aid to have managed with great skill and charm, after
which she invited others to join in the discussion. Mr. Emerson tells
us that the apparent sumptuousness in her attire was imaginary, the
"effect of a general impression made by her genius and mistakenly
attributed to some external elegance; for," he says, "I have been told
by her most intimate friend, who knew every particular of her conduct
at the time, that there was nothing of especial expense or splendor in
her toilette."

Mr. Emerson knew a lady "of eminent powers, previously by no means
partial to Margaret," who said, on leaving one of these assemblies, "I
never heard, read of, or imagined a conversation at all equal to this
we have now heard." Many testimonies have been brought together, in
the "Memoirs," of the enthusiasm and admiration created by Margaret in
these Conversations. They were probably her most brilliant
achievements, though, in the nature of the case, nothing survives of
them but the echo in these recorded memories of participants.

Mr. Emerson says that "the fame of these conversations" led to a
proposal that Margaret should undertake an evening class to which
gentlemen should be admitted and that he himself had the pleasure of
"assisting at one--the second--of these soirees." Margaret "spoke
well--she could not otherwise,--but I remember that she seemed
encumbered, or interrupted, by the headiness or incapacity of the
men." A lady who attended the entire series, a "true hand," he says,
reports that "all that depended on others entirely failed" and that
"even in the point of erudition, which Margaret did not profess on the
subject, she proved the best informed of the party." This testimony is
worth something in answer to the charge that Margaret's scholarship
was fictitious, that she had a smattering of many things, but knew
nothing thoroughly. She seems to have compared well with others, some
of whom were considered scholars. "Take her as a whole," said Mr.
Emerson's informant, "she has the most to bestow on others by
conversation of any person I have ever known."

For these services, Margaret seems to have received liberal
compensation, though all was so cordial that she says she never had
the feeling of being "a paid Corinne." For the conversations with
ladies and gentlemen, according to Mrs. Dall who has published her
notes of them, the tickets were $20 each, for the series of ten
evenings.

It appears from his account that Mr. Emerso