"MY DEAR HAWTHORNE:----I have been waiting and waiting in the hope of seeing you in Cambridge.... I have been meditating upon your letter, and pondering with friendly admiration your review of 'Evangeline,' in connection with the subject of which, that is to say, the Acadians, a literary project arises in my mind for you to execute. Perhaps I can pay you back in part your own generous gift, by giving you a theme for story, in return for a theme for song. It is neither more nor less than the history of the Acadians, _after_ their expulsion as well as before. Felton has been making some researches in the State archives, and offers to resign the documents into your hands. "Pray come and see me about it without delay. Come so as to pass a night with us, if possible, this week; if not a day and night. "Ever sincerely yours, "HENRY W. LONGFELLOW." There is nothing in our literary annals more unique and delightful than this history of Longfellow's warm recognition of his old classmate, and the mutual courtesies to which it led. One is reminded by it of the William Tell episode between Goethe and Schiller, though it was in this case only the theme and nothing of material that was transferred. An author now almost forgotten, Charles Fenno Hoffman, also published in "The American Monthly Magazine," [Footnote: For March, 1838.] which he was editing, a kindly review, which, however, underestimated the strength of the new genius, as it was at first the general habit to do. "Minds like Hawthorne's," he said, "seem to be the only ones suited to an American climate.... Never can a nation be impregnated with the literary spirit by minor authors alone.... Yet men like Hawthorne are not without their use.".... In this same number of the magazine, by the way, was printed Hawthorne's "Threefold Destiny," under the pseudonyme of Ashley Allen Royce; and the song of Faith Egerton, afterward omitted, is thus given:---- "O, man can seek the downward glance, And each kind word,----affection's spell,---- Eye, voice, its value can enhance; For eye may speak, and tongue can tell. "But woman's love, it waits the while To echo to another's tone; To linger on another's smile, Ere dare to answer with its own." These versicles, though they might easily be passed over as commonplace, hold a peculiar inner radiance that perhaps issued from the dawn of a lifelong happiness for Hawthorne at this period. V. AT BOSTON AND BROOK FARM. 1838-1842.