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him, February 25, 1861, “You have also done me no little good,” and other phrases which show how this American, nine years younger than himself, had already begun to influence that wayward mind.
Their correspondence was suspended, to be sure, by their difference of attitude on the
American Civil War; but it is pleasant to find that after ten months of silence
Ruskin wrote to
Norton again, if bitterly.
Later still, we find successive letters addressed to Norton-now in
England again — in this loving gradation, “Dear
Norton,” “My dearest
Norton,” “My dear Charles,” and “My dearest Charles,” and thenceforth the contest is won. Not all completed, however, for in the last years of life
Ruskin addressed “
Darling Charles,” and the last words of his own writing traced in pencil “From your loving J. R.”
I have related especially this one touching tale of friendship, because it was the climax of them all, and the best illustration of the essential Americanism of Norton's career.
He indeed afforded a peculiar and almost unique instance in New England, not merely of a cultivated man who makes his home for life in the house where he was born, but of one who has recognized for life the peculiar associations of his boyhood and has found them still the best.
While Ruskin was pitying him for
