Page:Margaret Fuller by Howe, Julia Ward, Ed. (1883).djvu/130

Rh relapse again and again. If you fall, do pot lie grovel- ling, but rise upon your feet once more, and struggle bravely on. And if aroused conscience makes you suffer keenly, have patience to bear it. God will not let you suffer more than you need to fit you for His grace. . . . Cultivate this spirit of prayer. I do not mean agitation and excitement, but a deep desire for truth, purity, and goodness."

Margaret visited also the prisons on Blackwell's Island, and, walking through the women's hospital, shed the balm of her presence upon the most hardened of its wretched inmates. She had always wished to have a better understanding of the feelings and needs of “those women who are trampled in the mud to gratify the brute appetites of men,” in order to lend them a helping hand.

The following extracts from letters, hitherto in great part unpublished, will give the reader some idea of Margaret's tender love and care for the dear ones from whom she was now separated. The letters are mostly addressed to her younger brother, Richard, and are dated in various epochs of the year 1845. One of those recalls her last impressions in leaving Boston:—

The last face I saw in Boston was Anna Loring's, looking after me from Dr. Peabody's steps. Mrs. Peabody stood behind her, some way up, nodding adieux to the 'darling,' as she addressed me, somewhat to my emotion. They seemed like a frosty November afternoon and a soft summer twilight, when night's glorious star begins to shine.

“When you go to Mrs. Loring's, will you ask W. Story if he has any of Robert Browning's poems to lend me for a short time? They shall be returned safe. I only want them a few days, to make some