lf made
up for everything by the tremendous stories he used to tell about the
South Sea Islands and the whale fishery. Normally he was not a man of
noticeable appearance; but when the narrative inspiration was on him, he
looked like all the things he was describing--savages, sea-captains, the
lovely Fayaway in her canoe, or the terrible Moby Dick himself. There
was vivid genius in this man, and he was the strangest being that ever
came into our circle. Through all his wild and reckless adventures,
of which a small part only got into his fascinating books, he had been
unable to rid himself of a Puritan conscience; he afterwards tried to
loosen its grip by studying German metaphysics, but in vain. He was
restless and disposed to dark hours, and there is reason to suspect
that there was in him a vein of insanity. His later writings were
incomprehensible. When we were living in England, he passed through the
midst of us on one of his aimless, mysterious journeys round the world;
and when I was in New York, in 1884, I met him, looking pale, sombre,
nervous, but little touched by age. He died a few years later. He
conceived the highest admiration for my father's genius, and a deep
affection for him personally; but he told me, during our talk, that he
was convinced that there was some secret in my father's life which had
never been revealed, and which accounted for the gloomy passages in
his books. It was characteristic in him to imagine so; there were many
secrets untold in his own career. But there were few honester or more
lovable men than Herman Melville.

[IMAGE: HERMAN MELVILLE]

James (no relation of our distinguished contemporary) was a commonplace,
meritorious person, with much blameless and intelligent conversation;
but the only thing that recalls him personally to my memory is the fact
of his being associated with a furious thunder-storm. My father and I
were alone in the house at the time; my mother had gone to West Newton
on a three weeks' visit. In the midst of the thunder and lightning, the
downpour and the hurricane, the crash of matter and the wreck of worlds,
our door burst open, and behold! of all persons in the world to be
heralded by such circumstances, G. P. R. James! Not he only, but close
upon his heels his entire family, numerous, orthodox, admirable, and
infinitely undesirable to two secluded gentlemen without a wife
and mother to help them out. But it was a choice between murder and
hospitality, an