All through the Kansas Free State struggle and the startling raid at Harper’s Ferry, in which the Doctor’s name was closely connected with that of “Old John Brown,” Mrs. Howe was the unflinching helpmate of the brave philanthropist and scholar with whose name her own is interwoven. In 1861 Mrs. Howe wrote the “Battle-Hymn of the Republic.” She gave me the manuscript, which I have yet, and she told me how she came to write it. “Late in the autumn of 1861, I visited the capital with a party of friends, among whom were Governor and Mrs. Andrew, Mr. and Mrs. E. P. Whipple, and my pastor, the Rev. James Freeman Clarke. One day we drove out to a review of troops some distance from the city. The day was fine and everything passed off well; but a _sudden surprise_ on the part of _the enemy_ interrupted the proceedings before they were well begun. A small body of our men had been surrounded and cut off from their companions; reinforcements were sent to their assistance, and the expected pageant was necessarily given up. We turned our horses’ heads homeward. For a long distance the foot soldiers filled the road. They were before us and behind us, and we were obliged to drive very slowly. We presently began to sing some of the well-known songs of the war, and among them, ‘John Brown’s Body Lies a-Mouldering in the Grave.’ This seemed to please the soldiers, who cried, ‘Good for you!’ and they themselves took up the strain. Mr. Clarke said to me, ‘You ought to write some new words to that tune.’ “I replied that I had often wished to do so. “In spite of the excitement of the day, I went to bed and slept as usual, but awoke next morning in the gray of the early dawn, and, to my astonishment, found that the wished-for lines were arranging themselves in my brain. I hastily rose, saying to myself, ‘I shall lose this if I don’t write it down.’ Immediately I searched for a sheet of paper and an old stump of a pen that I had had the night before, and began to scrawl the lines almost without looking. Having completed that, I lay down again and fell asleep, but not without feeling that something of importance had happened to me.” The poem was written at Willard’s Hotel, and, set to music, was sung by every soldier in our army. She has spoken to French scholars and wits in their own tongue and chief city. In Florence and Rome she has spoken to Italian audiences, having in Rome, during her last visit, also read two sermons to liberal congregations. She is a person of great wit, as well as learning, being as a speaker essentially and intellectually womanly; but she can startle her audience even now by some unexpected and spirited outburst of opinion that justifies her high reputation as a poet and her noble record as a brave, clear thinker. Her intellectual activity is unremittent. She could always have more engagements than she desires, and, as a marked favorite, is still in request.