Thomas Wentworth Higginson, Olde Cambridge

“ [128] in Boston.” He then continues, “In the evening I walk on the Common with Hillard, or alone; then go back to Cambridge on foot. If not very late, I sit an hour with Felton or Sparks. For nearly two years I have not studied at night, save now and then. Most of the time am alone; smoke a good deal; wear a broad-brimmed black hat, black frockcoat, a black cane. Molest no one. Dine out frequently. In winter go much into Boston society.”

This mention of the broad-brimmed black hat-now incredible — suggests the criticisms, still remembered in Cambridge, which were made upon Mr. Longfellow's youthful taste for becoming costume. He was undoubtedly thinking of himself when in “Hyperion” he made the Baron say to Paul Fleming, “The ladies already begin to call you Wilhelm Meister, and they say that your gloves are a shade too light for a strictly virtuous man.” He perhaps also thought of it when he wrote to Sumner, then in Europe, “If you have any tendency to ‘ curl your hair and wear gloves,’ like Edgar in ‘Lear,’ do it before your return.” Even Mrs.