Doctor Holmes lived amid a comparatively narrow circle of friends and
acquaintances. He attended the Saturday Club, but Lowell appears to have
been the only member of it with whom he was on confidential terms. He was
rarely seen or heard of in Longfellow's house. In the winter of 1878 he
met Mrs. L. Maria Child for the first time at the Chestnut Street Club.
It appears that she did not catch his name when he was introduced to her,
and stranger still did not recognize his face. When the Doctor inquired
concerning her literary occupation she replied that she considered
herself too old to drive a quill any longer, and then fortunately added:
"Now, there is Doctor Holmes, I think he shows his customary good
judgment in retiring from the literary field in proper season." What the
Doctor thought of this is unknown, but he still continued to write.
At the age of seventy his _alma mater_ conferred on Doctor Holmes an
LL.D., and this was followed soon afterwards by Oxford and Cambridge, in
England; but why was it not given ten or fifteen years earlier, when
Holmes was in his prime? Then it might have been a service and a
satisfaction to him; but when a man is seventy such tributes have small
value for him. There had been an _Atlantic_ breakfast for Doctor
Holmes in Boston, and a Holmes breakfast in New York.
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