202 CALVIN : 



our personality, and not make a ' mess ' of friend- 

 ship." He saw, with Emerson, the risk of de- 

 grading it to trivial conveniency. "Why insist 

 on rash personal relations with your friend ? " 

 " Leave this touching and clawing." Yet I would 

 not give an unfair notion of his aloofness, his 

 fine sense of the sacredness of the me and the 

 not-me. And, at the risk of not being believed, 

 I will relate an incident, which was often re- 

 peated. Calvin had the practice of passing a 

 portion of the night in the contemplation of its 

 beauties, and would come into our chamber over 

 the roof of the conservatory through the open 

 window, summer and winter, and go to sleep on 

 the foot of my bed. He would do this always 

 exactly in this way; he never was content to 

 stay in the chamber if we compelled him to go 

 upstairs and through the door. He had the ob- 

 stinacy of General Grant. But this is by the 

 way. In the morning, he performed his toilet 



