to the ground. For a day I thought it must make a difference, but it has served only to increase my admiration for Mr. Greeley’s smiling courage. He has really a strong character.’
On the other side, Mr. Greeley thus records his
recollections of his friend: —
“My first acquaintance with Margaret Fuller was
made through the pages of ‘The Dial’ ‘The lofty
range and rare ability of that work, and its un-American
richness of culture and ripeness of thought, naturally
filled the ‘fit audience, though few,’ with a high
estimate of those who were known as its conductors
and principal writers. Yet I do not now remember
that any article, which strongly impressed me, was
recognized as from the pen of its female editor, prior to
the appearance of ‘The Great Lawsuit,’ afterwards
matured into the volume more distinctively, yet not
quite accurately, entitled ‘Woman in the Nineteenth
Century.’ I think this can hardly have failed to make
a deep impression on the mind of every thoughtful
reader, as the production of an original, vigorous, and
earnest mind. ‘Summer on the Lakes,’ which appeared
some time after that essay, though before its expansion
into a book, struck me as less ambitious in its aim, bat
more graceful and delicate in its execution; and as one
of the clearest and most graphic delineations, ever given,
of the Great Lakes, of the Prairies, and of the receding
barbarism, and the rapidly advancing, but rude, repulsive
semi-civilization, which were contending with most
unequal forces for the possession of those rich lands. I
still consider ‘Summer on the Lakes’ unequalled,
