victory every where certain, could in any
wise overcome.

The feeling that existed on her part was of circumstances only,
influenced by strong parental predilection, and the desire which so
often obtains in the heart of a true woman--that of soothing the love
she cannot return, resolving itself at length into pity.

We might here also dwell upon the idiosyncrasies of genius as applicable
to her case, which are generally banned, of whatever character they may
be, and evermore shut out all sympathy, till, in despair or despite,
folly is made crime. But since sin must ever be arraigned for itself,
and error is prone to plead for mercy, I leave no word here that can be
misconstrued or misapplied. Certain it is that Elizabeth Whitman was
marked as one of strangely fluctuating moods, as the truly gifted ever
are, and of a wild, incomprehensible nature, little understood by those
who should have known her best, and with whom she was most intimate.
Over this, in tracing her history, it were well to pause, were it not
that thus we might give countenance to this prominent fact of modern
days, that the eccentricities of genius are often substituted for genius
itself, or are made its prime characteristics, as the gold of the
jeweller is recommended for its beauty and strength in proportion to its
alloy.

However much we may regret the waywardness of such a heart in the
present instance, in that it rejected one so nobly qualified as was Mr.
Buckminster to appreciate its genius and its love, while sympathizing
with his own mortifying disappointment, (for this we must admit,) that
she had in the secrets of her nature a preference for another, we cannot
altogether know its results. So cautiously and discreetly did he,
through a long and beautiful life, qualify both his lips and his pen,
that little or nothing remains beyond these letters of the
novelist--which we may not doubt are authentic, as they were long in the
possession of Mrs. Henry Hill, of Boston, the "Mrs. Sumner" of the
novel--to tell how the heart was instructed, and how blighted hope and
blasted affection were made the lobes through which the spirit caught
its sublimest and holiest respiration. We know

"Through lacerations takes the spirit wing,
And in the heart's long death throe grasps true life."

One little remark which has been suffered to creep into his Memoirs is,
however, of peculiar significance. I quote it here.

In speaking of Connecticut to a frien