In the spring of 1840 Sumner was home again, having been abroad for two and one-half years. The father and his sister Jane, a lovely girl of seventeen, had both died during his absence. He went at once to the Hancock Street home, and began his professional labors from nine till five or six in the afternoon. In the evening he read as formerly till midnight or later, going every Saturday evening to spend the night with Longfellow at Craigie House. This affection for Longfellow never changed. When the poet went abroad in 1842, Sumner wrote him, "We are all sad at your going; but I am more sad than the rest, for I lose more than they do. I am desolate. It was to me a source of pleasure and strength untold to see you; and, when I did not see you, to feel that you were near, with your swift sympathy and kindly words. I must try to go alone,--hard necessity in this rude world of ours, for our souls always in this life need support and gentle beckonings, as the little child when first trying to move away from its mother's knee. God bless you, my dear friend, from my heart of hearts. My eyes overflow as I now trace these lines." Sumner was full of incident and vivid description of his life abroad, and the most charming homes of Boston were open to him whenever he had the time to visit, which was seldom. The letters from Europe made the long days of law practice less monotonous. He wrote much on legal matters; and now, at thirty-three, undertook to edit the "Equity Reports" of Francis Vesey, Jr., numbering twenty volumes, for two thousand dollars. By the terms agreed upon, a volume was to be ready each fortnight. He worked night and day, took no recreation, and soon broke down in health; and his life was despaired of. He welcomed death, for he had before this time become somewhat despondent. Most of his friends were married, and some, like Prescott and Longfellow, had come to fame already. He felt that his life was not showing the results of which his youth gave promise. Had he found at this time "the perfect woman" for whom he used to tell his friends he was seeking, and made her his wife, there would doubtless have come into his life satisfaction and rest. That he did not marry was the more strange since women admired him for the qualities which are especially attractive to the sex; a knightly sense of honor, fidelity in friendship, fearlessness, and affectionate confidence.