[Boston—Saturday, 17 March 1866]
March 17. 1866. Spring is here. Yesterday I heard the robins, the day was damp and warm with April like showers.
Went to call on the Howells—found them in their little new rooms very comfortable and happy, their baby was asleep in her crib with her father’s slippers for her companions and pets, her pretty light curling hair was tossing over the bed. Her mother put her hands through it wonderingly, saying I don’t know where this comes from, yet her own hair is about the same shade and pretty too only she could not see the analogy, a child must always be a wonder, a light descended, a changing glory to its parents.
At night went to tea in Brookline with William Greene his wife and children. The Colonel has been editing “Job” and printing at his own expense. He looks like the eremite he is, with grey hair parted on the forehead. She could have been a brilliant woman of society perhaps under other conditions now however she devotes herself to her husband and man[a]ges pour se distraire and to please him with fine tact. Bessie studies Hebrew music and philosophizes between the letters and notes, the son is a rover, bent on the sea, performing tricks and I fear will soon fly away from the nest.
Last Monday ev’g. The Aldrichs.
Last Tuesday ev’g. Mr & Mrs Spofford & Mr & Mrs Howells.
Last Wednesday ev’g. Dined out. Dante Club after & Music at Mrs Huntington’s.
Last Thursday ev’g. Home. H O M E.
Last Friday ev’g. Mrs Greene’s Brookline.
Last Saturday ev’g. H O M E. Clear lovely day, west wind cool. “Constant practice,” says John Mitford, in his life of Dryden, “quickens the power of the intellect, awakens the slumbering associations of the fancy, gives to the taste and judgment an instantaneous selection and to the hand a surprising facility of execution.”
