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Chapter 41: search for health.—journey to Europe.—continued disability.—1857-1858.
Sumner's journey from New York to
Paris was by the same route which he traversed by sailing vessel and stage-coach nineteen years before.
1 Reaching
Paris by way of
Havre and
Rouen, March 23, he found there American and English friends to welcome him,—among the former
T. G. Appleton,
Mr.Emerson and
Mrs. George B. Emerson, and
Madame Laugel; and among the latter,
Nassau W. Senior.
His first friendly office was a search for
Crawford the artist, then facing death; and it was to be their last meeting.
His time was well occupied in visiting points of interest, driving with friends, attending the opera, and in interviews with distinguished Frenchmen.
Michel Chevalier, whose acquaintance he made during his earlier visit, was assiduous in his attentions; so also was Senior, who was in intimate association with the literary and public men of
France, and took pleasure in bringing
Sumner into relations with them.
He enjoyed
Tocqueville's conversations on
European politics, and was greatly attracted by the liberal thought of
Comte de Montalembert, both sympathetic with his own views on slavery.
He had interesting interviews with
Guizot,
Lamartine,
Drouyn de Lhuys, and the historian
Mignet.
He wrote from
Paris to
Dr. Howe, April 23:—
It is now a month since I wrote you from the British Channel.
In this interval I have had many experiences, mostly pleasant.
My tine is intensely occupied.
Besides making acquaintances here, and seeing the world more than any other American at this time, I am visiting the museums and other objects of interest most systematically.
But I am sometimes troubled to find how little I can bear now, compared with that insensibility to fatigue which I had once, even a year ago. My whole system is still morbidly sensitive, and after a walk which would have been pastime once, I drag my legs along with difficulty.
Add to this a terrific cold,—they call it la grippe here,—which I have had for three weeks, and which has compelled me to keep the house
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several days, and you will see some of my drawbacks.
Paris is very gay and beautiful, and abounding in interesting people.
Of those I have seen, Tocqueville and Guizot have impressed me most.
They are very superior men; I am disposed to believe them the first men in France. . . . the intelligence and education constituting the brains of France are all against the emperor, who has the ateliers and his own immediate adherents.
All admit that this baby, who was born with such parade, and who is now escorted by cavalry when he takes an airing, can never succeed to power; but I have not yet seen a human being who undertakes to say what will take place in the event of the death of the emperor.
my own impression is that the emperor's superiority is found in his fixed will.
His purpose is clear, and he is almost the only Man in this condition. . . . I tremble for Kansas, which seems to me a doomed Territory.
How disgusting seems the conduct of those miserable men who thus trifle with the welfare of this region!
My blood boils at this outrage, and I long to denounce it again from my place.
To
C. F. Adams, June 2, from
Paris:—
I have often thought of what the good Dr. Bigelow said when he postponed my complete recovery till next December; and I have had gloomy hours thinking that perhaps it would not come then.
But my feelings latterly, and particularly for the last few days, give me hope.
After a busy month in
Paris he made a tour of three weeks in the provinces, which included
Tours and the old chateaux of the Touraine; mettray, where he saw again
Demetz, the founder of the penitentiary colony; Angers,
Nantes,
Bordeaux, and the
Pyrenees.
His sojourn in
Paris after his return was very brief, and he was in
London June 16.
He was recruited by his journey to the west and south of
France; and while daily reminded of his disability by the sensitiveness in his spine, his inability to walk far, and weariness after exertion, he wrote, July 3, that he felt better than at any time since he was disabled.
Some of his English friends had died,—among them
Mr.Montagu and
Mrs. Basil Montagu,
John Kenyon, the first and second Lord Wharncliffe, and
Sir Charles Vaughan; and Earl Fitzwilliam was on his death bed. But the greater number still survived.
2 They remembered him well as he came in his youth, and had followed his career.
When they knew him first he was a youth of promise,—intelligent, aspiring, attractive in every way, but without any prestige of name or deeds; he came now with a fame equal to that of any whom he met, and with a record of devotion and suffering.
Time had wrought changes also with
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them as with him. He wrote to
Longfellow, June 26: ‘The lapse of nineteen years is very plain in the shrunk forms and feeble steps of some whom I had left round and erect.
Some seem changed in mood and character,—particularly
Milnes.’
He was welcomed by the Parkeses, Grotes, Seniors, and by
Milnes,
Reeve,
Milman, and
Whewell, of all of whom he had seen much during his first visit.
He was warmly received by Lansdowne, Brougham, Cranworth (now lord chancellor), Wensleydale (
Baron Parke), and
Lushington,—all friends of his youth.
The
Earl of
Carlisle promptly welcomed him to the vice-regal lodge at
Dublin.
the
Duke and
Duchess of
Sutherland pressed him to become their guest at Stafford House; but he preferred the freedom of hired lodgings.
During his sojourn in
England the duchess and her daughter, the
Duchess of
Argyll, were most sympathetic; and the latter was from this time until his death his correspondent, showing a constant interest in his personal as well as his public life.
3 Lord and
Lady Hatherton took an affectionate interest in his health and all that concerned him, and they became his faithful friends.
Lords Granville,
Aberdeen, and
Clarendon were very cordial; the Romillys and Buxtons were most friendly.
He was the guest of the Benchers at the
Inner Temple, where he met again
Samuel Warren, who many years later recalled him as ‘an affable and courteous guest.’
He made from
London brief visits to the Sutherlands at
Cliveden, to
Dr. Lushington at
Ockham Park, to
T. Baring at Norman Court, to the
Earl of
Stanhope at
Chevening, to the
Archbishop of
Canterbury at
Addington, and to the Laboucheres at Stoke
Park.
He met
Macaulay several times, as at Lord Belper's, the
Duke of
Argyll's, Lord Lansdowne's, and Earl Stanhope's. He was invited by
Thackeray to dine, and by
Charles Kingsley to visit Eversley; but these invitations he was obliged to decline.
At
Cliveden he met
Gladstone, apparently for the first time.
He had one or two long interviews with
