It is difficult to look back and trace the origins
of such friendships, for founded on sympathetic intellectual
interests they are of the essence of timelessness. The
Whartons and Nortons were of that Boston group - very small
in earlier days - which grew up in friendly intimacy, but
"Teddy's" New York wife came from a more or less alien society,
to these somewhat rigid and austere New Englanders. One knew
of his marriage - that was about all - for they lived in New
York and Newport - the Newport that was fast changing from the
days when it was the summer-home of delightful Southerners who
made close friendships with the Nortons, who lived there then
also, to be bitterly broken by the Civil War. Unconsciously
to us all, life began to change from simplicity to vulgarity
somewhere in the late 1880s and about then also one began to
realize that the society that seemed so aimless held voices
unknown. It was my sister Sara who, with the same literary
intuition that led to her saving of the "Recessional," recognized
Edith Wharton's genius in some verses printed in Scribner or
Harper. Not long after they met at the house of mutual friends
in New York. You would have said there was not much chance of
sympathy - Edith, then, shy, outwardly worldly, and measuring
life, and living, by worldly standards - and those New York
standards. But who can name the lovely spring from which
sympathy arises, and friendship blossoms and grows? Sally - as
she was known to all - was so obviously different - brought up
in the sheltered cloisters of Shady Hill, her grandparents' and
Father's home, influenced mainly by intellectual and spiritual
rather than social values - but with that subtle gift of lovely

2

looks and charm which beguiled all, and quickly won the affection
and interest of the more sophisticated yet brilliant Edith.
When Edith first came to Shady Hill, or Ashfield, I do not
remember, and I do not think the visits to Shady Hill were many.
Boston did not see her often. In those days society occupied
her and Teddy and her interests then were many, but always
intellectualized. For years she was absorbed in the study of
houses, furniture and of course gardens - she had a flair for
creation, but once the house in hand was finished her interest
ceased and she must create anew - so it was that Newport lost
interest, and she moved to Lenox, the New England village, once
the home of Fanny Kemble and Catherine Sedgwick, soon to become
the Newport of the Berkshire hills. There once more she created
afresh, and it was during these years we saw most of her. Life
in Lenox was the same social routine as in Newport, or New York;
she had little really in common with the summer colony and they
did not find her very sympathetic - her natural shyness
unconsciously impressed her intellectual superiority upon
people, and she lived remotely. Her house, her garden, her
appointments were all perfect - money, taste and instinct saw
to every detail - yet the sense of a home was not there, and I
think that perhaps is a quality one always missed in her sur-
roundings, and perhaps it was a quality she realized in both
Shady Hill and Ashfield. Her houses were all perfect, but cold;
perfection of a kind leaves coldness - there was never the sound
of young and ardent feet, of romping dogs (though dogs she always
had and loved, but they were Papillons or Pekinese)*, of music,
of games. I do not think she was ever young in the sense that

4

to lunch and return for dinner, and my Father's strength did
not allow for more. *insert letter no. 3*

Then came the day when America palled: there were no
more houses to be built over here. Paris became the centre of
life and a perfected apartment made her frame. There she found
an intellectual society of which she soon became an integral
part, and if she rather shook the dust of every day America off,
she never loosened her loyalties. She kept in intimate touch
with my Father and Sally. He never went to Europe again, but
for Sally her doors and her arms were always welcome and wide,
and many an interesting and delightful visit Sally had to her.
From then on it became a matter of letters and they were many.
How Edith found time for such correspondence speaks loudly for
her sense of affection and loyalty which distance was never
allowed to interfere with. But times were changing and forces
broke which we had none of us contemplated. With the war Edith
threw herself into refugee work and a side of her character
which was latent but had had little chance for expression
developed rapidly, and her rather starved heart expanded, and
she became a warmer personality, and a larger human being. One felt
it in a thousand inexpressible ways - human sympathies were no
longer hidden behind a social veneer and Edith Wharton, the critic,
the novelist, became the humanitarian, and I think the change
rendered her more free - social values were no longer of much
importance, her whole outlook widened. Perhaps she did not appeal
very much to her American public who disliked her stories at that
time, for she brought unfortunate habits and characteristics too
vividly before the world, and the American is a strangely sensitive
being! But it did not prevent everyone going to Paris wanting

5

to see her, especially in her new setting at St. Brice-sous-
Forêt where out of the wreck of the Pavillon Colombe she
reconstructed a little eighteenth centurie "folie." There it
came to me to be the fortunate inheritor of her loyalties -
changes had come fast and heavy to both of us - and it is there
we will leave the story of these two families. For my own part
I like to recall the Ashfield days best, when life was still
the song of birds for us all.

[COPY]

Sainte-Claire du Chateau,
Hyeres (Var),

Begin: — On March 4, 1926. She wrote

Dearest Lily:

"Thank you so much for copying that passage from your father's letter. It touch me very much to find that he believed in me all those long years ago, & when I think what it would have meant to know it then, when all my dreams were still in my head, & I never hoped to be able to express them, I am saddened by the endless waste of sympathy & opportunity.

It is to your father I owe the encouragement & interest that made The Valley of Decision what it is. He lent me many books I could not otherwise have got, & the knowledge that he was interested, & approved of my vast undertaking, made it possible for me to accomplish it.

How many many others he helped & stimulated in the same way! And what would he think of the country he lived in if he could see it now? ...

From Windsor, July 7th, 1909, Edith wrote to my sister:
"... I always 'evoke' your dear Father in his library there
(Ashfield) or in the basket chair outside, under the trees.
I am glad the garden is pretty and satisfactory. I was afraid
the heat would ravage it.

"Do you remember the day we sat on the verandah and
your Father read Donne to us? And that evening, in the sitting-
room, he read Matthew Arnold. I think it was once when Walter
Berry was with me, and I have always kept a specially charming
memory of that afternoon and evening. But best of all I like to
picture him as I saw him that last time at Shady Hill, last summer,
coming so gallantly down the steps to tell Cook (her chauffeur)
what road to take to go to Beverly! It was such a pleasant last
vision of him, in full alertness and activity."

On June 30th, 1908, Edith wrote to my Father, sympathizing in the death of a fox-terrier, beloved by all:

"When Teddy and I heard yesterday from Lily of Taffy's sad taking-off we both really felt a personal regret in addition to our profound sympathy for his master. His artless but engaging ways, his candid enjoyment of his dinner; his judicious habit of exercising by means of those daily rushes up and down the road had for so many years interested and attracted us that he occupies a very special place in our crowded dog-memories.

"As for your feelings, I can picture them with intensity, since to do so I have only to relive my poor Jules' last hours and farewell looks, about a year ago!

"Somebody says 'l'espoir est le plus fidele des amants' - but I really think it should be put in the plural and applied to dogs. Staunch and faithful little lovers that they are, they give back a hundred fold every sign of love one ever gives them - and it mitigates the pang of losing them to know how very happy a little affection has made them."

Edith wrote to my Father on July 1st, 1905, after a visit to Ashfield, as follows: "The 'bath of beauty' through which, as Mr. James said, we journeyed back to Lenox, rounded off most appropriately our few delightful hours at Ashfield. We came by Goshen and all the Hamptons to Westfield, Huntington and Becket, reaching here (The Mount) at 7:30 almost surfeited with the loveliness we had passed through - over good roads, by the way! . . . Mr. James (Henry) left this morning, carrying away, I think, a real tenderness for this little corner of his big country, and rejoicing so much that he had been with you just before leaving. We hope to descend on you - or rather ascend to you - again later."

3.

presently uplifted my drooping spirits by a generous "good", and when
the "good" came beside particular passages which I myself liked I
could have shouted for joy. She never condemned without suggesting
an alternative. What most aroused her indignation were words which had
crept in like sensed, locate, reminiscent, (verb) negotiate (a difficult)
Looking back through those pages I now realize how gentle she was,
how careful, while condemning till one squirmed with shame, never to
destroy the cobweb texture of one's confidence, and in one place she
had even scribbled across the page "Glorious chapter!" She was much
amused by my perplexity over deciding on which of the alternatives to
keep, and wrote: "do step into the next aeroplane and fly over with
the alternatives wrapped up in cotton-wool".

When my book, with her preface, subsequently appeared, she took endless
trouble to send it to England and America for review, besides giving
innumerable copies to her friends.

One of the most reposeful things about Edith was her perfectly ordered
life. One might picture her writing for twelve hours on end under the
stress of inspiration, yet she told me that she did all her writing
in the early morning between bath and breakfast, never for more than
two hours and never less. She would write on sheets of foolscap
which fell to the floor as they were written, and were gathered up
and typed out by her secretary for revision later. Writing is a
habit, she many times told me, and one should acquire this daily
habit. To my loss I never succeeded in doing so; once started on a
book I wrote for seven hours at a stretch when any interruption was
a torment, but the book finished, not a word would come. I could not
"drive at practice". Correcting an M.S. for me at St. Brice she said
impatiently: "You've the same fault as all beginners, you take too

4.

many words", and with infinite suppleness she inverted the reshaped
the sentence. Nothing is more thrilling than this suppleness with
words of the professional writer. This is where practice tells. Having
disposed of her writing before breakfast, during that golden time
before the post or the details of everyday have broken in upon the
oneness of vision, she was free for her friends, her books and her
garden.

Of her knowledge and erudition, her brilliance as a conversationalist,
I am in nowise qualified to speak; I can only write of her as she
revealed herself to me, as a great inspirer such as seldom appears
in a lifetime to touch mortal clay with divine fire, and as a friend.
Her friendship was always as incredibly wonderful to me as her work,
and surely none have spent more ungrudging time and thought than Edith
in friendship's cause.

When financial cares beset me - and I never knew how she guessed that
they had - she did not merely sympathize, she sought every means by
which I could help myself. She at once began to look for a French
translator for my book, she put me in touch with editors and publishers
and showered on me useful introductions, she even sent me an abstruse
article on archaeology for me to translate into English for a French
scientist. More than that she wrote: "My own literary 'chart' is on
the upward curve now owing to the persistent success of "The Old Maid",
now off on an eight months tour of the States (not to speak of a
début this winter in London); and I like to think that if you need a
help in the next two or three months, you will tell me so in all
frankness, for all my life one of my greatest pleasures has been to
help now and then a fellow homme-de-lettres over a temporary rough
place in the road...

De, dear Vivienne, let me do this without thinking,

10.

of living, that to savour it truly exerted one's highest mental faculties. Dinner was a poem to which brains and palate equally combined to bring a fitting appreciation; it was not a matter of living too well but whether one could bring a fine enough discernment to a work of art.

The dew yet glistened over the garden and I ran through it on the tip-toe of delight, round the stone pond green in the shadow of the trees where the little moss-grown Pan held on high the jet d'eau which scatted a song of drops upon the water, under the deep roof of limes down to the rose garden. Here as I lay hidden beneath a tree and looked at a weeping willow softly curving against a golden-blue sky, a bird flew to the trunk and began sharply to tap with his beak, and I had my first close-up view of the lesser spotted woodpecker. The garden, I remembered was a sanctuary, and the delight of many a bird-lover and scientist.

When I reached the terrace again, Edith called down from her window. She said happily that she felt better than she had done for months, and I told her about the woodpecker and the glory of the garden and the day. "And what about the Cézanne exhibition?" she reminded me. "Yes, but tomorrow", I pleaded; today was too beautiful and we could not lose a moment of it. "Very well", she agreed indulgently, "I will come out soon, and we might do a little work with the roses." Edith's plans for sightseeing were rigid, nothing short of a cataclysm could thwart them, and I rejoiced over this triumph, for my one object was to make her rest. Collecting basket and scissors I went back to the rose-garden. The water-lilies were already opening among the still reflections of the roses which grew about this pond in trim garlands, or climbed high and riotously above the walls,

LL.

mingling their scents in the sun, while the bees hummed among tiny
white flowers that smelt of honey and made a carpet over the steps
beside the crumbling stone seat. Here Edith came and sat, perfectly
gowned in white, with gloves and parasol, while I snipped the roses
at her direction. It was no good expecting her to share in one's
longing to lie under the trees and touch the earth or roll in the
grass; her feeling for the beauty of nature did not compel her to
such direct contact; yet there was no plant or flower in all that
garden that she did not know and love, from the myriad varieties of
roses to the smallest specimen in the rock-garden, from the glowing
herbaceous borders where the nasturtiums were allowed to spill over
the path so that you walked between winding golden banks, to the blue
garden: all was created beautiful in every detail out of her love and
poet's imagination.

And she had at times the poet's faculty for casting away grown-up
and even intellectual things, and my happiest memory of her goes back
to an afternoon when we spent enchanted hours in an undreamed of
world opened to us by a small and powerful magnifying glass. One
picked a flower and held it in bright sunshine up to the glass, keeping
the glass close to one's eye; whereupon the inside of the tiniest
floret rose up around one in solid walls of beauty. Looking into
each flower was a voyage of discovery, the petals no longer soft
wings, changed into a strong crisp texture glowing and iridescent,
cut almost to the brilliance of rubies and sapphires, yet more than
the holding particles of warm living, more warm living,
and the stamens from
yellow blobs formed themselves into patterns of unbelievable delicacy
and delight. We went from flower to flower, from border to rock-pool
in an ecstacy of experiment, each finding some new treasure and
clamouring for the magic eye, till we had run the gamut of the garden

13.

Soon the news of the world would be laid aside, and a chance remark would lead her to look out a book, and from that to another; thus we would browse happily in her library, (for my part often on hands and knees or at the top of the step-ladder), for the rest of the evening, and she would find favourite passages in Montaigne or look out Brownings "blue" stanza and read it to me. Then at the appointed hour Pitterie, the most devoted of French butlers, would appear with his soft carressing voice to lure Linky (the very old and beloved Peke) from his nest beside Edith on the sofa, and put on his little coat for his goodnight walk.

Although she was at this time convalescent, Edith's energy out-manoeuvered all my efforts to keep her quietly at home. In one day she spent a long morning at the Cézanne exhibition (pausing before almost every picture to tell me something of greatest interest about it), entertained my French translator to luncheon, and after discussing XVII French literature with him till late in the afternoon, besides showing him the garden, she was then eager for a long motor-drive to Chantilly where she took me to tea with the novelist Louis Bromfield and his wife. We did not reach home until after seven, and so far from admitting fatigue she would have been quite ready, had anything special been playing at the moment, to start out for the theatre in the evening.

I left St. Brice early one morning to go south, and I went up to Edith's room to say goodbye. She was sitting up in bed with Linky beside her, writing. She was full of solicitude for my journey: had Pitterie really looked out the best train? And it was essential to change more English money - she rang for Madane Frédéric to fetch it for me - one could never be sure that something unexpected might not happen. Sadness at leaving her was swallowed up in the lovely plan she already unfolded for my return, when Bunt was to be persuaded to

15.

let me think that you were my guest at whatever hotel you crawled
into at midnight - _Please_! Pitterie's head will roll in the sawdust
if you don't".

_No one could say a charming thing more gracefully than she, as_ "Your visit was like the blue kingfisher's flash across my pool". My Grandmother's address from which I wrote; Campagne Chene-Vert, Val des Lauriers, Aix-en-Provence, delighted her, and she added in a post-script: "I feel as if I had invented it for a novel, but it's far ahead of Oublie-sur-mer."

Plans that one sets one's heart upon so often never come about, and
_that_ perfect week _that_ Edith had planned for us is a precious possession which the hazards of life and time cannot destroy. It was the last time we were ever to see her, yet how many regrets are laid by those September days weaving into their stillness a hundred memories lit by the autumn gold over the Chantilly forest, the blue window of Chartres, or the fiery colours in her own garden; pictures of Edith laughing over nonsense, calling again "poisse! poisse!" or in her library suddenly serious, enthralling us with _her_ books, reminiscences and the manifold resources of her nimble wit. From _my_ pen and _her_ eyes everyday life one was liberated into a new world of possibility and wonder where the treasures of the ages were revealed by the magical touch of that spirit which was uniquely hers.

Kivienne de Chasteville

February 1938.

1.

When I heard that Edith Wharton was very ill, that
probably she was dying; when it was suggested that I should write
to her "because it would give her pleasure" I began to realise
how much I had irretrievably missed,

For since our first meeting over ten years ago, there
had existed between us a rather curious friendship which might
have developed into a great intimacy.

This friendship of ours had expressed itself for over
ten years chiefly on paper; often on half-sheets of paper. Some-
times I would send her a book; occasionally she wrote asking me a
question. Then there came a suggestion that I should go to Hyeres;
later I tried to lure her to North Wales. Only when she was dying
did I realise how much I valued her friendship and yet how seldom I
had seen her. To be exact, I met her and talked with her intimately,
on two occasions only.

The first time was at a dinner to which John Hugh Smith
had invited me saying: "I want you to meet Edith Wharton, you will
find her very intelligent," and then unluckily for my peace of mind
he had added, "but she doesn't really care for women."

On arriving at John Hugh's flat that evening, I
realised that Mrs Wharton and myself were the only women present:

2.

it was to be a party of four. I arrived a little late, (Or didn't I? She may have been staying in John Hugh's flat. Anyhow she was there when I arrived.) As I came into the room I saw an elderly woman, very well dressed, with a black velvet ribbon round her neck, whose face, I thought, was unusually square and impassive. We were introduced, I suppose we shook hands; all that I remember is that she then continued talking to the third guest while I observed her more closely.

For some reason that black velvet band round her neck made her look rather formidable. I began to anticipate with some dismay those inevitable moments later in the evening when she and I would be left to entertain each other.

Her dress, I then noticed, was quite perfect. Black satin. Elegant yet suitable. But the black velvet ribbon at the base of her neck continued to disconcert me. Then my eyes wandered downwards and I looked at her feet. What entrancing shoes she was wearing, exquisitely cut, with large sparkling buckles. And they covered such *very* pretty feet.

And then I became aware that the feet were jutting out just a little further than was necessary from beneath the hem of her dress.

3.

I took courage. The black velvet band was no longer so intimidating; the shoes delighted me.

I fancy that I can fix the exact moment when she first really liked me. It was during dinner that evening when something I said amused her. She looked up at me across the table and laughed, and as I looked back at her, I realised that we could be friends and I realised, too, how much I wanted her friendship.

Would it amuse you to hear the story that amused her? She and John Hugh had been discussing the quality of curiosity and, rather tentatively, I had intervened saying that the most inquisitive human being I knew was Antoine Bibesco. Then I went on to describe how, at a luncheon party, during a lull in the conversation, I had overheard Antoine saying to a clergyman's wife, "What! - you have been three times round the World and have only one child?!!" I can recall her chuckle as she agreed that only someone with the true gift of curiosity could have uttered that comment.

Later, after dinner, when we were alone, she suggested that she was probably the feminine counterpart of Antoine Bibesco, for she confessed to being deeply curious. I countered by saying that Virginia Woolf had a far greater curiosity,

4.

a mind that really delighted in hearing the most surprising and
unlikely facts, to which, I added, she invariably gave a sort
of symbolic twist peculiarly her own.

Edith didn't quite like that. Had Virginia really
a great curiosity, she queried; certainly Virginia had a very
imaginative mind, perhaps a very poetic mind, but was she fundament-
ally endowed with true curiosity? And what, continued Edith,
were the Sitwells really like; she admired Osbert's work very much;
and then, her own curiosity urging her on, she questioned me about
my children, asking what it was like to talk to a child, to talk
often, indeed every day, to a really young child?

If I had kept a diary I fancy I should have written
in it that night; "Dined with John Hugh Smith to meet Mrs Wharton.
Her curiosity about things and people exceeds even Virginia's.
She stimulates everyone. I want her for my friend."

- 5 -

elopement. Edith, to Anna's dismay, was interested and sympathetic to the evil-doers. "Surely", she said, "There must be compensations". Anna replied: "My friend, Mrs. Schwartz, has seen and experienced much of that kind of thing; she says that the pleasure has been much exaggerated."

Of course, there was Walter Berry.

But, however it came about, when I first knew her, Edith had an astonishing knowledge of English, French, German and Italian literature, a very real feeling for architecture and a considerable acquaintance with history, in such aspects as appeal to the writer of novels. And her knowledge was mature and competent. How mature it was one could see when she was talking to Henry James, or Bourget, or Schlumberger, or Gillet - I never saw her with the Abbé Brémond. Although she would say that women should not talk and had no other function in society than to "donner la réplique", such was not Edith's habit, and I had an impression of an equal talking to equals and that her judgments were received with respect.

But the first impression of any one who did not know that she was a distinguished artist would have been of an American aristocrat who was the complete mistress of civilized life. She had no remarkable artistic possessions, but her houses were charmingly arranged and her gardens were a delight; she told me that she thought her gardens better than her books.

She was, of course, a child of the 19th century, and it seems that, at one time, she had thought of Herbert Spencer as an emancipator. His influence had died down to nothing when I first met her, but she was still endlessly curious as to the results of contemporary science. Towards the end of her life, the Catholic Church became the object of increasing interest and admiration. When the first approach was made, I do not know - possibly through Bossuet and other French religious writers of the 17th century - I do not think it was due to any personal influence, although she knew the Abbé Mugnier and the Abbé Brémond. She felt that the

W.K.Richardson

84 State Street
Boston.

1

I have known Mrs. Wharton intimately since the days when she lived in Lenox. She had worked wonders there, having taken a rough piece of farm land and converted it into a beautiful and attractive estate. Her taste in landscape gardening was unerring, and was also shown at her palaces in St. Brice and Hyères. Indeed her love of flowers and trees was one of her outstanding qualities.

At Lenox she used to get up early and work all the morning, being accessible to her house-party at lunch and thereafter; and her husband at that period had charge of most of the housekeeping, and used to drive over to Pittsfield to do the household errands. He regarded her literary occupations with awe and admiration.

Another marked characteristic was her calm judgment in any unfortunate situation. I never saw her flurried. I had numerous letters from her at the time of certain serious difficulties about her husband, who was then living in America, and her judgment was entirely poised and equitable.

She was often regarded as cold, and it is a fact that she had not many friendships with women, thought she had a very warm regard for Mrs. Douglas Robinson and some others; but she was a very loyal and affectionate friend. I remember lunching with Walter Berry, after he had taken over her apartment in the Rue de Varennes, not very long before his death. She was the only other guest. Berry was in a very

2

trying mood, due no doubt to his illness, and her forbearance and
tact excited my admiration.

Another very striking characteristic was her sense of humour,
which was not adverse from Gallic wit. I remember going with her to
see "On Purge Bébé" at the Palais Royal, and we roared with laughter
at the comical situations. She could at times be very caustic with
stupid people, and there is a well authenticated story that when an
opulent woman friend, showing Mrs. Wharton over her gorgeous house,
said "This I call my Louis Quinze Room," Mrs. Wharton, looking through
her lorgnette, made an enemy for life by saying simply, "Why, my dear?"

I doubt whether she welcomed criticisms of her books, except
from Walter Berry or someone who was in some sense collaborating with
her. After receiving one of her books I wrote to her praising it in
general, but calling attention to a conflict between two dates as
stated, and one other minor slip. In her answer she never referred to
this. She also mildly resented my giving special praise to Ethan
Frome, though she was pleased by praise of "Summer," perhaps because
"Summer" was considered "unpleasant" at the time of its publication.

The last but not least of her characteristics was her extra-
ordinarily sound and ready judgment in literature and art; although I
used to think that she put Henry James on too high a pedestal. (She
insisted on my buying a complete set of his works as indispensable to
any well ordered library). Her reading was very wide, and her comments
on books very illuminating. In art she admired greatly the later
Italian painters, and I remember her vigorous exposition of the merits

3

of Tiepolo.

Many years ago I took her in my motor from Salso Maggiore to Milan; we stopped to visit the cathedral at Piacenza, which she had never seen before, and she immediately called my attention to beauties of proportion and design which had quite escaped my observation on previous visits.

She delighted in telling me of her discoveries in very small towns or obscure palaces, unknown to other travelers, and she had a healthy dislike of Baedeker. Her enthusiasm for traveling with sympathetic friends was very marked. In connection with a proposed cruise on the Mediterranean she wrote to me "I advise you to go if you possibly can, but not to go if your friends are worriers! A cruise is the nearest thing to heaven if everybody is jolly and care-free, otherwise----------!"

What do I not owe her in Treasures of memory, enchanting journeys,
meetings with interesting people, hospitality of every kind! For many
years when we were spending our winters abroad I would put in a happy
month of early spring at Ste Claire le Château, where I always found a
warm welcome, rest and refreshment for body and soul. Edith's mornings
were jealously guarded, she did her work in bed after an early break-
fast, and did not come downstairs till about 12.15 in time to take a
quick walk which was half a climb through the garden and see what was
happening there, before luncheon. She loved her flowers as other women
love their children, she was tireless in her care of them. The gardener
must be interviewed not once but several times a day, every plant was
kept in mind. One winter an unusually hard frost did cruel damage, kil-
ling fine old trees and rare plants it had taken many seasons to collect.
Edith was as Rachel weeping for her children, and would not be comforted.
She also loved her Pekinese, several of them were always in attendance
or being attended to; she liked their haughty imperial ways and was amused
by their rather horrid little characters. She did not like children. It
seems hardly fair to say this of her when she is no longer there to con-
tradict me. But I often said it to her face, and I know that if ever the
story of her life came to be written in the form of the lives of saints
in the second Nocturn we should be told that the devil frequently appea-
re do Edith Wharton in the shape of a little child, but he was never
able to deceive her as to his true nature, she was always well aware of
it and eschewed all contact with him. under this disguise. I have seen
her really frightened in the presence of children. To walk through a
group of poor little beggars, playing on the steps of a church she wished
to visit, was a test for her sight-seeing ardor. But let me add that she
did her duty nobly in taking care of innumerable war-orphans during and

Monsieur,

Vous me demandez quelques souvenirs sur notre regrettée
Mrs Wharton. Ce voeu répond à la pensée qui me suivait depuis sa
mort de donner sous une forme, qui ne se précisait pour moi, ma peti-
te pierre au monument que l'admiration et l'amitié élèverait à sa
mémoire.

Je n'ai pas été ce qu'on appelle en français une amie (intime))
de Mrs Wharton: nous avions dans la vie ordinaire assez peu de points
de contact, différentes d'origine, de religion, d'expériences, de modes
de vie, nous étions plutôt, de toutes manières, en contraste l'une avec
l'autre et notre intimité était faite de ce que nous devinions l'une
de l'autre plus que de ce que nous nous disions. J'aimais au reste
et simpliquement, de part et d'autre une mutuelle
compréhension
nous nous rencontrions surtout dans le beau jardin
de la vie de l'esprit, mettons qu'elle y cultivait des roses, d'espèce
rare et parfois exotiques et moi des violettes. Nous parlions ensem-
ble, indéfiniment, surtout des œuvres des autres, des jasmins, des or-
chidées de nos amis écrivains. Nous ne sommes guère sorties du beau
jardin. Au reste cette image lui va si bien! qui peut l'ayant seule-
ment un peu connue, évoquer son nom sans voir aussitôt cette perfec-
tion des beaux jardins.

J'ai connu Mrs Wharton tard, bien qu'il y ait de cela main-
tenant vingt ans: une circonstance singulière mais non rare, car j'en
ai vu plusieurs exemples, nous séparait. Nous étions, toutes deux, dans

2

des relations d'étroite amitié avec Paul Bourget et sa femme. De notre côté, l'affection entre les quatre membres de nos deux ménages: les Bourget et nous, avaient un caractère de simplicité et d'intimité fraternelles. Nulle palissade, nul appét, nous passions quelquefois plusieurs semaines ensemble, à la campagne ou à l'étranger, on se voyait à toute heure, on discutait sur tout, Bourget qui était la contradiction

même m'aimait beaucoup et me grondait de même sur toutes mes, m'etais pas dans la bouche une condamnation;

Les maris, camarades de college se tutoyaient, les épouses aussi comme font deux belles-soeurs qui en se mariant épousent la fraternité des maris.

Mais si nous parlons de jardins, il en était un, nullement secret, au contraire, mais réservé que nos amis Bourget se gardaient pour eux seuls, où l'on ne pouvait que regarder derrière la grille, c'était celui de quelques amitiés qui devaient rester leur possession absolument personnelle, par exemple les Barrès et Mrs Wharton.

Je dis que c'était un fait, curieux mais non rare, et qui au fond nous amusait tous. Quelquefois nous trichions et nous regardions, en riant, derrière la palissade. Nous savions que c'était défendu. Les Bourget n'avaient pas d'enfant, pas non plus autour d'eux de familles, et ils apportaient à quelques amitiés de première ligne cette exclusivité un peu jalouse que nous vouons inconsciemment ou non, à ceux "qui nous appartiennent". Enfin, pas de partage, plus ils aimaient leurs amis, moins ceux-ci devaient entre eux s'approcher et se connaître.

Par contre, ils se plaisaient à célébrer devant les uns les qualités, les charmes et les perfections des autres. Jamais il n'y

7

vous été chercher cela disait-elle?" "Mais, dans les contes de légendes, dans nos souvenirs d'écolières, dans nos propres drames de famille n'oubliez pas que nous avons toujours vécu en français, c'est bien autre chose que de le savoir, même en perfection." Nous étions d'accord pour trouver que l'anglais a un style particulier: dans le roman, généralement simple et familier, un autre très différent dans la poésie, un autre plus proche du français c'est à dire du latin, dans la dissertation ou l'art oratoire. Le roman, en particulier, la traduction du langage quotidien que tiennent des personnages ordinaires supportés des flous, des à peu près, des idiotismes qui seraient tout à fait en français. Si on traduit trop exactement, la langage ordinaire devient extraordinaire."

Nous prîmes une méthode qui amusait beaucoup Mrs Wharton; traduire une première fois, le livre en main, en suivant de près le texte; le résultat était parfois singulier même cocasse, ensuite fermer le livre anglais et récrire en oubliant qu'il y eut jamais eu un texte en cette langue. C'est alors seulement du français au français qu'on pouvait arriver, me semblait-il, à avoir vraiment du français.

Oui, délicieuses après-midges et soirées parfois, dans la bibliothèque grise, les tables basses couvertes des livres nouveaux, les aqua relles de fleurs aux murs, la porte grande ouverte sur le jardin, d'ou venaient de arômes de jasmin et de chèvre-feuille; dans les coupes, les grands pavots ou les delphiums bleus égrenaient grappes ou pétales, ou bien un grand lys blanc tout seul dans un cornet de cristal était là comme une présence. Alors au cours des longues heures où l'on s'ouï

9

"House of Mirth", j'apportais le passage à Edith Wharton, je vis son rapidement sursaut. "Ah, s'il me l'avait seulement dit de son vivant, dit-elle.

mais je n'avais pas de wordes de ce que je dis, car il était a mon ardeur nostalgieuse Sympathies inexprimées avait pour la faire souffrir. Le dirai-je, chez Edith Wharton, la perfection de l'élégance

la plus exigente et qui s'étendait à tout, des moindres détails du service, à l'assemblage des fleurs dans les parterres, même à la tenue des haies, des buissons, à l'ordonnance des arbres fruitiers dans le verger me causait quelquefois quand j'étais trop sensible, une impression de froid. On m'a permis, dans ces lignes, de parler très simplement et j'utilise comme on le voit de cette latitude. Chez les américains épris de notre civilisation, de nos élégances des siècles passés, il y a je lai souvent remarqué, quelque chose à quoi nous ne sommes pas préparés et qui passe pour nous la mesure, it is almost too much of a good thing. Dans un intérieur français, on surprendra presque toujours la pendule dénonciatrice du mauvais goût de la belle-mère ou la chaise de tapisserie souvenir touchant de 'bonne-maman'. Chez Mrs Wharton, la perfection esthétique de tout m'intimidait, il me semblait que si j'avais d'ap

mais de réussir, je crois, le lucide oeil gris l'aurait vu sans avoir l'air de le voir, même sans le vouloir. Laolkla société qui entourait Edith Wharton me sembla se composer surtout d'artistes d'écrivains, voyageurs diplomates, amis des lettres et des arts, français anglais ou américains toujours en petit nombre à la fois, sans la surchage que nous impose à nous autres, gens de chez nous, nos obligations de famille. Jamais ce qui s'appelle un dîner ou même ce qui dans la vie mondaine de Paris sévit à outrance, un "thé" où passent comme des météores cent cinquante personnes qui se demandent hâtivement comment elles se portent