pub
lish it ii he thought that justice demanded
it, but if he published it to print it word
for word and line for line as it was written.
Thomas Carlyle" DR.. Miburn went on,
was very hard worker. Everything he
produced cost him great mental labor, and
he did all his writing with his own hands,
When Mrs. Carlyle married him it was one
of her ambitions to be able to aid him in his
literary work. She appreciated his great
ness long before the world took him ur,
and she had herself one of the brightest
minds of her day. The two did work fer q.
short time after their marriage.
They did some translations to-
gether, but Carlyle found that he must
be alone to do his best work. The law { I
genius is solitude. and a. be went on with
his literary labors the distance between the
two increased, and he gradually came to
do all his work by himself. He was q fine
talker. and his conversations, could they
have been geographically reported, would
have read almost as well as his writings.
Every sentence sParkled with intellectual
brilliants, and I once asked him why he
did not dictate his thoughts instead of
writing them. He replied with mournful
shake of his head that such . thing would
be an impossibility for him, and that it was
too late for him now to begin.
II have said that Carlyle was wonderful
in conversation, fascinating beyond any
other person have ever known. think
l may safely say that spent more time
with him than anv other American. saw