Sublime

He was no older than the rest of them judging by his face, but his drawl suggested a decadent, world-weary forty-year-old.

When he was thirty-two years old, Thomy Lafon was listed in the 1842 city directory as a merchant. His mother was born a free woman in Haiti and had arrived with other migrants post-revolution. Lafon grew wealthy through real estate. The Holy Family nursing home was the result of one of many of his charitable donations made in service of Black peop

I saw more of Lyell than of any other man, both before and after my marriage. His mind was characterised, as it appeared to me, by clearness, caution, sound judgment, and a good deal of originality. When I made any remark to him on Geology, he never rested until he saw the whole case clearly, and often made me see it more clearly than I had done be

He was “Bella Moses’ son,” the one of her children most like her, the one in whom surfaced most strongly the mixed strain of passionate idealism and overweening arrogance that she had inherited from her parents, Grannie and Bernhard Cohen. When the idealism died, the arrogance was already well rooted and strong. If it was given nourishment, it woul

It was a tribute to Léon de Valmy’s rather overwhelming personality that my own first impression had nothing to do with his crippled state; it was merely that this was the handsomest man I had ever seen. My experience, admittedly, had not been large, but in any company he would have been conspicuous. The years had only added to his extraordinary go