The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1834-1872, Vol II. eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 306 pages of information about The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1834-1872, Vol II..

The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1834-1872, Vol II. eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 306 pages of information about The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1834-1872, Vol II..

—­R.W.  Emerson

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* “The Bothie of Tober-na-Vuolich.”
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CXL.  Carlyle to Emerson

Chelsea, 19 April, 1849

My Dear Emerson,—­Today is American Postday; and by every rule and law,—­even if all laws but those of Cocker were abolished from this universe,—­a word from me is due to you!  Twice I have heard since I spoke last:  prompt response about the Philadelphia Bill; exact performance of your voluntary promise,—­Indian Corn itself is now here for a week past....

Still more interesting is the barrel of genuine Corn ears,—­ Indian Cobs of edible grain, from the Barn of Emerson himself!  It came all safe and right, according to your charitable program; without cost or trouble to us of any kind; not without curious interest and satisfaction!  The recipes contained in the precedent letter, duly weighed by the competent jury of housewives (at least by my own Wife and Lady Ashburton), were judged to be of decided promise, reasonable-looking every one of them; and now that the stuff itself is come, I am happy to assure you that it forms a new epoch for us all in the Maize department:  we find the grain sweet, among the sweetest, with a touch even of the taste of nuts in it, and profess with contrition that properly we have never tasted Indian Corn before.  Millers of due faculty (with millstones of iron) being scarce in the Cockney region, and even cooks liable to err, the Ashburtons have on their resources undertaken the brunt of the problem one of their own Surrey or Hampshire millers is to grind the stuff, and their own cook, a Frenchman commander of a whole squadron, is to undertake the dressing according to the rules.  Yesterday the Barrel went off to their country place in Surrey,—­ a small Bag of select ears being retained here, for our own private experimenting;—­and so by and by we shall see what comes of it.—­I on my side have already drawn up a fit proclamation of the excellences of this invaluable corn, and admonitions as to the benighted state of English eaters in regard to it;—­to appear in Fraser’s Magazine, or I know not where, very soon.  It is really a small contribution towards World-History, this small act of yours and ours:  there is no doubt to me, now that I taste the real grain, but all Europe will henceforth have to rely more and more upon your Western Valleys and this article.  How beautiful to think of lean tough Yankee settlers, tough as gutta-percha, with most occult unsubduable fire in their belly, steering over the Western Mountains, to annihilate the jungle, and bring bacon and corn out of it for the Posterity of Adam!  The Pigs in about a year eat up all the rattlesnakes for miles round:  a most judicious function on the part of the Pigs.  Behind the Pigs comes Jonathan with his all-conquering ploughshare,—­glory to him too!  Oh, if we were not a set of Cant-ridden

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The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1834-1872, Vol II. from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.