Letter from Jeanne C. Carr to John Muir, 1867 Apr 6

[1] Madison April 6, [1867]Dear John Muir, I was very glad to get your bit of a note last night, and should have been gladder if your note had been longer! I felt sure on looking at the direction that you had peeked out of that good eye to unto it, and before I peeked in , to see what you would say for your- self I allowed myself to hope the bad one had got itself mended. You have no idea how much disagreeable weather how much mud and misery you have been kept outAllie sends his special love. 2of for the last four weeks. The earth does not look as if it had so much as the memory of a flower in it. The only sign of spring we have seen is a company of blackbirds who have been going through their Sunday exercises on Mr Van Slykes roof. And their guttural note \u27kluck \u27tsee\u27, kluck \u27tsee\u27 is musical because we have waited for it more than six months. You see I am bent on congrat- ulating you! You may be sure your beloved flowers will stay away until you00404 3are ready to look for them. And you must not prolong their days of patient waiting, -they are waiting even as you are. To be a little more se- rious dear John, (sick folks need not expect to have sense talked to them,) I be- leive fully that Nature needs us and waits for us just as we do for her. My best beloved friend says. There are spiritual existences wh the material forms of na- ture clothe and conceal . I had a fancy that there is a universe of spir- itual bodies and forms of which the material plant and animal are the exact counterparts in 4the physical world - that there is a pre-existent spirit- ual body for every moss lichen, & plant of every kind; growth is an actual clothing upon of themselves by these spiritual beings. They gather from nature its substances to make them- selves a garment exactly fit- ting their persons. And go through the process of life (as we see it,) for the sake of adding the pleasures of activity to the \u27sweet habitat of being . The delicate Calop- agon, the pure [white lilly?] look up at me with a smile of recognition, pleased with their success and say I am here , I have got unto the world. I wanted to try your00404 5life. I wanted to know how the sunshine felt, and what it would be to feel around me the elements of a material world. And I think - in the summer - it is beautiful So the poor things get a relation to us and our life which will make them near- er and dearer when they and we all are spiritual bodies again . So he says, this dear soul who wrote the prayer I sent you once. I thought of this John. when I witnessed you meeting with Calypso. I feel myself shaken with a strange unexplicable emotion in hearing the notes of some solitary birds - as if they called me to the silences of unknown worlds. They are the only 6true lovers I have known (as the flowers are your beloved) and we shall exchange the secrets of our existence soon. Have they grief and pain also, these sinless creatures? Do they rejoice to be gathered?Theirs Sunday thoughts enough for this time. And I am not going to tell you how sorry I am. Get well & come and see. I wrote you as soon as I heard of the misfortune (dont imagine it all yours) to the care of Miss (or Mis?) Merrill. Thank you for the Climacium. Your muscles deserve a rest, and this may make a doctor of you. making you sympathetic with the ner- vous. The Butlers and all of us speak often of you. Deanne Carr0040