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176 letter 60 To Emma Taylor Lamborn December 24, [1878] New York City, New York NY 329 E 15th Dec 24 Dear Emma When we heard at Stedman’s that Reid1 that very evening had heard almost fatal news of Bayard’s condition I wanted to write to some of you. I thought at least I might write to Charly,2 but I was told that it was best to keep anything concerning Bayard’s condition to ourselves. I see by your letter however that you must have felt as apprehensive as we were—but the news was a dreadful blow for all that, a surprise. It is impossible for me to realize that Bayard is dead3 and that I am alive. On first thought I felt that if you had been in Kennett4 I would have gone down at once, but now I do not believe that I could endure to be there at all. The knowledge that Bayard could never return would make ill. Of course editors came for Dick at once, he had five applications to write about him. The editor of the American Quarterly came on from Boston and would not take no for an answer. He wanted Dick to write an article upon B. as a man of letters, but Dick refused. Howells5 telegraphed for him to write a paper on his reminiscences of B.for the Atlantic which he is now doing and is perfectly absorbed in the work.6 You would be surprised to learn how many letters he has of Bayards, beginning as far back as the time when Mary Agnew7 was dying. Dick has it in his power to put to rest forever one lie about Bayard. Mr Bancroft8 came to me with tears in his eyes to see me, among other things he told me that now, there were people in Bayard’s own country who believed he had hastened Mary Agnew’s death by his neglect! Dick has the letter that B wrote him upon Lily’s birth,9 a beautiful letter, indeed all his letters are so excellent that I could almost wish that his private correspondence could be made public, in place of his published prose. 177 Marie is to be pitied because of the solitude which the loss of Bayard has thrown her into. Her family life was so much to her that she never felt the need of friends and friendships, and therefore never went out of her way to cultivate such. I hope now that Lily will be drawn into a closer companionship with her mother. It is a loss that must grow upon them with time for he was an almost perfect husband and father—and how faithful in his friendships! As much as I vexed him and hurt him in not being any longer able to keep him upon the intellectual pedestal I started with, I believe he never in his heart was indifferent to me. I was to blame greatly as I have always been for a want of charity and for taking upon myself to insist upon my friends being perfect as if I were perfect myself, instead of being carbuncled with faults and weakness. Well it is over between me and him for the present. I shall never cease to feel a vital interest in his memory. He was a good man, and Charly did not say a word too much in his favor. I wish you would write me when you hear from Marie. I wrote her more than two weeks ago, and have written her since, I wrote Annie10 a few lines several days ago, but have had no reply, it seems to me as if mother11 would break right down and die at once—do you remember those days of Fred’s funeral?12 You say Bayard was homesick, is it possible that homesickness was added to his other sufferings. The [illegible] day the news of his death came a cartoon of him appeared in the American Punch13 with him in bed drinking beer while the [polarized?] citizens were waiting for his help outside—it was very dastardly. A few weeks ago, my father was so indignant at the slings in the NE papers that he wrote a short defence of B’s character and published it in the Boston Post. I sent it to Bayard, but his eyes were closed in death before it reached Berlin. Lorry sent Christmas cards to your children to Colorado...

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