Page:The Life and Letters of Emily Dickinson (1924).pdf/27

Rh went so deep it never came to the surface in words, but was never absent, diminished, or lost, or ceased to be even after his death had blasted her trust in life forever. "If Father is asleep on the lounge the house is full," she often exclaimed. It expressed their understanding.

That the Squire was a proud man no one doubted, but that his name was the first on any subscription to relieve want or disaster, and that his eyes were capable of suffusing at the pain of an animal or trouble of the human heart, related him to Emily's fire and dew quality.

His wife, Emily's mother, was an exquisite little lady of the old school long passed into mythology. She was the daughter of Alfred Norcross, of Monson. The family were well-to-do and she was educated and finished off at a school for young ladies at New Haven, very much in repute in her day. Upon her marriage, no railroad then reaching Amherst, her dower was brought by several yoke of brindle oxen. Her mahogany was claw-footed and pine-apple cut; her silver had the basket of flowers on the handles; her bandboxes are still in the family possession—monstrous gay affairs, with scenes of Mount Vernon on one side and Paris on the other.

Emily Norcross Dickinson feared and honored her husband after the manner of the Old Testament. She trembled and flushed, obeyed and was silent before him. He was to her Jehovah, and she was to him the sole being to whom he entrusted the secrets of his inmost heart. His letters to her were discreet, respectful, "frosty but kindly"—ending always with the assurance of his remaining her "most ob't servant, Edward Dickinson."