the pioneer manual of its kind; and her “Recollections of Seventy Years” is an admirable record of a well-spent life. She was the friend of Miss Martineau and others of the ablest English women of her time; she readily saw the remarkable intellect of Margaret Fuller, and also perceived the defects of her training. She undertook to mould her externally, to make her less abrupt, less self-asserting, more comme il faut in ideas, manners, and even costume. She had her constantly at her own house, reformed her hairdresser, and instructed her dressmaker; took her to make calls, took her on journeys. Mrs. Farrar had, moreover, often with her a young kinswoman who furnished outwardly and inwardly a charming model, Miss Anna Barker, of New Orleans, now Mrs. S. G. Ward. This lady, whose gifts and graces have since won affectionate admiration in two continents, was soon a warm friend of Margaret Fuller; who had already another friend of similar attractions in Miss Harriet Fay, now Mrs. W. H. Greenough, then living in the very next house at Cambridgeport and for a time her inseparable companion. Dr. Holmes has once or twice referred to this last fair maiden in his writings as “the golden blonde,” and describes vividly in his “Cinders from the Ashes” the manner in which she won the hearts of all the school-boys.[1] One of her especial attractions was a head covered with sunny curls, the free gift of nature; and it
- ↑ Atlantic Monthly, xxiii. 116.
