119
on top of him, will, in short do anything.
Now all this isn t funny or affectionate. It s
decidedly dreary, and though Jim does not, perhaps,
confess it to himself, he must find it so. He
is a gentleman, she emphatically not a lady. Be-
sides these capers are unbecoming her age and one
cannot avoid a sense of the absurdity accruing.
I (and Haney too, I know) would infinitely prefer
quiet, sociable intellectual chat to all the boisterous
old-young-girlishnesses that could be extemporized.
I feel slow and stupid in their presence and
think how dreary it must be for Jim when we are
not there. I do not doubt that the woman loves
him after her fashion, but she is self-centered.
He is hers that s her way of looking at it. When
he had to go down south it was all how shall I
be able to get along in his absence I, I, I! He
seems to recognized this, almost passively, only coming
out in opposition when some sentiment not action
provokes it. I fancy she has all her own way and
would hate him if she didn t. Let her get alarm-
ed by the idea that this man is holding his own;
perhaps oh horrors! reckoning me up and not
entirely believing that I am the fascinating, gushing,
slap-dash, intellectual, admirable-in right-and-
still-more-admirable-when-wrong creature, there d
be the devil to pay. No man could live happily
with her who strove for not the mastery but
| Page |
| Title: | Thomas Butler Gunn Diaries, Volume Ten: page one hundred and thirty-two |
| Description: | Regarding the marriage of James Parton and Fanny Fern. |
| Date: | 1859-03-16 |
| Subject: | Fern, Fanny; Gunn, Thomas Butler; Haney, Jesse; Marriage; Parton, James; Women |
| Coverage (City/State): | [New York, New York] |
| Scan Date: | 2011-01-31 |
| Volume |
| Title: | Thomas Butler Gunn Diaries, Volume Ten |
| Description: | Includes descriptions of an explosion of a boat on the North River, New York literary Bohemians, boarding house living at 132 Bleecker Street, his freelance writing and drawing work, the death of writer Mort Thomson's young wife Anna, working on the publication ''Constellation,'' visits to the Edwards family, a falling out with Fanny Fern over an article he wrote criticizing ''The New York Ledger,'' a rumor that Fitz James O'Brien is the heir to an Irish baronetcy, and a change of landladies at his boarding house. |
| Subject: | Boardinghouses; Bohemians; Gunn, Thomas Butler; Journalism; Publishers and publishing; Women |
| Coverage (City/State): | New York, New York |
| Note: | Thomas Butler Gunn was born February 15, 1826, in Banbury, England, and came to New York in 1849. During the Civil War he worked as a correspondent for the New York Tribune and the New York Evening Post. He returned to England in 1863, and died in Birmingham in April 1903. The collection includes twenty-one volumes of his diaries, including newspaper clippings, letters, photographs, sketches, and various other items inserted by Gunn. Diary entries date from July 7, 1849, to April 7, 1863, and include his experiences with the New York publishing and literary world, his descriptions of boarding houses, his travels throughout the United States, and his experiences traveling with the Federal army as a Civil War correspondent. |
| Publisher: | Missouri History Museum |
| Rights: | Copyright 2011 Missouri History Museum. |
| Source: | Page images, transcriptions, and metadata of the Thomas Butler Gunn diaries have been provided by the Missouri History Museum. |
