Thomas Carlyle in England
Emerson’s cherished friend Thomas Carlyle, a Scottish essayist, historian, mathematician, and philosopher.
On October 22, 1847 Emerson arrived in Liverpool, England to conduct a lecture tour. His decision to go was in reaction to increased pleas from his connections in Europe and confidence that, financially, he could create a lengthy tour. On October 5th he sailed from Boston, where his wife Lidian and friends Henry David Thoreau and Bronson & Abigail Alcott saw him off.
Shortly after arrival he wrote, “I found…a letter which had been seeking me, from Carlyle (author Thomas Carlyle), addressed to ‘R.W.E. the instant when he lands in England’ conveying the heartiest welcome and urgent invitation to house and hearth.” He stayed with the Carlyles for several days. Carlyle and Emerson had met 14 years prior on Emerson’s first trip to Europe, and on this second meeting spent much more time together—including a trip to Stonehenge. While they did not always agree, they were lifelong friends.
Emerson lectured in England and Scotland, and spent a month sightseeing in Paris. While in England, he met with many of the elite literary and artistic talents of the day, including Charles Dickens, William Wordsworth, Alfred Lord Tennyson, George Eliot, William Makepeace Thackeray, and Frederic Chopin. Hearing Chopin play, Emerson wrote, “…and heard him play; could the denying heaven have also given me ears for the occasion.”
Some comments he wrote in his journal while on tour:
“It is certain that more people speak English correctly in the United States than in Britain.”
“People eat the same dinner at every house in England. 1, soup; 2, fish; 3, beef, mutton or hare; 4 birds; 5 pudding and pastry and jellies; 6, cheese; 7, grapes, nuts and wine. During dinner, hock and champagne are offered you by the servant, and sherry stands at the corners of the table….What rivers of wine are drunk in England daily! One would say, every guest drinks six glasses.”
After an eight-month tour that included more than 70 lectures as well as sightseeing, Emerson was ready to go home. “Never was a well-appointed dinner with all scientific belongings so philosophic a thing as at sea. Even the restless American finds himself, at last, at leisure.” He arrived back in Boston on July 27, 1848.
— B. Ewen, Emerson House guide
