If he chances to
speak to his mother about a bore, and he did not suffer bores
gladly, he not only does not name the person, but gives no hint by
which he might be identified. He had much to embitter him, for he
had a keen consciousness of `the something within him,' of the
powers which never found full expression; and he saw others
advancing and prospering while he seemed to be standing still, or
losing ground in all ways. But no word of bitterness ever escapes
him in the correspondence which I have seen. In one case he has to
speak of a disagreeable and disappointing interview with a man from
whom he had been led to expect sympathy and encouragement. He told
me about this affair in conversation; `There were tears in my eyes
as I turned from the house,' he said, and he was not effusive. In a
letter to Mrs. Murray he describes this unlucky interview,--a
discouragement caused by a manner which was strange to Murray,
rather than by real unkindness,--and he describes it with a
delicacy, with a reserve, with a toleration, beyond all praise.
These are traits of a character which was greater and more rare than
his literary talent: a character quite developed, while his talent
was only beginning to unfold itself, and to justify his belief in
his powers.
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