University of Virginia Library

III.

FOR the second time she was to encounter a wholly new intellectual experience after adopting a new abode. The literary development, which had begun somewhat late, was to be merged into a moral enthusiasm, beginning still later. She wrote to an intimate friend (January 17, 1880):

In this same letter she announces her intention of going to work for three months at the Astor Library on her "Century of Dishonor"; and it is worth noticing that with all her enthusiasm she does not disregard that careful literary execution which is to be the means to her end; for in the same letter she writes to this friend, one of her earliest critics: "I shall never write a sentence, so long as I live, without studying it over from the stand-point of whether you would think it could be bettered." This shows that she did not, as some have supposed, grow neglectful of literature in the interest of reform; as if a carpenter were supposed to neglect his tools in order to finish his job.

Her especial interest in the Indians was not the instantaneous result of her Colorado life, but the travels and observations of those first years were doubtless preparing the way for it. It came to a crisis in 1879, when she heard the Indians "Standing Bear" and "Bright Eyes" lecture in Boston on the wrongs of the Poncas, and afterwards met them in New York, at the house of her friend Mrs. Botta. Her immediate sympathy for them seemed very natural to those who knew her, but it was hardly foreseen how strong and engrossing that interest would become. Henceforth she subordinated literature not to an ulterior aim merely, for that she had often done before, but to a single aim. It must be remembered, in illustration of this, that at least half the papers in her "Bits of Talk" were written with a distinct moral purpose, and so were many of her poems; and from this part of her work she had always great enjoyment. So ready were her sympathies that she read with insatiable pleasure the letters that often came to her from lonely women or anxious school-girls who had found help in her simple domestic or religious poems, while her depths of passion would only have frightened them, and they would have listened bewildered to those sonnets which Emerson carried in his pocket-book and pulled out to show his friends. No, there was always a portion of her literature itself which had as essentially a moral motive as had "Ramona"; and, besides, she had always been ready to throw aside her writing and devote whole days, in her impulsive way, to some generous task. For instance, she once, at the risk of great unpopularity, invoked the aid of the city solicitor and half the physicians in Newport to investigate the case of a poor boy who was being, as she believed, starved to death, and whom the investigation came too late to save.

Nor was the Indian question the first reform that had set her thinking, although she was by temperament fastidious, and therefore conservative. On the great slavery question she had always, I suspect, taken regular army views; she liked to have colored people about

her as servants, but was disposed to resent anything like equality; yet she went with me to a jubilee meeting of the colored people of Newport, after emancipation, and came away full of enthusiasm and sympathy, with much contrition as to things she had previously said and done. She demurred at her Newport hostess's receiving a highly educated young quadroon lady as a temporary boarder in the house, but when the matter was finally compromised by her coming to tea, Mrs. Hunt lavished kindnesses upon her, invited her to her private parlor, and won her heart. The same mixture of prejudice and generosity marked her course in matters relating to the advancement of her own sex. Professedly abhorring woman suffrage, she went with me to a convention on that subject in New York, under express contract to write a satirical report in a leading newspaper; but was so instantly won over — as many another has been — by the sweet voice of Lucy Stone, that she defaulted as a correspondent, saying to me, "Do you suppose I ever could write against anything which that woman wishes to have done?" Afterwards she hospitably entertained the same lecturer when on the canvass in Colorado; and a few months before her death she gave an English advocate of the cause a letter to one of her Eastern friends, saying that her old prejudices were somewhat shaken. A California friend states, indeed, that she sometimes felt moved to write something on the legal and other disabilities of women.

But if other reforms had touched her a little, they had never controlled or held her, until the especial interest in the Poncas arose. After that she took up work in earnest, studied the facts, corresponded with statesmen, and finally wrote her "Century of Dishonor," as has been said. Over this she fairly worked herself sick, and was forced to go to Norway for refreshment with her friends the Horsfords, leaving the proof-reading to be done by a literary ally. Several charming memorials of this trip appeared in the magazines. She afterwards received an appointment from the United States Government to report on the condition and needs of the California "Mission Indians," in connection with Abbott Kinney, Esq.; and she visited all or most of those tribes for this purpose, in the spring of 1883. The report of the commissioners, which is understood to have been mainly prepared by her, is as clear, as full, and as sensible as if it had been written by the most prosaic of mankind. She also explored the history of the early Spanish missions, whose story of enthusiasm and picturesqueness won her heart; and she wrote the series of papers in regard to these missions which appeared in this magazine.

During this whole period, moreover, she did not neglect her earlier productions, but gathered them into volumes; publishing "Bits of Talk for Young Folks" (1876) and "Bits of Travel at Home" (1878). She also issued separately (1879) a single poem, "The Story of Boon." This was founded on a tale told in "The English Governess at the Siamese Court," by Mrs. A. H. Leonowens, a lady whose enthusiasm and eloquence found ardent sympathy in Mrs. Hunt, who for her sake laid down her strong hostility to women's appearance on the platform, and zealously organized two lectures for her friend. She published also a little book of her mother's, "Letters from a Cat" (1880), and followed it up by "Mammy Tittleback's Stories" (1881), of her own; and "The Hunter of Cats of Connorloa" (1884). Another book, for rather older children, was "Nelly's Silver Mine" (1878), and she wrote a little book called "The Training of Children" (1882). Then came "Ramona," first published in the "Christian Union" in 1884, appearing there because it had been written, as it were, at a white heat, and she could not wait for the longer delays of a magazine. It was issued in book form that same year, and completes the list of her acknowledged works. It was no secret, however, that she wrote, in the "No Name" series, "Mercy Philbrick's Choice" (1876) and "Hetty's Strange History" (1877). Into the question of other works that may have been rightly or wrongly attributed to her, the present writer does not propose to enter.

The sad story of her last illness need not here be recapitulated. She seemed the victim of a series of misfortunes, beginning with the long confinement incident to a severe fracture of the leg in June, 1884, this being followed by her transfer to a malarious residence in California, and at last by the discovery of a concealed cancerous affection that had baffled her physicians and herself. During all this period — much of it spent alone, with only a hired attendant, far from all old friends, though she was cheered by the constant kindness of newer ones — her sunny elasticity never failed; and within a fortnight of her death she wrote long letters, in a clear and vigorous hand, expressing only cheerful hopes for the future, whether she should live or die. One of the last of these was to President Cleveland, to thank him for sustaining the rights of the Indians. Her husband, who had been imperatively detained in Colorado by important business, was with her at the last, and she passed away quietly but unconsciously, on the afternoon of August 12, 1885. A temporary interment took place in San Francisco, the services being performed by the Rev. Horatio Stebbins, who read, very appropriately, the "Last

Words," with which her little volume of verses ends. It was the precise memorial she would have desired; and the burial-place assigned to her was also in accordance with her own expressed wishes — it being a spot near the summit of the Cheyenne Mountains, about four miles from Colorado Springs.