Select Item below to DOWNLOAD - Once item is selected, right click and choose 'save as'
dc24c4c5-38e6-436f-b9dc-0c623e274fe6
Frances (Appleton) Longfellow to Nathan Appleton, 12 August 1845
Manuscript letter
Brattleboro.’. Aug 12th 1845.
Dear papa,
We have been impatiently looking for Tom for several days, & hoping you also might accompany him. We have kept an extra bed-room ever since we came, first for Sam, who has not appeared, & then for Tom. Dont detain him any longer from us, for we shall be here only this week, leaving probably a week from today (Tuesday) that we may be a few days in Portland before Commencement. The heat has been extreme, & the drought proportionably so until the last day or two, when delicious showers have laid our dust, & set our myriad streams flowing. Today is as cool & delight- [p. 2] ful as one would wish. Through all this drought there has been plenty of water for the hydropaths, but he village cascade has been voiceless till Sunday, when suddenly the rushing was heard, & for a short time, from some overflow in the hills, we had a very pretty, tho’ rather muddy, fall. I never saw a neighbourhood fuller of lovely brooks. This afternoon we followed several, & upon one found a very picturesque cascade. The drives are very charming, & inexhaustible. The Dr has just opened the “wave-bath”, where a stream, running down an inclined plane, rushes thro’ the bath with much force & foam. Henry thinks it delicious, & I should like to try it, but am not allowed to indulge in any of them.
Henry feels much benefited already, & I heartily wish could give months [p. 3] instead of weeks, to it, but the Faculty would not, I suppose, give him permission. It is a slow process of cure, but then it is chiefly used for deep seated complaints of long standing. There is one poor youth here who was doctored by Dr Bigelow two years, & salivated, for his liver, & then told he had a disease of the heart instead, for which he underwent a year or two more of dosing, & was finally informed it was the liver after all.
I am interrupted by the Dr’s servant bringing a letter from Tom at Greenfield, dated last night, & giving us the good news that he will be here tonight. I shall therefore cut “a dozen friends” at Mrs Blake’s (Miss Dumanesque’s) invited to meet me unless he arrives late.
We have very good Unitarian preaching. Mr Huntington the first Sunday & Mr Ellis the last. The [p. 4] latter is engaged to Gertrude Blake. Many thanks for your kind note. I think we have certainly a right to demand something back from our Pittsfield driver, for we arrived here so early the second day that he, driving off immediately, must have got well on his way homeward & could not have consumed more than three days in all.
We have Sumner’s Oration, & you likewise, I suppose, as he writes us he sent these two before any others. He has added considerably, but it makes it a more thorough treatise on the subject. Our rooms are in great demand, & will be pounced upon as soon as we leave. I wish Aunt Sam would come here in the Autumn (the best time for the cure) instead of submitting to blisters &c.
With love to Harriet & the chicks. Aunt M. &c
Yr affte
Fanny.
ENDORSED: FANNY / AUG 12.
Dear papa,
We have been impatiently looking for Tom for several days, & hoping you also might accompany him. We have kept an extra bed-room ever since we came, first for Sam, who has not appeared, & then for Tom. Dont detain him any longer from us, for we shall be here only this week, leaving probably a week from today (Tuesday) that we may be a few days in Portland before Commencement. The heat has been extreme, & the drought proportionably so until the last day or two, when delicious showers have laid our dust, & set our myriad streams flowing. Today is as cool & delight- [p. 2] ful as one would wish. Through all this drought there has been plenty of water for the hydropaths, but he village cascade has been voiceless till Sunday, when suddenly the rushing was heard, & for a short time, from some overflow in the hills, we had a very pretty, tho’ rather muddy, fall. I never saw a neighbourhood fuller of lovely brooks. This afternoon we followed several, & upon one found a very picturesque cascade. The drives are very charming, & inexhaustible. The Dr has just opened the “wave-bath”, where a stream, running down an inclined plane, rushes thro’ the bath with much force & foam. Henry thinks it delicious, & I should like to try it, but am not allowed to indulge in any of them.
Henry feels much benefited already, & I heartily wish could give months [p. 3] instead of weeks, to it, but the Faculty would not, I suppose, give him permission. It is a slow process of cure, but then it is chiefly used for deep seated complaints of long standing. There is one poor youth here who was doctored by Dr Bigelow two years, & salivated, for his liver, & then told he had a disease of the heart instead, for which he underwent a year or two more of dosing, & was finally informed it was the liver after all.
I am interrupted by the Dr’s servant bringing a letter from Tom at Greenfield, dated last night, & giving us the good news that he will be here tonight. I shall therefore cut “a dozen friends” at Mrs Blake’s (Miss Dumanesque’s) invited to meet me unless he arrives late.
We have very good Unitarian preaching. Mr Huntington the first Sunday & Mr Ellis the last. The [p. 4] latter is engaged to Gertrude Blake. Many thanks for your kind note. I think we have certainly a right to demand something back from our Pittsfield driver, for we arrived here so early the second day that he, driving off immediately, must have got well on his way homeward & could not have consumed more than three days in all.
We have Sumner’s Oration, & you likewise, I suppose, as he writes us he sent these two before any others. He has added considerably, but it makes it a more thorough treatise on the subject. Our rooms are in great demand, & will be pounced upon as soon as we leave. I wish Aunt Sam would come here in the Autumn (the best time for the cure) instead of submitting to blisters &c.
With love to Harriet & the chicks. Aunt M. &c
Yr affte
Fanny.
ENDORSED: FANNY / AUG 12.
Archives Number: 1011/002.001-015#020
U. S. National Park Service
Permission must be secured from the individual copyright owners to reproduce any copyrighted materials contained within this website.
Courtesy of National Park Service, Longfellow House-Washington's Headquarters National Historic Site; Archives Number 1011/002.001-015#020
Public domain
Correspondence (1011/002), (LONG-SeriesName)
, Letters from Frances Longfellow (1011/002.001), (LONG-SubseriesName)
, 1845 (1011/002.001-015), (LONG-FileUnitName)
, Letters from Frances Longfellow (1011/002.001), (LONG-SubseriesName)
, 1845 (1011/002.001-015), (LONG-FileUnitName)
Image
Longfellow House - Washington's Headquarters National Historic Site, Code: LONG
Longfellow House - Washington's Headquarters National Historic Site, Middlesex County, Massachusetts
Latitude: 42.3769989013672, Longitude: -71.1264038085938
Latitude: 42.3769989013672, Longitude: -71.1264038085938
NPS Museum Number Catalog : LONG 20257
Title: Finding Aid to the Frances Elizabeth Appleton Longfellow (1817-1861) Papers, 1825-1961 (bulk dated: 1832-1861)
URL: https://www.nps.gov/long/learn/historyculture/archives.htm#FEAL
URL: https://www.nps.gov/long/learn/historyculture/archives.htm#FEAL
2016-01-30
08/12/1845
Manuscript letter in Frances Appleton Longfellow Papers, Series II. Correspondence, A. Outgoing, 1845. (1011/002.001-015#020)
Public Can View
Organization: Longfellow House-Washington's Headquarters National Historic Site
Address: 105 Brattle Street, Cambridge, MA 02138
Email: LONG_archives@nps.gov
Address: 105 Brattle Street, Cambridge, MA 02138
Email: LONG_archives@nps.gov
Wednesday, November 9, 2022 6:27:21 PM
Wednesday, November 9, 2022 6:27:21 PM
1011-02-01-15-20 p1+4.jpg
jpg
2.7 MB
Historic