Page:Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli (IA memoirsofmargare02fullrich).pdf/290

282 her to be in America, that I continually said, ‘How have I misjudged you, — you are not at all such a person as I took you to be.’ To this she replied, ‘I am not the same person, but in many respects another; — my life has new channels now, and how thankful I am that I have been able to come out into larger interests, — but, partly, you did not know me at home in the true light.’ It was true, that I had not known her much personally, when in Boston; but through her friends, who were mine also, I had learned to think of her as a person on intellectual stilts, with a large share of arrogance, and little sweetness of temper. How unlike to this was she now! — so delicate, so simple, confiding, and affectionate; with a true womanly heart and soul, sensitive and generous, and, what was to me a still greater surprise, possessed of so broad a charity, that she could cover with its mantle the faults and defects of all about her.

“We soon became acquainted with the young Marquis Ossoli, and met him frequently at Margaret’s rooms. He appeared to be of a reserved and gentle nature, with quiet, gentleman-like manners, and there was something melancholy in the expression of his face, which made one desire to know more of him. In figure, he was tall, and of slender frame, with dark hair and eyes; we judged that he was about thirty years of age, possibly younger. Margaret spoke of him most frankly, and soon told us the history of her first acquaintance with him, which, as nearly as I can recall, was as follows: —

“She went to hear vespers, the evening of ‘Holy Thursday,’ soon after her first coming to Rome, in the spring of 1847, at St. Peter's. She proposed to her companions that some place in the church should be desig-