II.
CONVERSATION. — SOCIAL INTERCOURSE.
“Be thou what thou singly art, and personate only thyself. Swim smoothly in the stream of thy nature, and live but one man.”
“Ah, how mournful look in letters
Black on white, the words to me,
Which from lips of thine cast fetters
Round the heart, or set it free.”
Goethe, translated by J. S. Dwight.
“Zu erfinden, zu beschliessen,
Bleibe, Kunstler, oft allein;
Deines Wirkes zu geniessen
Eile freudig zum Verein,
Hier im Ganzen schau erfahre
Deines eignes Lebenslauf,
Und die Thaten mancher Jahre
Gehn dir in dem Nachbar auf.”
Goethe, Artist’s Song.
When I first knew Margaret, she was much in society,
but in a circle of her own,—of friends whom she
had drawn around her, and whom she entertained and
delighted by her exuberant talent. Of those belonging
to this circle, let me recall a few characters.
The young girls whom Margaret had attracted were very different from herself, and from each other. From Boston, Charlestown, Roxbury, Brookline, they came to her, and the little circle of companions would meet now
