, and conscientious in every
department. She did a great deal of quiet, systematic thinking from
her early school days onward, and was never satisfied until she
completed the act of thought by expression and manifestation in some
way for the advantage of others. The last time I saw her, which was
for less than five minutes accorded me by her nurse during her last
illness, she spoke of a new plan of literary work which she had in
mind, and although she attempted no delineation of it, said she was
thinking it out whenever she felt that it was safe for her to think.
Her active brain never ceased its plans for others, for working toward
the illumination of the mind, the purification of the soul, and the
elevation and broadening of all the ideals of life. I remember her
sitting, absorbed in reflection, at the setting of the sun every
evening while we were at the House Beautiful of the Peabodys [We spent
nearly all our time at West Newton in a little cottage on the hill,
where Miss Elizabeth Peabody, with her saintly mother and father, made
a paradise of love and refinement and ideal culture for us, and where
we often met the Hawthornes and Manns; and we shall never be able to
measure the wealth of intangible mental and spiritual influence which
we received therefrom.] at West Newton; or, when at home, gazing
every night, before retiring, from her own house-top, standing at
her watchtower to commune with the starry heavens, and receive that
exaltation of spirit which is communicated when we yield ourselves to
the "essentially religious." (I use this phrase, because it delighted
her so when I repeated it to her as the saying of a child in looking
at the stars.)

No one ever felt a twinge of jealousy in Jane's easy supremacy; she
never made a fuss about it, although I think she had no mock
modesty in the matter. She accepted the situation which her uniform
correctness of judgment assured to her, while she always accorded
generous praise and deference to those who excelled her in departments
where she made no pretence of superiority.

There were some occasions when her idea of duty differed from a
conventional one, perhaps from that of some of her near friends; but
no one ever doubted her strict dealing with herself, or her singleness
of motive. She did not feel the need of turning to any other
conscience than her own for support or enlightenment, and was
inflexible and unwavering in any course she deemed right. She never
apo