354 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF 



evening, while we stood before the drawing-room fire, I 

 spoke to him of Emerson. There was something lofty 

 in the tone of Carlyle's own voice as he spoke of the 

 ' loftiness ' of his great American friend. 1 I mentioned 

 Lewes's life of Goethe, which I had been just reading, 

 and ventured to express a doubt whether Lewes, as a 

 man, was strong enough to grapple with his subject. 

 He was disposed to commend the Life as the best we 

 had, but he was far from regarding it as adequate. 

 Carlyle was a bold rider, and during this visit to the 

 Grange he indulged in some wild galloping. Professor 

 Hofmann was his companion, and he humorously de- 

 scribed their motion as tantamount to being shot like 

 a projectile through space. Brookfield was one of the 

 guests, a clergyman of grace and culture, who might 

 have been a great actor, and who entertained a high 

 notion of the actor's vocation. One evening he gave us 

 an illustration of his dramatic gifts extemporising, and 

 drawing by oblique references, the principal person- 

 ages round him into his performance. It was then I 

 first heard the resonant laugh of Carlyle. Himself a 

 humourist on a high plane, he keenly enjoyed humour 

 in others. Lady Ashburton, with fine voice and ex 

 pression,- read for us one of Browning's poems. It was 

 obvious from his ejaculatory remarks that Carlyle 

 enjoyed and admired Browning. 



As time went on I drew more closely to Carlyle, 



1 Their friendship continued unimpaired to the end. Not long 

 before Carlyle's death, I noticed two volumes of the same shape and 

 binding on the table of his sitting-room. Opening one of them, I 

 found written on the fly-leaf : 



1 To Thomas Carlyle 



' with unchangeable affection 



' from Ralph Waldo Emerson.' 



The two volumes were Emerson's own collected works. ' That,' I 

 said, 'is as it ought to be : you and Emerson must remain friends to 

 the last.' 'Aye,' he responded, 'you are quite right; take the 

 volumes with you, but return them punctually ': which I did. 



