Early Letters of George Wm. Curtis

he farm, an intimate and confidential correspondence began between them, and this continued until Curtis went to Europe. After he returned it was resumed, but the interchange o

n unbroken succession, and are presented to the public in this volume. In these days, when we complain of the

s settled in New York, Curtis did his part in an effort to get Dwight established in that city. When Dwight began his Journal of Music, Curtis wrote for it frequently over the signature of "Hafiz." It is safe to say that these contributio

School and the Boston Latin School, from which he entered Harvard College. As a boy he was a devoted reader of books, studious in his habits, but little inclin

e gave the class poem on his graduation, in 1832. During his Senior year he taught at Northborough, and following his graduation he spent a year as a tutor in a family at Meadville, Pennsylvania. In the autumn of 1834 he entere

were of like mind with himself; and a society was organized for the purpose of promoting its study. In 1840 the name was changed to

d a number of books in the same periodical. The first review of Tennyson published in this country he gave to the public in that journal. In 1838 he published in the series of translations edited by George Ripley, under the general title of "Specimens of Foreign Standard Literature," a volume of "Select Minor Poems, Translated from the German of Goethe

be more clearly manifest. A few persons of thoughtful and more distinctly spiritual cast of mind were warmly drawn to him, but the majority grew more and more opposed to him, and he withdrew from the parish after a year and a half. During his stay in Northampton he wrote for The Dial, for one or two musical journals, planned several extended literary undertakings, and gave

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ration was to bring about a truer state of society, one in which human beings should stand in frank relations of true equality and fraternity, mutually helpful, respecting each other's occupation, and making one the helper of the other. The prime idea was an organization of industry in such a way that the most re

leasant. For instance, in the matter of music we had extremely limited means or talent, and very little could be done except in a very rudimentary, tentative, and experimental way. We had a singing-class, and we had some who could sing a song gracefully and accompany themselves at the piano. We had some piano music; and, so far as it was possible, care was taken that it should be good-son

pupils often went into Boston to hear the best music, walking both ways. In The Dial, and especially in the Harbinger, Dwight wrote with enthusiasm and poetic charm of the merits of classical music. He wrote afterwards that the treatment of music in these periodicals told the time of day far ahead;

at this period. His chief literary work, however, was in the form of lectures on musical subjects, especially on the great com

ntributors. He wrote much in behalf of association, but he also discussed literary topics. His chief contributions were on the subject of music, which was then, as always, so near his heart. He co

or the Daily Chronotype on musical subjects. In 1849 he edited a department in the Chronotype devoted to the interests of association, and he had the assistance of Channing, Brisbane, Dana, and Cranch. This arrangement was continued for only a few months, not proving a success. In 1851 he was for six months the musical editor of the Boston Commonwealth, he wrote for Sartain's Magazine and other periodicals on musical topics, and he continued to lecture. Ripley and Dana made an earne

is associationist and musical friends, who generously contributed to a guarantee fund for the purpose. The Harvard Musical Assoc

teen, and even the last ten, years. Boston has been without such a paper, and Boston has thousands of young people who go regu

sed, crude, heterogeneous is this sudden musical activity in a young, utilitarian people. A thousand specious fashions too successfully dispute the place of true a

we hear and feel and in our poor way understand of this great world of music, together with what we receive thr

usic was varied in contents, and published much that was of great value. The selections from English, French, and German musical publications were well adapted to give music a higher position in American society. Many works of great value were translated for its pages; and whatever new or of importance was taking place or being sa

him of much drudgery as publisher, which he had hitherto undertaken. The conduct of the paper did not essentially change, but with each number was added a musical composition; the best works of Mendelss

was taken ill, and died in a few weeks. The blow nearly crushed him, and it took many months for him to reco

, and the blossoms showered down upon her with such tokens of affection and sorrow that the rough men, whose business makes them callous to common impressions, were moved as none of us ever saw them moved before. Our good James Clarke, as you know, conducte

en, Munich, and other cities. He gave much attention to music, taking every opportunity of making himself better acquainted with its traditions and spirit. He then went to Italy, passed on to France, and reached England in July, 1861. Early in September

Street, and went on with his tasks as usual. He became an active member of the Saturday Club, and was a constant attendant. He helped to organize, in

to reach a larger public. From some cause, not easy to understand, the response on the part of the public was not large enough to warrant the additional outlay; the list of paid contributors had to be abandoned, and the paper returned gradually to its old ways. In December, 1880, Dwight's friends joined with the musicians of Boston in giving a testimonial concert for the benefit of the paper, which yielded the sum of $6000. In an editorial Dwight said of this expression of interest in hi

he was not a great critic, certainly he had not the technical knowledge of music which is desirable in its scientific expositor; but his whole soul was in the art, and he gave it the devotion of his life. His preference was for the older composers, and he did not yield a ready homage to those of the newer schools. Of this he speaks in the closing number of his journal: "Startling as the new composers are, and novel, curious, bri

dern journalism. The turn of mind which looks at the ideal rather than the practical, and the native indolence of temperament which sometimes goes with it, have made our movements slow. To be the firs

ur valuable editorial labors. You have done great work; and have that consciousness to be sure-some comfort, but it should not be all. There is not a musician of respectability in the c

etion of its thirtieth year, for want of adequate support. We mean, of course, Dwight's Journal of Music, which ended with an admirably manly, candid, and sagacious, but inevitably pathetic, valedictory from its editor-veteran editor,

on might be as serious a work of art, as full of thought and passion, and, in a word, of genius, as a great poem, and that no form of art was more spiritually elevating. They lifted the performance of such music from the category of mere amusement, and asserted for the authors a dignity like that of the master poets. If to some hearers the exposition seemed sometimes fanciful and remote, it was only as all criticism of works of the im

the airy ripple of Auber's 'Zanetta,' the swift passionate storm of Beethoven's 'Egmont,' the symphonic murmur of woods and waters and summer fields in the limpid 'Pastorale,' or the solemn grandeur of sustained pathetic human feeling in the 'Fifth Symphony.' The musical revival was all part of the new birth of the Transcendental epoch, although

since vanished. The bare Tremont road is bare no longer. Green Roxbury and Jamaica Plain are almost city rather than suburbs. From the symphony concerts dates much of the musical taste and cultivation of Boston. The old Odeon is replaced by the stately Music Hall. The Journal of Music, which sprang from the impulse of those days, now, after a generation, is suspended; nor need we speculate why musical Boston, which demands the Passion music of Bach, permits a journal of such character to expire. Amid all

the position of vice-president of the association; and in the latter year was elected president, which place he held until his death. Beginning about 1850 he worked steadily for securing a good musical library, that should be as nearly complete as possible; and his desire was to make this a special feature in the activities of the association. In 1867 a room was secured for it; and in 1869 a suite of rooms was rented for the gatherings, both social and musical, of the members of the association. On his election as president, Dwight

out, and the concerts were for many years very successful. In time their place was taken by the concerts of Theodore Thomas, and the Symphony Concerts generously sustained by Mr. H.

e which he brought forward frequently in the pages of his Journal of Music. He maintained that music was not merely for amusement, but that it is the most human and spiritual of all the arts, and must find its

ak an appreciative word for them. However Dwight might differ from some of them, he could recognize their true merits, and did not fail to make them known to the public. When Mr. Paine, who had been watched by Dwight with appreciation and approval from the beginning of his musical care

to mean to an intelligent person he could make known in language of a fine literary texture, and with a rare spiritual insight he voiced its poetic and aesthetic values. If the better-trained musicians of more recent years look upon his musical judgments with somewhat of disapproval, as not being sufficiently technical, they ought not to forget that he prepared the way for them as

was intimately associated with almost every man and woman of note in Boston. He was of a quiet, gentlemanly habit of life, took the world in the way of one who appreciates it and desires to secure from it the most of good, was warmly a

his life, and he greatly appreciated it. A few months later, September 5, 1893, his life came to an end-a life that had been in no way great, but that had been spent

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wight to his friend. In a letter to Christopher P. Cranch, the preacher, poet, and artist, written at the time when he was starting his Journal of Music on its way, Dwight said: "If you see the Howadji, can you not enlist his active sympathy a little in my cause? A

journal, persuaded a number of his friends to subscribe, and wrote fr

t-but we do not love the name. 1st. Journal of Music is too indefinite and commonplace. It will not be sufficiently distinguished from the Musical Times and the Musical World, be

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most friendly words which the "Easy Chair" had said of him and his work as an editor, i

we all (committee, director, teachers, pupils) have set our hearts upon having you perform that service. It would delight us all; and I know that you would find the occasion, the very sight of those sightless children made so happy, most inspiring.... A more responsive audience than th

ghtful talk about me and my Journal in the 'Easy Chair.' It was so like you, like the dear old George. I tell you, it made me feel good, as if life wasn't all a failure. And now I am finding laziness agreeing with me too-too well.... And if I were not so very, very old, if it were not my fate to have been sent int