Suddenly a lady rose, who seemed to me the most beautiful being I had ever seen. Her features were as clean cut as a Greek cameo, her hair of a golden lustre was gathered in long ringlets at the back, and her whole bearing was one of aerial grace. She took up my questions, made them plain to the audience, and showed very clearly their connection with the discussion. " What a teacher she would make! " I thought as I listened with delight, not knowing that she had already taught, and that it was her own experience that had translated my meaning. After all was over she came to me, offered me her card, and expressing her sympathy in the interest I evidently felt, asked me to come and see her.

The name upon the card was that of Maria Weston Chapman. I did not know it, nor that of William Lloyd Garrison in their true relations, until long after. As I looked at her, she seemed to represent Minerva, so Greek, so purely intellectual was the whole expression of her figure. From that moment till she died, my allegiance never wavered. I see her now, as she stood before me then, as distinctly as I did that day. The "steel blue eye" which Lowell celebrated in his early poem was brilliant but not penetrating. Many years have passed since she died, and no intelligible word has yet been spoken concerning her. Though I loved her, I never became an agnostic for her sake. She realized my highest ideal, so far as intellect was concerned, but my imagination always ventured on higher flights than hers, my heart always beat more warmly. Her indignations were rooted in her sense of justice, mine in warm human sympathies.

I carried my card home. "Shall she go?" said my mother. " It will not harm her," said my father. Never shall I forget that delightful afternoon. One of the finest intellects was devoted to my entertainment. Portfolios and cabinets, filled with things that I had never seen, were opened to me. Once we came upon a picture of a slave chained and beaten. I turned it quickly. " It hurts me," I said. " It ought to," she added, and I saw a sorrowful expression pass over her beautiful face.

When I wrote the Constitution of the " Association for the Advancement of Social Science," she was the only person who recognized my hand. I did not see her for many years after that pleasant afternoon in West Street, but when, after some personal experience of slavery, I sent my first contribution to the " Liberty Bell," Mrs. Chapman, who was the Editor, sent it back to me with a note. " I want to print it," she wrote, " but I cannot do it until I am sure you have counted the cost. Are you strong enough to bear the isolation that will come ? " "I ought to be," I answered, " have I not seen Dr. Channing walking the streets of Boston alone ?" The question showed the strictly just character of the woman.

From:

Preface:

"I have written frankly, garrulously, and at ease; speaking of what it gives me joy to remember, at any length I like — sometimes very carefully — of what I think it may be useful for others to know; and passing in total silence, things which I have no pleasure in reviewing, and which the reader would find no help in the account of."

To these words, with which Ruskin introduces the first chapter of Praeteria, it seems to me that there is no need that I should add anything.

If there are any living who remember with what opening my life began, who have witnessed a sincere effort to make it, in spite of fate, of some use to the world, those persons will know why I have selected this passage.

CAROLINE H. DALL . . .

Who would have been about 16 years old, at the time of
the first meeting with Chapman described above.