d writing, and at last "by dint of continual endeavor for
many weary weeks," the first volume was completed and submitted to his
friend Mill. The valuable manuscript was accidentally and ignorantly
destroyed by a servant, and Mill was in despair. Carlyle bore the loss
like a hero. He did not chide or repine. If his spirit sunk within him,
it was when he was alone in his library or in the society of his
sympathizing wife. He generously writes to Emerson,--

"I could not complain, or the poor man would have shot himself: we had
to gather ourselves together, and show a smooth front to it,--which
happily, though difficult, was not impossible to do. I began again at
the beginning, to such a wretched, paralyzing torpedo of a task as my
hand never found to do."

Mill made all the reparation possible. He gave his friend L200, but
Carlyle would accept only L100. Few men could have rewritten with any
heart that first volume: it would be almost impossible to revive
sufficient interest; the precious inspiration would have been wanting.
Yet Carlyle manfully accomplished his task, and I am inclined to think
that the second writing was better than the first; that he probably left
out what was unessential, and made a more condensed narrative,--a more
complete picture, for his memory was singularly retentive. I do not
believe that any man can do his best at the first heat. See how the
great poets revise and rewrite. Brougham rewrote his celebrated
peroration on the trial of Queen Caroline seventeen times. Carlyle had
to rewrite his book, but his materials remained; his great pictures were
all in his mind. In this second writing there may have been less
emotion,--less fire in his descriptions; but there was fire enough, for
his vivacity was excessive. Even _his_ work could be pruned, not by
others, but by himself. "The household at Chelsea was never closer drawn
together than in those times of trial." Carlyle lost time and spirits,
but he could afford the loss. The entire work was delayed, but was done
at last. The final sentence of Vol. III. was written at ten o'clock on a
damp evening, January 14, 1837.

This great work, the most ambitious and famous of all Carlyle's
writings, and in many respects his best, was not received by the public
with the enthusiam it ought to have awakened. It was not appreciated by
the people at large. "Ordinary readers were not enraptured by the Iliad
swiftness and vividness of the narrative, its sustained