TEMPLE PLACE 21 



The following letter written by Elizabeth Gary to a 

 cousin, Dr. Samuel Cabot, while he was in Paris, to whom 

 gossip was reporting that she was engaged, shows her in a 

 gayer mood and gives an early glimpse of her life-long 

 passion for flowers and music. Little did she dream that 

 seventeen years later she would write to her mother the 

 letter given below on page 55, telling of her husband's 

 refusal of a professorship at the Jardin des Plantes, of 

 which she speaks here with such enthusiasm to her cousin. 



TO DR. SAMUEL CABOT 



Boston, March 21, 1840 



WELL, my dear Sam, and how do you find yourself, 

 set down, as you are, in the midst of the great metro- 

 polis of Europe? Have you learned to waltz yet? But 

 no, I fear that I must not hope that. Your disposition, 

 I think, was never quite volatile enough to enjoy the 

 whirling dance, thou', if you had lived in the time of 

 minuets, I doubt not you would have made a famous 

 dancer, when you could have paced slowly and grace- 

 fully across the room and made a low bow at a proper 

 distance from your partner, then gently taking the 

 tips of her fingers paced back amidst the admiring 

 gaze of the multitude. Ay, the minuet would have 

 been the dance for your sober legs (excuse me!) to 

 have joined in. 



Think of Edward's being engaged actually in 

 love! Shall I congratulate you or not? I hardly think 

 it a subject of congratulation to lose a brother, for 

 certainly it is losing a friend to a certain degree when 



