MY DEAR KENNEDY : [To John P. Kennedy.] SUNNYSIDE, October 5, 1854. Your letter has remained too long unanswered; but I find it impossible to be regular and prompt in correspondence, though with the best intentions and constant efforts to that effect. I condole with you sincerely on the loss of your mother, for, from my own experience, it is one of the losses which sink deepest in the heart. It is upward of thirty years since I lost mine, then at an advanced age: yet I dream of her to this day, and wake up with tears on my cheeks. I think the advanced age at which she died endears her memory to me, and gives more tenderness and sadness to the recollection of her. Yet, after all, a calm and painless death, closing a long and well-spent life, is not a thing in itself to be lamented; and, from your own account, your mother's life was happy to the end; for she was, you say, "well conditioned in mind and body," and one of her last employments was to perform for her grandchildren on the piano. . What a blessing it is to have this feeling for music, which attended your mother to the last! It is indeed a sweetener of life, and a fountain of youth for old age to bathe in and refresh itself. MY DEAR KENNEDY : [To Mr. J. P Kennedy.] SUNNYSIDE, November 22, 1854. Your last letter was in cheerful contrast to those which preceded it. I had heard, in a circuitous way, of Mrs. Kennedy's illness, and was about to write to you on the subject, when I received from you the intelligence that she had routed the enemy; was "gathering strength with her accustomed energy of action;" walked, rode, and ate with a determination to be as well as ever; and that you hoped she would even be better than ever. I rejoice in your bulletin, and trust that she and her allies, the doctor and quinine, will be more prompt and complete in their triumph than the allied powers in the Crimea, with whom you have compared them. I am glad to find, also, that Mr. Gray continues to falsify his predictions, and to grow fat and hearty in spite of himself. I trust Nature will continue to make him a false prophet in this respect; she is very apt to surprise valetudinarians with a latent fund of longevity of which they had no conception. I think, if he were to take a jaunt to New York, and hear Grisi and Mario through their principal characters, it would be like a dip in the fountain of youth to him. I have had some delicious treats since their arrival in New York. I think Grisi's singing and acting would be just to Mr. Gray's taste. There is a freshness and beauty about her, in voice and person, that seem to bid defiance to time. I wish Mr. Gray could see her in "Semiramide," and in "Rosina" ("Barber of Seville"), which exhibits her powers in the grand and the comic. I had always seen her in the former, and considered her a magnificent being. It was only lately, on my last visit to town, that I saw her in comedy, when she played "Rosina" twice, and surprised me by the truthfulness with which she could assume the girl, and the unforced whim and humor with which she could illustrate all her caprices. But, to perceive her thorough excellence in this part, one must be able to discern every play of her countenance, and especially of her eye. Her acting, like all great achievements of art, is worthy of especial examination. It is a perfect study. Like all great achievements of art, it is delightful from its simplicity. The "Semiramide" and the "Barber of Seville," as now performed in New York, are worthy of a winter's journey from Baltimore. Just before I left town there was a semi-centennial anniversary of the New York Historical Society. Indeed, I stayed in town to be present at it; but, when the time arrived, my incorrigible propensity to flinch from all public ceremonials and festivals came over me. I mingled in the crowd, and heard Bancroft's erudite address from the "auditorium," but kept clear of the banquet which took place afterwards. Among the dignitaries and invited guests on the stage, I saw our friend Winthrop, who, I find by the papers, made an eloquent speech at the banquet. This I regret not to have heard. I have never heard him speak in public, but have heard much of his talent for public speaking; and I think, from what I have seen of him, he would be apt to acquit himself well and gracefully. With affectionate remembrances to Mr. G--, Miss G (much) better half, Yours, my dear Kennedy, very truly, and your WASHINGTON IRVING. MY DEAR SARAH : [To Mrs. Storrow, at Paris.] SUNNYSIDE, November 23, 1854. Your last letter has taken me over many scenes of former travel, and brought up delightful recollections. Switzerland, the Rhine, and the southern parts of Germany bordering on the Tyrol, with the quaint old towns and cities, Baden-Baden, Strasburg, Ulm, Augsburg, Salzburg, etc., etc. Did you, when at Baden-Baden, visit those awful chambers, or dungeons, under the old castle, one of the seats of the "Vehm Gericht," or Secret Tribunal-that mysterious and tremendous association that once held such sway over Germany? I do not know whether they are generally shown to strangers; but, having read a great deal on the subject of that secret institution, I sought them out, and visited them with thrilling interest. You say you found my name written in the visitors' book at Augsburg, thirty-two years since. Had there been a visitors' book at Zurich of sufficiently ancient date, you might have met my name written forty-nine years since, as I made a visit to it in 1805, in the course of my first European tour; and well do I recollect how much I was charmed with it, and how willingly I would have lingered there. You do not say whether, when at Salzburg, you visited the famous salt mine, and made a subterranean excursion. I presume you did not, as you would have found it rather "awsome," as the Scotch say, though I was very much interested by it. Salzburg and its vicinity struck me as a very region for legendary romance. I presume you recollect the Unters burg, or Wanderburg, a few miles from Salzburg; within which, according to popular tale, the Emperor Charles sits in state, with golden crown on his head and scepter in his hand. In the interior of the same mountain are palaces, and churches, and convents, and gardens, and untold treasures, guarded by dwarfs, who sometimes wander, at midnight, into Salzburg, to say their prayers in the cathedral. No doubt Kate has come across all this in the course of her German studies, and was able to put you on the track of these wonders. Before the breaking out of any war, the Emperor Charles issues out of the mountain with all his array, and marches round it with great blast and bray of trumpet, and then returns into his subterranean palace. I wish you could have seen a procession of the kind. It would have surpassed all the state of the mongrel emperors and empresses in whom you delight. Give my love to the princesses, who, I understand, are growing in grace as in years. You are devoting yourself to their education. Do not attempt to make remarkable women of them. Let them acquire those accomplishments which enliven and sweeten home, but do not seek to fit them to shine in fashionable society. Keep them as natural, simple, and unpretending as possible; cultivate in them noble and elevated sentiments, and, above all, the feeling of veneration, so apt to be deadened, if not lost, in the gay, sensuous world by which they are surrounded. They live in the midst of spectacle; everything around them is addressed to the senses. The society with which they mingle is all of a transient kind-travelling Americans, restless seekers after novelty and excitement. All this you must bear in mind, and counteract as much as possible, by nurturing home feelings and affections, habits of thought and quiet devotion, and a reverence for grand, and noble, and solemn, and sacred things. Give my kindest remembrances to your husband, and believe me, my dear Sarah, ever your affectionate uncle, WASHINGTON IRVING. CHAPTER XX. A NEW-YEAR SALUTATION.-PUBLICATION OF WOLFERT'S ROOST.-EXTRACT FROM SOME OF THE NOTICES.-ANECDOTE RESPECTING MOUNTJOY.-PUB66 LICATION OF VOL. I. OF THE LIFE OF WASHINGTON."-AN EQUESTRIAN OVERTHROW.-LETTER TO JOHN P. KENNEDY.-LETTER FROM BANCROFT ON PRESS.-REPLY MOSES THOMAS.-LETTER TO JAMES K. PAULDING. HE new year finds Mr. Irving again at Cassilis, in the valley of the Shenandoah, where he had gone to attend a wedding of a niece of Mr. Kennedy. A letter to one of the inmates of his little home, dated January 1st, opens with this characteristic salutation from the country seat where the nuptuals were to be celebrated: "My dear Kate, a happy New Year to you, and all the family. So there, I've caught you all." There was generally a strife, at Sunnyside, who should be first to bid "Happy New Year." Soon after his return, the volume entitled "Wolfert's Roost" was issued from the press. This work derives. its title from what was the first name given by the author to his residence at Sunnyside-the Roost (or Rest) of |