44 “the most fashionable promenade”: Ibid., 152.
44 “I have been there repeatedly”: Willis, Pencillings by the Way, 78–79.
44 “I never venture”: Sanderson, The American in Paris, Vol. I, 102.
44 “every inch of it”: Ibid., 104.
45 Let us have gardens: Ibid., 106.
45 “a library on the street”: Ibid., 60.
46 “You can stop in on your way”: Ibid., 164.
46 “nothing that did not belong”: Hugo, Notre-Dame of Paris, 136.
47 “And it seemed to me”: Willis, Pencillings by the Way, 74.
47 “In our own country”: Sanderson, The American in Paris, Vol. I, 88.
48 “The evening need never hang”: Emerson, The Journals and Notebooks of Ralph Waldo Emerson, ed. Ferguson, Vol. IV, 202.
48 Faultlessly attired: Willard, Journal and Letters, from France and Great Britain, 37.
48 “genteel society”: Ibid.
48 I never saw so many: Ibid.
49 “We may make many valuable improvements”: Ibid., 164.
49 Charles Sumner made a point: Pierce, Memoir and Letters of Charles Sumner, Vol. I, 236.
49 dazzling Marie Taglioni: Willis, Pencillings by the Way, 48.
50 “No language can describe”: Ibid., 50.
50 Her figure is small: Ibid., 49–50.
50 “Mercy! How deficient”: Sanderson, The American in Paris, Vol. I, 46.
50 “overwhelming tumult”: Willis, Pencillings by the Way, 51.
50 “We shall never have”: Ibid.
50 “And when they come upon stage”: Ibid.
51 Indeed, while at the opera: James Jackson, Jr., to his father, March 20, 1832, Jackson Family Papers, Countway Library, Harvard Medical School.
51 “James Jackson has just come up”: Morse, Life and Letters of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Vol. I, 98.
51 “There is no need of cutting”: Ibid., 120.
52 “Molière could not have”: Sanderson, The American in Paris, Vol. II, 129.
52 “Her voice is like a silver flute”: Pierce, Memoir and Letters of Charles Sumner, Vol. I, 234.
52 “Thousands in merry moods”: Appleton, Life and Letters of Thomas Gold Appleton, 129.
52 “the blaze of day”: Ibid.
52 “Cafés abound in Paris”: Galignani’s New Paris Guide, 1827, li.
52 It is impossible to conceive: Ibid.
52 “Alas, my poor roasting”: Sanderson, The American in Paris, Vol. I, 84.
52 “Your best way”: Ibid., 85.
53 the elegant Trois Frères Provençaux: Les Trois Frères Provençaux no longer exists. Le Grand Véfour, in the Palais Royal, is the oldest restaurant in Paris still operating at its original site and one of the finest in the city.
53 As much as the food and the wine: Holmes, The Autocrat at the Breakfast Table, 24.
53 “ladies of easy virtue”: Galignani’s New Paris Guide, 1827, 176.
53 The Palais Royal, Holmes liked to say: Morse, Life and Letters of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Vol. I, 99.
53 “haunts where the stranger”: Galignani’s New Paris Guide, 1827, iii.
53 “Billiards, cards, faro”: Sanderson, The American in Paris, Vol. I, 94.
54 “Young men are very fond of Paris”: Emerson, The Journals and Notebooks of Ralph Waldo Emerson, ed. Ferguson, Vol. IV, 201.
54 “arrangements”: Sanderson, The American in Paris, Vol. I, 88.
54 “They are very pretty”: Ibid., 199.
54 If a student is ill: Ibid.
54 “out of order”: Ibid., 203.
55 If you can preserve him: Ibid., 204.
55 “My anxiety deprives me”: Willard, Journal and Letters, from France and Great Britain, 209.
55 Sumner hated seeing so many soldiers: Pierce, Memoir and Letters of Charles Sumner, Vol. I, 238.
55 Emma Willard was appalled to learn: Willard, Journal and Letters, from France and Great Britain, 235, 236.
56 An American or Englishman when he first: Oliver Wendell Holmes to his parents, September 28, 1833, Holmes Papers, Houghton Library, Harvard University.
57 gathering places like the Café Procope: The Café Procope continues in business, though much enhanced from what it was in Holmes’s day.
57 It had been started in 1670 by a Sicilian: Barclay, A Place in the World Called Paris, 51.
57 “I am getting more and more a Frenchman”: Morse, Life and Letters of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Vol. I, 109.
57 “Good Americans, when they die”: Holmes, The Autocrat at the Breakfast Table, 121.
58 Some days, according to his wife, Susan: Susan Cooper to her children, May 15, 1828, Cooper Family Papers, Beinecke Library, Yale University.
58 “But manage he did”: Bigot, Life of George P. A. Healy, 9.
58 “He lived like his comrades”: Ibid., 13.
58 “the Boswell of Paris”: Sanderson, The American in Paris, Vol. I, 43.
58 “It seems as if a spell”: Willard, Journal and Letters, from France and Great Britain, 241.
59 recruited a first teacher of French: See copy of Madame Alphise de Courval’s contract dated March 19, 1831. Courtesy of Nancy Ianucci, Emma Willard School Archives.
59 “the effect was speedily”: Lord, The Life of Emma Willard, 134.
3. Morse at the Louvre
The six volumes of Letters and Journals of James Fenimore Cooper are a treasure trove, not only for so much that Cooper writes, but for the thorough notes provided by editor James Franklin Beard. Cooper was a far more interesting man and the popularity of his work abroad far greater than generally appreciated in our time. Of considerable interest, too, are the letters of Susan Cooper, in the collection of the Beinecke Library at Yale. The main sources for Morse and his travails have been Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals, in two volumes; The Life of Samuel F. B. Morse by Samuel I. Prime; The American Leonardo by Carleton Mabee; and the more recent Lightning Man: The Accursed Life of Samuel F. B. Morse by Kenneth Silverman.
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61 My country has the most: Morse, Samuel F. B. Morse: His Letters and Journals, Vol. I, 33.
61 “hard at work”: Cooper, Letters and Journals of James Fenimore Cooper, 235.
61 “has created a sensation”: Ibid., 172.
61 “He is painting”: Ibid., 239.
61 “just as good a fellow”: Ibid.
61 “friends are rare”: Cooper, The Prairie(Penguin), 29.
61 Cooper and Morse had met first: Morse, Samuel F. B. Morse: His Letters and Journals, Vol. I, 263.
62 “Crowds get round the picture”: Cooper, Letters and Journals of James Fenimore Cooper, Vol. II, 239.
62 “deliciously spring-like”: Willis, Pencillings by the Way, 107.
62 “wholly bent”: Silverman, Lightning Man, 109.
62 “wicked Morse”: Ibid.
62 “without a true love”: Ibid.
63 “amazingly improved”: Cooper, Letters and Journals of James Fenimore Cooper, Vol. II, 163.
63 Morse had no sooner unpacked: Ibid., 167, 172.
63 Bread and Cheese: Silverman, Lightning Man, 89.
63 “I saw nothing but Jefferson”: Cooper, Letters and Journals of James Fenimore Cooper, Vol. I, 96.
63 One stunning example of the genre: Tatham, “Samuel F. B. Morse’s Gallery of the Louvre: The Figures in the Foreground,” American Art Journal, Vol. XIII, No. 4 (Autumn 1981), 41.
64 On a small piece of paper, Jefferson had drawn: The piece of paper with Jefferson’s floor plan and Trumbull’s sketch is one of the treasures of the Trumbull Collection at the Yale Art Gallery.
65 Cooper loved what he saw emerging: Cooper, Letters and Journals of James Fenimore Cooper, Vol. II, 239.
66 I get up at eight: Ibid.
66 “Lay it on here, Samuel”: Ibid.
67 “the independent, self-possessed”: Willis, Pencillings by the Way, 43–44.
67 Morse with his kind: Ibid., 110.
67 “
chameleon face”: Morse, Samuel F. B. Morse: His Letters and Journals, Vol. I, 415.
68 Morse’s passport: Papers of Samuel F. B. Morse, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.
68 “little pleasure concealed”: Cooper, Letters and Journals of James Fenimore Cooper, Vol. I, 126.
68 Cooper’s nephew William: Ibid., Vol. II, 144.
68 Cooper’s wife, Susan: Ibid., 168.
69 “They[the French]”: Ibid., 175.
69 “Of course, I believe them”: Ibid., 109.
69 “When he goes into crowded rooms”: Susan Cooper to her sisters, November 29, 1830, James Fenimore Cooper Papers, Beinecke Library, Yale University.
69 “What are you to do”: James Jackson, Sr., to James Jackson, Jr., November 25, 1831, Jackson Family Papers, Countway Library, Harvard Medical School.
69 “a good deal of exaggeration”: Cooper, Letters and Journals of James Fenimore Cooper, Vol. II, 139.
69 Cooper had been reading aloud: Cooper, Correspondence of James Fenimore Cooper, Vol. I, 38.
70 he was expelled at age sixteen: Cooper, Letters and Journals of James Fenimore Cooper, Vol. I, 5.
70 Finding he liked the sailor’s life: Franklin, James Fenimore Cooper: The Early Years, 109, 111.
70 “By persuasion of Mrs. Cooper”: Cooper, Letters and Journals of James Fenimore Cooper, Vol. I, 44, 43.
71 The house he had built burned: Ibid., 84.
71 Cooper had written The Last of the Mohicans: Franklin, The New World of James Fenimore Cooper, 240.
71 “I think Pioneers, Mohicans”: Cooper, Letters and Journals of James Fenimore Cooper, Vol. I, 168.
72 He was hailed as the American Walter Scott: Ibid., Vol. II, 84.
72 “the mere butterflies”: Ibid., Vol. I, 15.
72 “The fear of losing their butterfly distinctions”: Ibid., 16.
72 “It is a weary path, indeed”: Cooper, The Prairie (Penguin), 23.
72 “a point of honor”: Cooper, Letters and Journals of James Fenimore Cooper, Vol. II, 61.
72 “gaining ground daily”: Ibid., Vol. I, 165.
73 “more than anyone”: Ashbel Smith to W. Hall, February 25, 1832, Center for American History, University of Texas at Austin.
73 “a very distingué part of the town”: Susan Cooper to her sister Caroline, April 26, n.d. (probably 1833), James Fenimore Cooper Papers, Beinecke Library, Yale University.
73 The salon is near thirty feet: Cooper, Gleanings in Europe: France, Vol. I, 83. The building in which the Coopers lived at 59 rue Saint-Dominique is still there.
73 “adjoining Mr. Cooper’s library”: Susan Cooper to her sister Caroline, April 26, n.d. (probably 1833), James Fenimore Cooper Papers, Beinecke Library, Yale University.
73 “prattle like natives”: Cooper, Letters and Journals of James Fenimore Cooper, Vol. I, 223.
73 “We [are] … very retired”: Susan Cooper to her sister Martha, January 26–27, 1831, James Fenimore Cooper Papers, Beinecke Library, Yale University.
74 “Instead of seeking society”: Cooper, Gleanings in Europe: France, Vol. I, xx.
74 “The people seem to think”: Cooper, Letters and Journals of James Fenimore Cooper, Vol. I, 209.
74 Willis would describe: Ibid., Vol. II, 122.
74 “Some of the best hours”: Willard, Journal and Letters, from France and Great Britain, 90.
74 “our worthy friend, Mr. Morse”: Susan Cooper to her sister Caroline, January 26, 1832(?), James Fenimore Cooper Papers, Beinecke Library, Yale University.
74 “an excellent man”: Silverman, Lightning Man, 113.
75 “daily … almost hourly”: Morse, Samuel F. B. Morse: His Letters and Journals, Vol. II, 314.
75 “gentlemen in all republican simplicity”: Franklin, James Fenimore Cooper: The Early Years, 382.
75 “understood the look of a gentleman”: Dowling, Oliver Wendell Holmes in Paris, 119.
75 “genius in land speculation”: Cunningham, ed., James Fenimore Cooper: A ReAppraisal, 374.
75 “my noble-looking”: Cooper, Correspondence of James Fenimore Cooper, Vol. I, 340.
76 “Geography” Morse: Morse, Samuel F. B. Morse: His Letters and Journals, Vol. I, 15; Silverman, Lightning Man, 10.
76 “very steady and good scholars”: Morse, Samuel F. B. Morse: His Letters and Journals, Vol. I, 21.
76 “I was made for a painter”: Ibid.
76 “unsteady”: Ibid., 11.
76 “Attend to one thing at a time”: Ibid., 4.
76 “steady and undissipated”: Ibid., 5.
76 “one object”: Silverman, Lightning Man, 12.
76 “Your mama and I”: Morse, Samuel F. B. Morse: His Letters and Journals, Vol. I, 22.
77 “no use of Segars”: Silverman, Lightning Man, 11.
77 “The main business of life”: Morse, Samuel F. B. Morse: His Letters and Journals, Vol. I, 8.
77 study under Washington Allston: Ibid., 21, 32.
77 His parents had designed: Ibid., 31–32.
78 desire to “shine”: Ibid., 177.
78 “mortifying”: Ibid., 74–75.
78 “and that really to improve”: Ibid., 75.
78 “Oh, he is an angel”: Silverman, Lightning Man, 22.
79 Morse was amazed to learn: Morse, Samuel F. B. Morse: His Letters and Journals, Vol. I, 45.
79 “appeared very zealous”: Prime, The Life of Samuel F. B. Morse, 36.
79 “Paint large!”: Ibid., 103.
79 “Mr. West … told me”: Morse, Samuel F. B. Morse: His Letters and Journals, Vol. I, 102.
79 “These are necessary to a painter”: Ibid.
79 “You mention being acquainted”: Ibid., 118.
79 “quarrelsome companions”: Ibid., 180.
80 “no nice dinners”: Silverman, Lightning Man, 27.
80 “mere portrait painter”: Ibid., 132.
80 I need not tell you: Ibid.
80 “I long to bury myself”: Ibid., 152.
81 “She is very beautiful”: Ibid., 204.
81 “Is she acquainted with domestic affairs”: Ibid., 207.
81 $2,000 to $3,000: Morse, Samuel F. B. Morse: His Letters and Journals, Vol. I, 209.
81 he developed a flexible (leather) piston: Ibid., 211.
81 machine for carving marble: Ibid., 245, 247.
81 Reverend Morse was asked to leave the pulpit: Ibid., 223–24.
82 “fully employed”: Ibid., 257.
82 “a nine days’ wonder”: Ibid., 258.
82 “You will rejoice with me”: Ibid., 259.
82 “My feelings were almost too powerful for me”: Ibid., 262.
82 “not good”: Ibid.
82 “noble” countenance: Ibid., 261.
82 “accordance between the face and the character”: Ibid., 262.
83 “There was a great crowd”: Ibid.
83 “I have but little room”: Ibid., 264.
83 “My affectionately beloved son”: Ibid., 265.
83 “My whole soul seemed wrapped”: Ibid., 269.
83 To my friends here: Ibid., 270.
84 “a life of severe and perpetual toil”: New York Evening Post, May 4, 1827.
84 Reverend Jedidiah Morse died: Morse, Samuel F. B. Morse: His Letters and Journals, Vol. I, 288.
84 In 1828 she, too, died: Ibid., 293.
85 The sun is just disappearing: Willis, Pencillings by the Way, 112.
85 “exotic production”: Delaporte, Disease and Civilization, 17.
85 The first word of cholera in Paris: New York Evening Post, May 1, 1832.
85 “in the presence of thirty-eight medical men”: Ibid.
86 “Her eyes were started from their sockets”: Willis, Pencillings by the Way, 126.
86 Stomach contained a quart of reddish fluid: James Jackson, Jr., to James Jackson, Sr., March 20, 1832, Jackson Family Papers, Countway Library, Harvard Medical School.
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