Middletown transcript., 1895-04-06
CARLYLE's WIFE.


The story of Thomas Carlyle's court
ship and marriage to Miss Jane Welsh,
formed one OF the principal parts of
Prof. G. T. Winchester's lecture on
''Thomas Carlyle" yesterday after
noon. 1t was the second lecture Of
his course on "Victorian Writers" at
Mccoy Hall, Johns Hopkins Univer-
sity. @ = - y"
"Miss WeIsh's first recorded mention
of Carlyle is in the delightful volumes
of her letters printed last SUMNER"
said Professor Winchester. 'She had
been reading Rosseau's 'Novelle He
loise' with vast admiration for VOL
mar and St. Preux, but drew therefrom
the following discouraging reflection
''Alasl No lover will Jane Welsh
ever find like WOlmar, and to no one
will she give her heart and pretty hand
who bears to him no resemblance
MI. Thomas Carlyle speaks of coming
to see me. He is something like st.
Preux. He has his tastes, his vast and
cultivated mind, his vivid imagination,
his independence of soul and his high
souled principles of honor. But then
oh, these buts-St. Preux never kicked
the fireirons, nor made puddings in his
tea cup. Want of elegancel Want of
elegance, Rosseau says, is defect no
woman can overlook $3.50. ..
"But think,' continued Professor
Winchester. "that this is a rather dam
gerous array of virtues for any TN
attached young lady to find in an ac-
quaintance. 1t was the old story. and
in remarkably pretty version. They
were not married for several years, but
the story of the years between, so far
as we have been allowed to read it.,
runs very like one of the comfortable
old-fashioned novels, with nothing in
it very strange or very saddening. It
was on their wedding journey, in 1926,
that hestipulated only that he should
be allowed to smoke three cigars with
out protest or remark. ...-.f -.
sit is obvious enough that the
friendship of Miss Welsh was of i'm
mense service to Carlyle. Here was
intelligent sympathy with him, un-
stinted but discriminating admiration;
best of all, clear-sighted confidence in
his future. And seldom has wife ever
been more helpful to husband than Car
lyle. Everybody knows how she made
home on the windy Moor of Craigin-
puttock, and how in the crowded Lon
don life she stood as a kind of buffer
between the manifold shocks of that |
noisy world and her grim, smoky, sur
ly, piano-pounded, big-bitten, much
bedeve1ed man of genius now she ST.
fenced the offending cocks in the
neighbours yard, bought off the piano.
players, pared down his taxes before
the board of relief and in a thousand
ways ministered to his exacting ineffi-
cheney in the daily economics of life.
'But this was the least of her SER
vices. She had quick, unnerling liter
ary judgment and was always her shus-
bands best critic. Her nature was
more versatile and buoyant than his
and she had-what he never had
quick, social aptitudes. S.. ..-.-,.
"Her humor was an admirable COM
plement to his. Carlyle had humor,
doubtless, but of a rather formidable
sort. 1t Is massive and takes, SO to
speak, a good deal of room to turn in.
He is said to have had laugh quite
astounding, cavernous, from the roots
of the man. But Mrs. Carlyle's humor
was sprightly and flashing. She had
an irrepressible vivacity and quick
eye for the dramatic points of the hu-
man comedy, whether in the drawing
room or in the kitchen.
''lt is true that the care of such a
helpless creature as Carlyle was some
lines sore trialstotthis delicately Or
ganized woman. The dyspeptic man
With nervous system, who writes
books, always will put something of
strain upon wifely affection. But Mr..
Froude can never make us believe that
this match was not well made"