you of anything when you are
so busy and weary and bereaved. But yet in such a sad emergency as
this, I am sure your generous, kind heart will not refuse me any
help you can render.... I wish Dr. Holmes would feel his pulse; I do
not know how to judge of it, but it seems to me irregular."

His friend, Dr. O.W. Holmes, in compliance with Mrs. Hawthorne's desire,
expressed in this letter to me, saw the invalid, and thus describes his
appearance in an article full of tenderness and feeling which was
published in the "Atlantic Monthly" for July, 1864:--

"Late in the afternoon of the day before he left Boston on his last
journey I called upon him at the hotel where he was staying. He had
gone out but a moment before. Looking along the street, I saw a form
at some distance in advance which could only be his,--but how
changed from his former port and figure! There was no mistaking the
long iron-gray locks, the carriage of the head, and the general look
of the natural outlines and movement; but he seemed to have shrunken
in all his dimensions, and faltered along with an uncertain, feeble
step, as if every movement were an effort. I joined him, and we
walked together half an hour, during which time I learned so much
of his state of mind and body as could be got at without worrying
him with suggestive questions,--my object being to form an opinion
of his condition, as I had been requested to do, and to give him
some hints that might be useful to him on his journey.

"His aspect, medically considered, was very unfavorable. There were
persistent local symptoms, referred especially to the
stomach,--'boring pain,' distension, difficult digestion, with great
wasting of flesh and strength. He was very gentle, very willing to
answer questions, very docile to such counsel as I offered him, but
evidently had no hope of recovering his health. He spoke as if his
work were done, and he should write no more.

"With all his obvious depression, there was no failing noticeable in
his conversational powers. There was the same backwardness and
hesitancy which in his best days it was hard for him to overcome, so
that talking with him was almost like love-making, and his shy,
beautiful soul had to be wooed from its bashful prudency like an
unschooled maiden. The calm despondency with which he spoke about
himself confir