nently. Prose is the inferior
medium when a great utterance is addressed to men, it is the singer
pre-eminently who holds our hearts and lives forever. But Emerson
chose to be what he was and we are thankful for him. Many were vexed
with Matthew Arnold whom we thought depreciatory, but I find no fault
with his summing up of Emerson, "as the friend of all those who seek
to live in the spirit." His prose and poetry are a precious possession
and we should be grateful for both, and for him. But my purpose here
as always is not to criticise but only to touch the light outside
things, pausing at the edge of profundities.

I knew Emerson when I was a child and I also knew him when I was well
advanced in years at a time when, of course, he was close upon his
end. His old age was pathetic. As often happens his memory failed
while his other faculties were strong and the embarrassment of the
thinker aroused sadness in those who came near him as the trusty
servant fell short, though the mind in general was active. Emerson
felt that I had put him under some obligation by giving him the
first portrait he had ever seen of his faithful German disciple and
translator Hermann Grimm. Perhaps that helped the welcome with which I
was received when I went to see him not far from the end.

I had as a fellow-guest a man who had long been intimate with him and
whom he was very glad to see; talking after tea in the library Emerson
said, "I want to tell you about a friend in Germany, his name I cannot
remember," and he moved to and fro uneasily, in his effort to recall
it. "This friend with whom we have taken tea to-night, whose name also
I cannot remember," here again came a distressed look at the failure
of his faculty, "I cannot remember his name either, but he can tell
you of this German friend whose name I have also forgotten." It was a
sorrow to see the breaking down of a great spirit and his agitation as
he was conscious of his waning power. And yet so far as I could see,
it was only the memory that was going; the intellectual strength was
still apparent and the amiability of his spirit was perhaps even
more manifest than in the years when he was in the full possession of
himself. This came out in little things; he was over-anxious at the
table lest the hospitality should come short, troubled about the
supply of butter and apple-sauce, and soon after I saw him on his
knees on the hearth taking care that the fire should catch the wood to