THOMAS CARLYLE. 397 



welcome him, but he chose to lie down among his own, 

 in the humble burial-ground of Ecclefechan, where 

 many a reverent pilgrim of the future will look upon 

 his grave. Since his death we have had misjudgment 

 and misapprehension manifold regarding him and his ; 

 but these are essentially evanescent, and I therefore pass 

 them by with a simple comparison to mark their value. 

 In Switzerland I live in the immediate presence of a 

 mountain, noble alike in form and mass. A bucket or 

 two of water, whipped into a cloud, can obscure, if not 

 efface, that lordly peak. You would almost say that 

 no peak could be there. But the cloud passes away, 

 and the mountain, in its solid grandeur, remains. 

 Thus, when all temporary dust is laid, will stand out, 

 erect and clear, the massive figure of Carlyle. 



It now becomes my duty to unveil and present to 

 the British public, and to the strangers within our gates 

 who can appreciate greatness, the statue of a great man. 

 Might I append to these brief remarks the expression of 

 a wish, personal perhaps in its warmth, but more than 

 persona] in its aim, that somewhere upon this Thames 

 Embankment could be raised a companion memorial 

 to a man who loved our hero, and was by him beloved 

 to the end ? I refer to the loftiest, purest, and most 

 penetrating spirit that has ever shone in American 

 literature — to Ralph Waldo Emerson, the life-long friend 

 of Thomas Carlyle. 



