"Begging letters and begging visits were also very frequent, and his sister told us that her brother had frequently been victimized in his desire to help those whose pitiful stories he believed. One day he received a letter from a man in a neighboring town, asking him for a loan of ten dollars, and assuring him that he should blow his brains out if Mr. Whittier did not send him the money. The tone of the letter made him doubt the sincerity of the writer, and he did not send the money, comforting himself, he said, with the thought that the man really had no brains to blow out. 'I must confess, however,' he added, 'I looked rather anxiously at the newspapers for the next few days, but seeing no news of a suicide in the neighboring town, I was relieved.' "His sister once told us of an incident which occurred during the war, which pleased them very much. One night, at a late hour, the door-bell rang, and her brother, on answering it, found a young man in an officer's uniform standing at the door. 'Is this Mr. Whittier?' he asked. 'Yes.' 'Well, sir,' was the quick reply, 'I only wanted to have the pleasure of shaking hands with you.' And with that he seized the poet's hand, shook it warmly, and rushed away, before Mr. Whittier had recovered from his surprise. "In subsequent visits to Mr. Whittier, he was sometimes induced to talk about his poems, although that was a subject on which he rarely spoke. On my friend's once warmly praising _Maud Muller_, he said decidedly that he did not like the poem, because it was too sad; it ministered to the spirit of unrest and dissatisfaction which was only too prevalent. With _My Psalm_ he felt much better satisfied, because it was more hopeful. His favorite poets were Wordsworth and Burns. He once showed us an autograph letter of Burns, which he prized very highly, and a number of beautiful photographs of Scotch scenery, the gift of a sturdy old Scotchman, a neighbor of his and also an ardent, admirer of Burns. "Our conversation occasionally touched on the subject of marriage, and I remember his asking us if we could imagine why there should be so much unhappiness among married people, even among those who seemed to have everything calculated to make them happy, and who really loved each other. He said he had pondered over the subject a good deal, and had finally concluded that it was because they saw too much of each other. He did not believe it was well for any two human beings to have too much of each other's society. We told him that, being a much-to-be-commiserated bachelor, he was not competent authority on that subject. "Among the most intimate of his friends were Mr. and Mrs. James T. Fields, Colonel Higginson, Charles Sumner, and Bayard Taylor. To the two latter, and also to Emerson, he has alluded very beautifully in one of his most characteristic poems, _The Last Walk in Autumn_.