“Mr. Greeley is a man of genuine excellence, honorable, benevolent, of an uncorrupted disposition, and, in his way, of even great abilities.”[1]
The breadth of her work in practical directions — the proof that she was now obtaining what she had always sought, a working-place for something beyond self-culture — is to be seen in the very titles of her papers in the “Tribune.” She wrote, Mr. Parton tells us, about three articles a week, these discussing such themes as “The Rich Man,” “The Poor Man,” “Woman in Poverty,” “What fits a Man to be a Voter?” “The Condition of the Blind,” “Prison Discipline,” “Appeal for an Asylum for discharged Female Convicts,” “Politeness to the Poor,” “Capital Punishment.” Then there are Meditations for special days, as Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year’s, St. Valentine’s Day, the Fourth of July, the first of August; these having always some practical bearing. Thus her St. Valentine’s Eve was passed at the Bloomingdale Asylum for the Insane, and she describes it. Mr. Greeley thus testifies in regard to this practical tendency of her work: —
“For every effort to limit vice, ignorance, and misery she had a ready, eager ear, and a willing hand; so that her charities — large in proportion to her slender means — were signally enhanced by the fitness and fullness of her wise and generous counsel, the readiness and emphasis with which she, publicly and privately, commended to those richer than herself any object de-
- ↑ Fuller MSS. i. 43.
