was purely historical; but when it came to Boston it was strangely
re-abolitionized, and amidst an ardor for the antiquities of the place,
his old love for its humanitarian pre-eminence blazed up. He would have
her visit Faneuil Hall because of its Revolutionary memories, but not
less because Wendell Phillips had there made his first antislavery
speech. She was to see the collections of the Massachusetts Historical
Society, and if possible certain points of ancient colonial interest
which he named; but at any rate she was somehow to catch sight of the
author of the "Biglow Papers," of Senator Sumner, of Mr. Whittier, of
Dr. Howe, of Colonel Higginson, and of Mr. Garrison. These people were
all Bostonians to the idealizing remoteness of Dr. Ellison, and he could
not well conceive of them asunder. He perhaps imagined that Kitty was
more likely to see them together than separately; and perhaps indeed
they were less actual persons, to his admiration, than so many figures
of a grand historical composition. Finally, "I want you to remember, my
dear child," he wrote, "that in Boston you are not only in the
birthplace of American liberty, but the yet holier scene of its
resurrection. There everything that is noble and grand and liberal and
enlightened in the national life has originated, and I cannot doubt that
you will find the character of its people marked by every attribute of a
magnanimous democracy. If I could envy you anything, my dear girl, I
should envy you this privilege of seeing a city where man is valued
simply and solely for what he is in himself, and where color, wealth,
family, occupation, and other vulgar and meretricious distinctions are
wholly lost sight of in the consideration of individual excellence."

Kitty got her uncle's letter the night before starting up the Saguenay,
and quite too late for compliance with his directions concerning Quebec;
but she resolved that as to Boston his wishes should be fulfilled to the
utmost limit of possibility. She knew that nice Mr. March must be