gossip behind him. His wife had died some sixteen years before,
leaving a brilliant memory. The books of Mr. Froude seemed for a moment
to have desecrated the grave, and to have shed a sudden and sinister
light upon those who could not make the least defense for themselves.

For a moment, Carlyle seemed to have been a monster of harshness,
cruelty, and almost brutish feeling. On the other side, his wife took
on the color of an evil-speaking, evil-thinking shrew, who tormented the
life of her husband, and allowed herself to be possessed by some demon
of unrest and discontent, such as few women of her station are ever
known to suffer from.

Nor was it merely that the two were apparently ill-mated and unhappy
with each other. There were hints and innuendos which looked toward some
hidden cause for this unhappiness, and which aroused the curiosity of
every one. That they might be clearer, Froude afterward wrote a book,
bringing out more plainly--indeed, too plainly--his explanation of the
Carlyle family skeleton. A multitude of documents then came from every
quarter, and from almost every one who had known either of the Carlyles.
Perhaps the result to-day has been more injurious to Froude than to the
two Carlyles.

Many persons unjustly speak of Froude as having violated the confidence
of his friends in publishing the letters of Mr. and Mrs. Carlyle. They
take no heed of the fact that in doing this he was obeying Carlyle's
express wishes, left behind in writing, and often urged on Froude while
Carlyle was still alive. Whether or not Froude ought to have accepted
such a trust, one may perhaps hesitate to decide. That he did so is
probably because he felt that if he refused, Carlyle might commit the
same duty to another, who would discharge it with less delicacy and less
discretion.

As it is, the blame, if it rests upon any one, should rest upon Carlyle.
He collected the letters. He wrote the lines which burn and scorch with
self-reproach. It is he who pressed upon the reluctant Froude the duty
of printing and publishing a series of documents which, for the most
part, should never have been published at all, and which have done equal
harm to Carlyle, to his wife, and to Froude himself.

Now that everything has been written that is likely to be written by
those claiming to possess personal knowledge of the subject, let us
take up the volumes, and likewise the scattered fragments, and seek to
penetrate the mystery of the