Excerpt from Letters of Richard Watson Gilder In the following pages will be found, expressed in his letters or set forth in the connecting narrative of his daughter, the full current of the life of one of the most vital and variously influential Americans of his time. But since the record is largely a story of the inner life, of ideals, ambitions, and impulses to literary or civic achievement, of fruitions and friendships, it may not be out of place to say a word here concerning the outer and objective man, Richard Watson Gilder. So the reader may meet him as one met him in life, receiving first the startling visual impression of him, and then gradually learning through repeated meetings and continuing correspondence how uncommonly his vivid person expressed the range of his temperament and the variety of his mind. The impression made by Mr. Gilder at a first meeting can perhaps be no better conveyed than in the following passage taken from a letter written by Miss Cecilia Beaux, in which the sensitive perceptions of the portrait painter find expression in words: "I shall never forget the first time I saw Mr. Gilder. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

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