THE PASTOR'S WIFE AND DAUGHTER OF CONSOLATION.
1866-1868.
I.
Happiness as a Pastor's Wife. Visits to Newport and Williamstown
Letters. The great Portland Fire. First Summer at Dorset. The new
Parsonage occupied. Second Summer at Dorset. _Little Lou's Sayings and
Doings_. Project of a Cottage. Letters. _The Little Preacher_. Illness
and Death of Mrs. Edward Payson and of Little Francis.
We now enter upon the most interesting and happiest period of Mrs.
Prentiss's experience as a pastor's wife. The congregation of the Church
of the Covenant had been slowly forming in "troublous times"; it was
composed of congenial elements, being of one heart and one mind; some of
the most cultivated families and family-circles in New York belonged to
it; and Mrs. Prentiss was much beloved in them all. What a help-meet
she was to her husband and with what zeal and delight she fulfilled her
office, especially that of a daughter of consolation, among his people,
will soon appear.
How ignorant we often are, at the time, of the turning-points in our
life! We inquire for a summer boarding-place and decide upon it without
any thought beyond the few weeks for which it was engaged; and yet,
perhaps, our whole earthly future or that of those most dear to us,
is to be vitally affected by this seemingly trifling decision. So it
happened to Mrs. Prentiss in 1866. Early in May her husband and his
brother-in-law, Dr. Stearns, went, at a venture, to Dorset, Vt., and
there secured rooms for their families during the summer. But little did
either she, or they, dream that Dorset was to be henceforth her summer
home and her resting-place in death! [1]
The Portland fire, to which reference is made in the following letters,
occurred on the 4th of July, and consumed a large portion of the city.
_To Miss Mary B. Shipman, Dorset, July 25, 1866._
Never in my life did I live through such a spring and early summer as
this! As to business and bustle, I mean. You must have given me up as a
lost case! But I have thought of you every day and longed to hear
how you were getting on, and whether you lived through that dreadful
weather. Annie went with the children to Williamstown about the middle
of June; I nearly killed myself with getting them ready to go and could
see the flesh drop off my bones. George and I went to Newport on what
Mrs. Bronson called our "bridal trip," and stayed eleven days. Mr. and
Mrs. McCurdy were kindness personified. We came home and preached on
the first Sunday in July, and then went to Greenfield Hill to spend the
Fourth with Mrs. Bronson. [2] That nearly finished me, and then I went
to Williamstown on that hot Friday and was quite finished on reaching
there, to hear about the fire in Portland. Did you ever hear of anything
so dreadful? I did not know for several days but H. and C. were burnt
out of house and home; most of my other friends I knew were, and can
there be any calamity like being left naked, hungry and homeless,
everything gone forever.... But let no one say a word that has a roof
over his head. All my father's sermons were burned, the house where
most of us were born, his church, etc. Fancy New Haven stripped of its
shade-trees, and you can form some idea of the loss of Portland in
that respect. Well, I might go on talking forever, and not have said
anything. [3] The heat upset G. and we have been fighting off sickness
for a week, I getting wild with loss of sleep. We are enchanted with
Dorset. We are so near the woods and mountains that we go every day and
spend hours wandering about among them. If there is any difference, I
think this place even more beautiful than Williamstown; it suits us
better as a summer retreat, from its great seclusion. I am, that is we
are, mean enough to want to keep it as quiet and secluded as it is
now, by not letting people know how nice it is; a very few fashionably
dressed people would just spoil it for us. So keep our counsel, you dear
child.
A few days later she writes to Mrs. Smith, then in Europe:
On the sixth, a day of fearful heat, I went to Williamstown, where I
found all the children as well as possible, but heard the news of the
Portland fire which almost killed me. All my father's manuscripts are
destroyed; we always meant to divide them among us and ought to have
done it long ago. I heard of any number of injudicious babies as taking
the inopportune day succeeding the fire to enter on the scene of
desolation; all born in tents. I am sorry my children will never see my
father's church, nor the house where I was born; but private griefs are
nothing when compared with a calamity that is so appalling and that must
send many a heart homeless and aching to the grave. I spent two weeks at
Williamstown, when George came for me, and the weather cooling off, we
had a comfortable journey here. We are perfectly delighted with Dorset;
the sweet seclusion is most soothing, and the house is very pleasant.
Mr. and Mrs. F. are intelligent, agreeable people, and do all they can
to make us comfortable. The mountains are so near that I hear the
crows cawing in the trees. We are making pretty things and pressing an
unheard-of quantity of ferns. We go to the woods regularly every morning
and stay the whole forenoon. In the afternoon we rest, read, write,
etc.; sometimes we drive and always after tea George walks with me about
two miles. I hope the war is not impeding your movements. I suppose you
will call this a short letter, but I think it is as long as is good for
you. All my dear nine pounds gained at Newburgh have gone by the board.
_August 20th._--I am sorry you had such hot weather in Paris, but hope
it passed off as our heat did. Dr. Hamlin's two youngest daughters have
been here, and came to see me; they are both interesting girls, and the
elder of the two really brilliant. They had never been here before, and
were carried away with the beauties of their mother's birthplace. I wish
you could see my room. Every pretty thing grows here and has come to
cheer and beautify it. The woods are everywhere, and as for the views,
oh my child! However, I do not suppose anything short of Mt. Blanc will
suit you now.
In April, 1867, the parsonage on Thirty-fifth street was occupied. It
had been built more especially for her sake, and was furnished by the
generosity of her friends. Her joy in entering it was completed by a
"house-warming," at the close of which a passage of Scripture was read
by Prof. Smith, "All hail the power of Jesus's name" sung, and then the
blessing of Heaven invoked upon the new home by that holy man of God,
Dr. Thomas H. Skinner. Here she passed the next six years of her life.
Here she wrote the larger portion of "Stepping Heavenward." And here the
cup of her domestic joy, and of joy in her God and Saviour often ran
over. Here, too, some of her dearest Christian friendships were formed
and enjoyed.
The summer of 1867 was passed at Dorset. In less than a month of it
she wrote one of her best children's books, _Little Lou's Sayings and
Doings_; and much of the remainder was spent in discussing with her
husband the project of building a cottage of their own. In a letter to
her cousin, Miss Shipman, dated Sept. 21, she writes:
We have had our heads full all summer, of building a little cottage
here. We are having a plan made, and have about fixed on a lot. We are
rather tired of boarding; George hates it, and Dorset suits us as well,
I presume, as any village would. It is a lovely spot, and the people
are as intelligent as in other parts of New England. The Professor is
disappointed at our choosing this rather than Williamstown, but it would
be no rest to us to go there. We have not decided to build; it may turn
out too expensive; but we have taken lots of comfort in talking about
it. We have been on several excursions, one of them to the top of
Equinox. It is a hard trip, fully six miles walking and climbing. I have
amused myself with writing some little books of the Susy sort: four in
less than a month, A.'s sickness taking a good piece of time out of that
period. They are to appear, or a part of them, in the Riverside next
winter, and then to be issued in book-form by Hurd and Houghton. This
will a good deal more than furnish our cottage and what trees and shrubs
we want, so that I feel justified in undertaking that expense. We had
two weeks at Newport before we came here, and Mr. and Mrs. McCurdy
overwhelmed us with kindness, paying our traveling expenses, etc., and
keeping up one steady stream of such favors the whole time. I never
saw such people. How delightful it must be to be able to express such
benevolence! Well; you and I can be faithful in that which is least, at
any rate.
We have all had plenty to read all summer, and have sat out of doors
and read a good deal. I am going now to carry a little wreath to a
missionary's wife who is spending the summer here; a nice little woman;
this will give me a three miles walk and about use up the rest of the
forenoon. In the afternoon I have promised to go to the woods with the
children, all of whom are as brown as Indians. My room is all aflame
with two great trees of maple; I never saw such a beautiful velvety
color as they have. We have just had a very pleasant excursion to a
mountain called Haystack, and ate our dinner sitting round in the grass
in view of a splendid prospect.... I have thus given you the history of
our summer, as far as its history can be written. Its ecstatic joys have
not been wanting, nor its hours of shame and confusion of face; but
these are things that can not be described. What a mystery life is, and
how we go up and down, glad to-day and sorrowful to-morrow! I took real
solid comfort thinking of you and praying for you this morning. I love
you dearly and always shall. Good-bye, dear child.
The "four little books" afford a good illustration of the ease and
rapidity with which she composed. When once she had fixed upon a
subject, her pen almost flew over the paper. Scarcely ever did she
hesitate for a thought or for the right words to express it. Her
manuscript rarely showed an erasure or any change whatever. She
generally wrote on a portfolio, holding it upon her knees. Her pen
seemed to be a veritable part of herself; and the instant it began to
move, her face glowed with eager and pleasurable feeling. "A kitten
(she wrote to a maiden friend) a kitten without a tail to play with,
a mariner without a compass, a bird without wings, a woman without a
husband (and fifty-five at that!) furnish faint images of the desolation
of my heart without a pen." But although she wrote very fast, she never
began to write without careful study and premeditation when her subject
required it.
About this time _The Little Preacher_ appeared. The scene of the story
is laid in the Black Forest. Before writing it she spent a good deal of
time in the Astor Library, reading about peasant life in Germany. In a
letter from a literary friend this little work is thus referred to:
I want to tell you what a German gentleman said to me the other day
about your "Little Preacher." He was talking with me of German peasant
life, and inquired if I had read your charming story. He was delighted
to find I knew you, and exclaimed enthusiastically: "I wish I knew her!
I would so like to thank her for her perfect picture. It is a miracle of
genius," he added, "to be able thus to portray the life of a _foreign_
people." He is very intelligent, and so I know you will be pleased with
his appreciation of your book. He said if he were not so poor, he would
buy a whole edition of the "Little Preacher" to give to his friends.
During the autumn of this year her sister-in-law, Mrs. Edward Payson,
died after a lingering, painful illness. The following letter, dated
October 28, was written to her shortly before her departure:
I have been so engrossed with sympathy for Edward and your children,
that I have but just begun to realise that you are about entering on a
state of felicity which ought, for the time, to make me forget them.
Dear Nelly, _I congratulate you with all my heart._ Do not let the
thought of what those who love you must suffer in your loss, diminish
the peace and joy with which God now calls you to think only of Himself
and the home He has prepared for you. Try to leave them to His kind,
tender care. He loves them better than you do; He can be to them more
than you have been; He will hear your prayers and all the prayers
offered for them, and as one whom his mother comforteth, so will He
comfort them. We, who shall be left here without you, can not conceive
the joys on which you are to enter, but we know enough to go with you to
the very gates of the city, longing to enter in with you to go no more
out. All your tears will soon be wiped away; you will see the King in
His beauty; you will see Christ your Redeemer and realise all He is and
all He has done for you; and how many saints whom you have loved on
earth will be standing ready to seize you by the hand and welcome you
among them! As I think of these things my soul is in haste to be gone;
I long to be set free from sin and self and to go to the fellowship
of those who have done with them forever, and are perfect and entire,
wanting nothing. Dear Nelly, I pray that you may have as easy a journey
homeward as your Father's love and compassion can make for you; but
these sufferings at the worst can not last long, and they are only the
messengers sent to loosen your last tie on earth, and conduct you to the
sweetest rest. But I dare not write more lest I weary your poor worn
frame with words. May the very God of peace be with you every moment,
even unto the end, and keep your heart and mind stayed upon Him!
Mrs. Payson had been an intimate friend of her childhood, and was
endeared to her by uncommon loveliness and excellence of character. The
bereaved husband, with his little boy, passed a portion of the ensuing
winter at the parsonage in New York. There was something about the
child, a sweetness and a clinging, almost wild, devotion to his father,
which, together with his motherless state, touched his aunt to the quick
and called forth her tenderest love. Many a page of Stepping Heavenward
was written with this child in her arms; and perhaps that is one secret
of its power. When, not very long afterwards, he went to his mother,
Mrs. Prentiss wrote to the father:
Only this morning I was trying to invent some way of framing my little
picture of Francis, so as to see it every day before my eyes. And now
this evening's mail brings your letter, and I am trying to believe what
it says is true. If grief and pain could comfort you, you would be
comforted; we all loved Francis, and A. has always said he was too
lovely to live. How are you going to bear this new blow? My heart aches
as it asks the question, aches and trembles for you. But perhaps you
loved him so, that you will come to be willing to have him in his dear
mother's safe keeping; will bear your own pain in future because through
your anguish your lamb is sheltered forever, to know no more pain, to
suffer no more for lack of womanly care, and is already developing into
the rare character which made him so precious to you. Oh do try to
rejoice for him while you can not but mourn for yourself. At the longest
you will not have long to suffer; we are a short-lived race.
But while I write I feel that I want some one to speak a comforting word
to me; I too am bereaved in the death of this precious child, and my
sympathy for you is in itself a pang. Dear little lamb! I can not
realise that I shall never see that sweet face again in this world; but
I shall see it in heaven. God bless and comfort you, my dear afflicted
brother. I dare not weary you with words which all seem a mockery; I can
only assure you of my tenderest love and sympathy, and that we all feel
with and for you as only those can who know what this child was to you.
I am going to bed with an aching heart, praying that light may spring
out of this darkness. Give love from us all to Ned and Will. Perhaps Ned
will kindly write me if you feel that you can not, and tell me all about
the dear child's illness.
* * * * *
II.
Last Visit from Mrs. Stearns. Visits to old Friends at Newport and
Rochester. Letters. Goes to Dorset. _Fred and Maria and Me_. Letters.
The life of a pastor's wife is passed in the midst of mingled gladness
and sorrow. While somebody is always rejoicing, somebody, too, is always
sick or dying, or else weeping. How often she goes with her husband from
the wedding to the funeral, or hurries with him from the funeral to the
wedding. And then, perhaps, in her own family circle the same process
is repeated. The year 1868 was marked for Mrs. Prentiss in an unusual
degree by the sorrowful experience. The latter part of May Mrs. Stearns,
then suffering from an exhausting disease, came to New York and spent
several weeks in hopes of finding some relief from change of scene. But
her case grew more alarming; she passed the summer at Cornwall on the
Hudson in great pain and feebleness, and was then carried home to lie
down on her dying bed.
_To Mrs. Stearns, Newport, July 7, 1868._
We had a dreadful time getting here; I did not sleep a wink; there
were 1,250 passengers on board, almost piled on each other, and such
screaming of babies it would be hard to equal. There are lots of people
here we know; ever so many stopped to speak to us after church. We are
in the midst of a perfect world of show and glitter. But how many empty
hearts drive up and down in this gay procession of wealth and fashion!
I shall think of you a good deal to-day, as setting forth on your
journey and reaching your new home. I do hope you will find it
refreshing to go up the river, and that your rooms will be pleasant and
airy. We shall be anxious to hear all about it.
It is a constant lesson to be with Mrs. McCurdy. I think she is a true
Christian in all her views of life and death. Her sweet patience,
cheerfulness and contentment are a continual reproof to me. Here she
is so lame that she can go nowhere--a lameness of over twenty
years--restricted to the plainest food, liable to die at any moment, yet
the very happiest, sunniest creature I ever saw. She says, with tears,
that God has been _too good_ to her and given her too much; that
she sometimes fears He does not love her because He gives her such
prosperity. I reminded her of the four lovely children she had lost.
"Yes," she says, "but how many lovely ones I have left!" She says that
the long hours she has to spend alone, on account of her physical
infirmities, are never lonely or sad; she sings hymns and thinks over to
herself all the pleasures she has enjoyed in the past, in her husband
and children and devoted servants. She goes up to bed singing, and I
hear her singing while she dresses. She said, the other day, that at
her funeral she hoped the only services would be prayers and hymns of
praise. I think this very remarkable from one who enjoys life as she
does. [4]
_To the Same, Newport, July 20._
George and I went to Rochester, taking M. with us, last Wednesday and
got back Friday night. We had one of those visits that make a mark in
one's life; seeing Mr. and Mrs. Leonard, and Mrs. Randall, and Miss
Deborah, [5] so fond of us, and all together we were stirred up as we
rarely are, and refreshed beyond description. We rowed on Mr. Leonard's
beautiful, nameless lake, fished, gathered water-lilies, ate black
Hamburg grapes and broiled chickens, and wished you had them in our
place. Mr. L.'s mother is a sweet, calm old lady, with whom I wanted to
have a talk about Christian perfection, in which she believes; but there
was no time. It was a great rest to unbend the bow strung so high here
at Newport, where there is so much of receiving and paying visits. I
have been reading a delightful French book, the history of a saintly
Catholic family of great talent and culture, six of whom, in the course
of seven years, died the most beautiful, happy deaths. I am going to
make an abstract of it, for I want everybody I love to get the cream of
it. You would enjoy it; I do not know whether it has been translated.
_To the Same, Dorset, July 26._
Here begins my first letter to you from your old room, whence I hope to
write you regularly every week. That is the one only little thing I can
do to show how truly and constantly I sympathise with you in your sore
straits. It distresses me to hear how much you are suffering, and at the
same time not to be near enough to speak a word of good cheer, or to do
anything for your comfort. It grieves me to find how insecure my health
is, for I had promised to myself to be your loving nurse, should any
turn in your disease make it desirable. Miss Lyman boards here, but
rooms at the Sykes', and her friend Miss Warner is also here, but rooms
out. Miss W. is in delicate health, takes no tea or coffee, and is full
of humor. We have run at and run upon each other, each trying to get
the measure of the other, and shall probably end in becoming very good
friends.
It is a splendid day, and we feel perfectly at home, only missing you
and finding it queer to be occupying your room. What a nice room it is!
How I wish you were sitting here with me behind the shade of these maple
trees, and that I could know from your own lips just how you are in body
and mind. But I suppose the weary, aching body has the soul pretty well
enchained. Never mind, dear, it won't be so always; by and by the tables
will be turned, and you will be the conqueror. I like to think that far
less than a hundred years hence we shall all be free from the law of sin
and death, and happier in one moment of our new existence, than through
a whole life-time here. Rest must and will come, sooner or later, to you
and to me and to all of us, and it will be glorious. You may have seen a
notice of the death of Prof. Hopkins' mother at the age of ninety-five.
But for this terribly hot weather, I presume she might have lived to be
one hundred.
I shall not write you such a long letter again, as it will tire you, and
if you would rather have two short ones a week, I will do that. Let me
know if I tire you. Now good-bye, dear child; may God bless and keep you
and give you all the faith and patience you need.
_To Miss Mary B. Shipman, Dorset, Aug. 2, 1868._
We spent rather more than two weeks at Newport, taking two or three days
to run to Rochester, Mass., to see some of our old New Bedford friends.
We had a charming time with them, as they took us up just where they
left us nearly twenty years ago. Oh, how our tongues did fly! We left
Newport for home on Tuesday night about two weeks ago. I went on board
and went to bed as well as usual, tossed and turned a few hours, grew
faint and began to be sick, as I always am now if I lose my sleep; got
out of bed and could not get back again, and so lay on the floor all
the rest of the night without a pillow, or anything over me and nearly
frozen. The boys were asleep, and anyhow it never crossed my mind to let
them call George, who was in another state-room. He says that when he
came in, in the morning, I looked as if I had been ill six months, and I
am sure I felt so. Imagine the family picture we presented driving from
the boat all the way home, George rubbing me with cologne, A. fanning
me, the rest crying! On Saturday more dead than alive I started for this
place, and by stopping at Troy four or five hours, getting a room and a
bed, I got here without much damage.
Our house is very pretty, and I suppose it will be done by next year.
Oh, how they do poke! George is so happy in watching it, and in working
in his woods, that I am perfectly delighted that he has undertaken this
project. It may add years to his life. Imagine my surprise at receiving
from Scribner a check for one hundred and sixty-four dollars for six
months of Fred and Maria and Me. The little thing has done well, hasn't
it? I feel now as if I should never write, any more; letter-writing is
only talking and is an amusement, but book-writing looks formidable.
Excuse this horrid letter, and write and let me know how you are.
Meanwhile collect grasses, dip them in hot water, and sift flour over
them. Good-bye, dear.
_Fred and Maria and Me_ first appeared anonymously in the Hours at Home,
in 1865. It had been written several years before, and, without the
knowledge of Mrs. Prentiss, was offered by a friend to whom she had
lent the manuscript, to the Atlantic Monthly and to one or two other
magazines, but they all declined it. She herself thus refers to it in
a letter to Mrs. Smith, July 13: "I have just got hold of the Hours at
Home. I read my article and was disgusted with it. My pride fell below
zero, and I wish it would stay there." But the story attracted instant
attention. "Aunt Avery" was especially admired, as depicting a very
quaint and interesting type of New England religious character in the
earlier half of the century. Such men as the late Dr. Horace Bushnell
and Dr. William Adams were unstinted in their praise. In a letter to
Mrs. Smith, dated a few months later, Mrs. Prentiss writes: "Poor old
Aunt Avery! She doesn't know what to make of it that folks make so much
of her, and has to keep wiping her spectacles. I feel entirely indebted
to you for this thing ever seeing the light." When published as a book,
_Fred and Maria and Me_ was received with great favor, and had a wide
circulation. In 1874 a German translation appeared. [6] Although no
attempt is made to reproduce the Yankee idioms, much of the peculiar
spirit and flavor of the original is preserved in this version.
_To Mrs. H. B. Smith, Dorset, August 4, 1868._
Miss Lyman says I have no idea of what Miss W. really is; she looks as
if she would drop to pieces, can not drive out, far less walk, and every
word she speaks costs her an effort. Miss Lyman is not well either; and
what with their health and mine, and A.'s, I see little of them. But
what I do see is delightful, and I feel it to be a real privilege to get
what scraps of their society I can. Our house proves to be far prettier
and more tasteful than I supposed. I am writing up lots of letters, and
if I ever get well enough, shall try to begin on my Katy once more. But
since reading the Récit d'une Soeur, I am disgusted with myself and my
writings. I ache to have you read it. Miss Lyman and Miss Warner send
love to you. I do not like Miss L.'s hacking cough, and she says she
does not believe Miss W. will live through the winter. Among us we
contrive to keep up a vast amount of laughter; so we shall probably live
forever.
_August 18th._--I have enjoyed Miss Lyman wonderfully, but want to
get nearer to her. I see that she is one who does not find it easy to
express her deepest and most sacred feelings. I read Katy to her and
Miss W., as they were kind enough to propose I should, and they made
some valuable suggestions to which I shall attend if I ever get to
feeling able to begin to write again. I am as well as ever save in one
respect, and that is my sleep; I do not sleep as I did before I left
home, while I ought to sleep better, as I work several hours a day in
the woods, in fact do almost literally nothing else.... But after all,
we are having the nicest time in the world. I have not seen George so
like himself for many years; he lives out of doors, pulls down fences,
picks up brushwood, and keeps happy and well. I feel it a real mercy
that his thoughts are agreeably occupied this summer, as otherwise he
would be incessantly worried about Anna. We work together a good deal;
this morning I spoiled a new hatchet in cutting down milkweed where our
kitchen garden is to be and we are literally raising our Ebenezer, which
we mean to conceal with vines in due season. George is just as proud of
our woods as if he created every tree himself. The minute breakfast is
over the boys dart down to the house like arrows from the bow, and there
they are till dinner, after which there is another dart and it is as
much as I can do to get them to bed; I wonder they don't sleep down
there on the shavings. The fact is the whole Prentiss family has got
house on the brain. There, this old letter is done, and I am going to
bed, all black and blue where I have tumbled down, and as tired as tired
can be.
_Aug. 28th._--I made a fire in MY woods yesterday, and another to-day,
when I melted glue, and worked at my rustic basket, and felt extremely
happy and amiable.
_Sept. 13th._--Miss Warner told me to-night that she thought my Katy
story commonplace at the beginning, but that she changed her mind
afterward. Of course I wrote a story about that marigold of G----
W----'s and I am dying to inflict it on you. Then if you like it,
hurrah!
_To Miss Woolsey, Dorset, Aug. 13, 1868._
I was right glad to get your letter yesterday, and to learn a little
of your whereabouts and whatabouts. You may imagine "him" as seated,
spectacles on nose, reading The Nation at one end of the table, and
"her" as established at the other. This table is homely, but has a
literary look, got up to give an air to our room; books and papers are
artistically scattered over it; we have two bottles of ink apiece, and a
box of stamps, a paper cutter and a pen-wiper between us. Two inevitable
vases containing ferns, grasses, buttercups, etc., remind us that we are
in the country, and a "natural bracket" regales our august noses with
an odor of its own. A can of peaches without any peaches in it, holds
a specimen of lycopodium, and a marvelous lantern that folds up into
nothing by day and grows big at night, brings up the rear. But the most
wonderful article in this room is a bookcase made by "him," all himself,
in which may be seen a big volume of Fenelon, Taylor's Holy Living and
Dying, the Récit d'une Soeur, which have you read? Les Soirées de Saint
Petersbourg, Prayers of the Ages, a volume of Goethe, Aristotle's Ethics
and some other Greek books; the Life of Mrs. Fry, etc. etc. Such a queer
hodge-podge of books as we brought with us, and such a book-case! The
first thing "he" ever made for "her" in his mortal life.
Our house isn't done, and what fun to watch it grow, to discuss its
merits and demerits, to grab every check that comes in from magazine and
elsewhere, and turn it into chairs and tables and beds and blankets!
Then for "them boys," what treasures in the way of bits of boards, and
what feats of climbing and leaping! Above all, think of "him" in an old
banged-in hat, and "her" in a patched old gown, gathering brushwood in
their woods, making it up into heaps, and warming themselves by the
fires it is agoing for to make.
"Stick after stick did Goody pull!"
Mr. P. is unusually well. His house is the apple of his eye, and he is
renewing his youth. Thus far the project has done him a world of good.
_To Mrs. Stearns, Dorset, September 13, 1863._
Yesterday Mr. F. and George drove somewhere to look at sand for mortar,
and the horse took fright and wheeled round and pitched George out,
bruising him in several places, but doing no serious harm. But I shudder
when I think how the meaning might be taken out of everything in this
world, for me, at least, by such an accident. He preached all day
to-day; in the afternoon at Rupert. I find my mission-school a good deal
of a tax on time and strength, and it is discouraging business, too. One
of the boys, fourteen years old, found the idea that God loved him so
irresistibly ludicrous, that his face was a perfect study. I often think
of you as these "active limbs of mine" take me over woods and fields,
and remind myself that the supreme happiness of my father's life came to
him when he called himself what you call yourself--a cripple. If it is
not an expensive book, I think you had better buy A Sister's Story, of
which I wrote to you, as it would be a nice Sunday book to last some
time; the Catholicism you would not mind, and the cultivated, high-toned
Christian character you would enjoy.
The boys complain, as George and I do, that the days are not half long
enough. They have got their bedsteads and washstands done, and are now
going to make couches for George and myself, and an indefinite number of
other articles.
_Sept. 20th._--I am greatly relieved, my dear Anna, to hear that you
have got safely into your new home, and that you like it, and long to
see you face to face. George has no doubt told you what a happy summer
we have had. It has not been unmingled happiness--that is not to be
found in this world--but in many ways it has been pleasant in spite of
what infirmities of the flesh we carry with us everywhere, our anxiety
about and sympathy with you, and the other cares and solicitudes that
are inseparable from humanity. I had a great deal of comfort in seeing
Miss Lyman while she was here, and in knowing her better, and now I am
finding myself quite in love with her intimate friend, Miss Warner, who
has been here all summer. A gentler, tenderer spirit can not exist.
Mrs. F.'s brother was here with his wife, some weeks ago, and they were
summoned home to the death-bed of their last surviving child. Mrs. F.
read me a letter yesterday describing her last hours, which were really
touching and beautiful, especially the distributing among her friends
the various pretty things she had made for them during her illness, as
parting gifts. I suppose this will be my last letter from Dorset and
from your old room. Well, you and I have passed some happy hours under
this roof. Good-bye, dear, with love to each and all of your beloved
ones.
_To Miss Eliza A. Warner, Dorset, Sept. 27, 1868._
I was so nearly frantic, my dear Fanny, from want of sleep, that I could
not feel anything. I was perfectly stupid, and all the way home from
East Dorset hardly spoke a word to my dear John, nor did he to me. [7]
The next day he said such lovely things to me that I hardly knew whether
I was in the body or out of it, and then came your letter, as if to make
my cup run over. I longed for you last night, and it is lucky for your
frail body that can bear so little, that you were not in your little
room at Mrs. G.'s; but not at all lucky for your heart and soul. I hope
God will bless us to each other. It is not enough that we find in our
mutual affection something cheering and comforting. It must make us more
perfectly His. What a wonderful thing it is that coming here entire
strangers to each other, we part as if we had known each other half a
century!
I am not afraid that we shall get tired of each other. The great point
of union is that we have gone to our Saviour, hand in hand, on the
supreme errand of life, and have not come away empty. All my meditations
bring me back to that point; or, I should rather say, to Him. I came
here praying that in some way I might do something for Him. The summer
has gone, and I am grieved that I have not been, from its beginning to
its end, so like Him, so full of Him, as to constrain everybody I met to
love Him too. Isn't there such power in a holy life, and have not some
lived such a life? I hardly know whether to rejoice most in my love for
Him, or to mourn over my meagre love; so I do both.
When I think that I have a new friend, who will be indulgent to my
imperfections, and is determined to find something in me to love, I am
glad and thankful. But when, added to that, I know she will pray for me,
and so help my poor soul heavenward, it does seem as if God had been
too good to me. You can do it lying down or sitting up, or when you are
among other friends. It is true, as you say, that I do not think much of
"lying-down prayer" in my own case, but I have not a weak back and do
not need such an attitude. And the praying we do by the wayside, in cars
and steamboats, in streets and in crowds, perhaps keeps us more near to
Christ than long prayers in solitude could without the help of these
little messengers, that hardly ever stop running to Him and coming back
with the grace every moment needs. You can put me into some of these
silent petitions when you are too tired to pray for me otherwise.
I have been writing this in my shawl and bonnet, expecting every instant
to hear the bell toll for church, and now it is time to go. Good-bye,
dear, till by and by.
Well, I have been and come, and--wonder of wonders!--I have had a little
tiny bit of a very much needed nap. Mr. Pratt gave us a really good
sermon about living to Christ, and I enjoyed the hymns. We have had a
talk, my John and I, about death, and I asked him which of us had better
go first, and, to my surprise, he said he thought _I_ should. I am sure
that was noble and unselfish in him. But I am not going to have even a
wish about it. God only knows which had better go first, and which stay
and suffer. Some of His children _must_ go into the furnace to testify
that the Son of God is there with them; I do not know why I should
insist on not being one of them. Sometimes I almost wish we were not
building a house. It seems as if it might stand in the way, if it should
happen I had a chance to go to heaven. I should almost feel mean to do
that, and disappoint my husband who expects to see me so happy there.
But oh, I do so long to be perfected myself, and to live among those
whose one thought is Christ, and who only speak to praise Him!
I like you to tell me, as you do in your East Dorset letter, how you
spend your time, etc. I have an insatiable curiosity about even the
outer life of those I love; and of the inner one you can not say too
much. Good-bye. We shall have plenty of time in heaven to say all we
have to say to each other.
* * * * *
III.
Return to Town. Death of an old Friend. Letters and Notes of Love and
Sympathy. An Old Ladies' Party. Scenes of Trouble and Dying Beds. Fifty
Years old. Letters.
Her return to town brought with it a multitude of cares. The following
months drew heavily upon her strength and sympathies; but for all that
they were laden with unwonted joy. The summer at Dorset had been a very
happy one. While there she had finished _Stepping Heavenward_ and on
coming back to her city home, the cheery, loving spirit of the book
seemed still to possess her whole being. Katy's words at its close were
evidently an expression of her own feelings:
Yes, I love everybody! That crowning joy has come to me at last. Christ
is in my soul; He is mine; I am as conscious of it as that my husband
and children are mine; and His Spirit flows forth from mine in the
calm peace of a river, whose banks are green with grass, and glad with
flowers.
_To Miss Eliza A. Warner, New York, Oct. 5, 1868_
This is the first moment since we reached home, in which I could write
to you, but I have had you in my heart and in my thoughts as much as
ever. We had a prosperous journey, but the ride to Rupert was fearfully
cold. I never remember being so cold, unless it was the night I reached
Williamstown, when I went to my dear sister's funeral.... I have told
you this long story to try to give you a glimpse of the distracted life
that meets us at our very threshold as we return home. And now I'm going
to trot down to see Miss Lyman, whom I shall just take and hug, for I am
so brimful of love to everybody that I must break somebody's bones, or
burst. John preached _delightfully_ yesterday; I wanted you there to
hear. But all my treasures are in earthen vessels; he seems all used up
by his Sunday and scarcely touched his breakfast. I don't see how his or
my race can be very long, if we live in New York. All the more reason
for running it well. And what a blessed, blessed life it is, at the
worst! "Central peace subsisting at the heart of endless agitation."
Good-bye, dear; consider yourself embraced by a hearty soul that
heartily loves you, and that soul lives in E. P.
On the 25th of October Mr. Charles H. Leonard, an old and highly
esteemed friend, died very suddenly at his summer home in Rochester,
Mass. He was a man of sterling worth, generous, large-hearted, and
endeared to Mrs. Prentiss and her husband by many acts of kindness. He
was one of the founders of the Church of the Covenant and had also aided
liberally in building its pleasant parsonage.
_To Miss Eliza A. Warner, New York, Oct. 26, 1868._
I am reminded as I write my date, that I am fifty years old to-day. My
John says it is no such thing, and that I am only thirty; but I begin to
feel antiquated, dilapidated, and antediluvian, etc., etc.
I write to let you know that we are going to Rochester, Mass., to attend
the funeral of a dear friend there. It seems best for me to risk the
wear and tear of the going and the coming, if I can thereby give even a
little comfort to one who loves me dearly, and who is now left without
a single relative in the world. For twenty-four years these have been
faithful friends, loving us better every year, members of our church
in New Bedford, Mercer street, and then here. They lived at Rochester
during the summer and we visited them there (you may remember my
speaking of it) just before we went to Dorset. Mrs. Leonard was then
feeling very uneasy about her husband, but he got better and seemed
about as usual, till last Tuesday, when he was stricken down with
paralysis and died on Saturday. Somebody said that spending so large a
portion of my time as I do in scenes of sorrow, she wondered God did not
give me more strength. But I think He knows just how much to give. I
have been to Newark twice since I wrote you. Mrs. Stearns is in a very
suffering condition; I was appalled by the sight; appalled at the
weakness of human nature (its physical weakness). But I got over that,
and had a sweet glimpse at least of the _eternal_ felicity that is to be
the end of what at longest is a brief period of suffering. I write her
a little bit of a note every few days. I feel like a ball that now is
tossed to Sorrow and tossed back by Sorrow to Joy. For mixed in with
every day's experience of suffering are such great, such unmerited
mercies.
Two or three of the little notes follow:
MY DEAREST ANNA :-I long to be with you through the hours that are
before you, and to help cheer and sustain you in the trial of faith and
patience to which you are called. But unless you need me I will not
go, lest I should be the one too many in your state of excitement and
suspense. We all feel anxiety as to the result of the incision, but
take comfort in casting our care upon God. May Christ Jesus, our dear
Saviour, who loves and pities you infinitely more than any of us do,
be very near you in this season of suspense. I would gladly exchange
positions with you if I might, and if it were best; but as I may not,
and it is not best, because God wills otherwise, I earnestly commend
you to His tender sympathy. If He means that you shall be restored to
health, He will make you happy in living; if He means to call you home
to Himself, He will make you happy in dying. Dear Anna, stay yourself
on Him: He has strength enough to support you, when all other strength
fails. Remember, as Lizzy Smith said, you are "encompassed with
prayers."
_Friday Afternoon_,
MY DEAR ANNA :-I send you a "lullaby" for next Sunday, which I met with
at Dorset, and hope it will speak a little word and sing a little song
to you while the rest are at church. How I do wish I could see you every
day! I feel restless with longing; but you are hardly able to take any
comfort in a long visit and it is such a journey to make for-a short
one! But, as I said the other day, if at any time you feel a little
stronger and it would comfort you even a little bit to see me, I will
drop everything and run right over. It seems hard to have you suffer
so and do nothing for you. But don't be discouraged; pain can't last
forever.
"I know not the way I am going
But well do I know my Guide!
With a childlike trust I give my hand,
To the mighty Friend at my side.
The only thing that I say to Him
As He takes it, is, 'Hold it fast.
Suffer me not to lose my way,
And bring me home at last!'"
MY DEAR ANNA:-I feel such tender love and pity for you, but I know you
are too sick to read more than a few words.
"In the furnace God may prove thee,
Thence to bring thee forth more bright
But can never cease to love thee:
Thou art precious in His sight!"
Your ever affectionate LIZZY.
_To Mrs. Lenard, Friday, Oct. 30, 1858._
We got home safely last evening before any of the children had gone to
bed, and they all came running to meet us most joyfully. This morning I
am restless and can not set about anything. It distresses me to think
how little human friendship can do for such a sorrow as yours. When a
sufferer is on the rack he cares little for what is said to him though
he may feel grateful for sympathy. I found it hard to tear myself away
from you so soon, but all I could do for you there I could do all along
the way home and since I have got here: love you, be sorry for you, and
constantly pray for you. I am sure that He who has so sorely afflicted
you accepts the patience with which you bear the rod, and that when this
first terrible amazement and bewilderment are over, and you can enter
into communion and fellowship with Him, you will find a joy in Him that,
hard as it is to the flesh to say so, transcends all the sweetest and
best joys of human life. You will have nothing to do now but to fly to
Him. I have seen the time when I could hide myself in Him as a little
child hides in its mother's arms, and so have thousands of aching
hearts. In all our afflictions He is afflicted. But I must not weary you
with words. May God bless and keep you, and fully reveal Himself unto
you!
_To Miss. E. A. Warner, New York, Nov. 2, 1868._
I have been lying on the sofa in my room, half asleep, and feeling
rather guilty at the lot of gas I was wasting, but too lazy or too tired
to get up to turn it down. Your little "spray" hangs right over the head
of my bed, an it was it was slightly dilapidated by its journey hither,
I have tucked in a bit of green fern with it to remind me that I was not
always in the sere and yellow leaf, but had a spring-time once. To think
of your going for to go and write verses to me in my old age! I have
just been reading them over and think it was real good of you to up and
say such nice things in such a nice way. I'd no idea you _could!_ We did
not come home from Rochester through Boston; if we had done so I meant
to go and see you. I made it up in many loving thoughts to you on our
twelve hours' journey. Poor Mrs. L. met me with open arms, and I was
thankful indeed that I went, though every word I said in the presence
of her terrible grief, sounded flat and cold and dead. How little
the tenderest love and sympathy can do, in such sorrows! She was so
bewildered and appalled by her sudden bereavement, that it was almost a
mockery to say a word; and yet I kept saying what I _know_ is true, that
Christ in the soul is better than any earthly joy. Both Mr. Prentiss and
myself feel the reaction which must inevitably follow such a strain.
You ask if I look over the past on my birthdays. I suppose I used to do
it and feel dreadfully at the pitiful review, but since I have had the
children's to celebrate, I haven't thought much of mine. But this time,
being fifty years old, did set me upon thinking, and I had so many
mercies to recount and to thank God for, that I hardly felt pangs of any
sort. I suppose He controls our moods in such seasons, and I have done
trying to force myself into this or that train of thought. I am sure
that a good deal of what used to seem like repentance and sorrow for sin
on such occasions, was really nothing but wounded pride that wished it
could appear better in its own eyes. God has been so good to me! I wish
I could begin to realise how good! I think a great many thoughts to you
that I can't put on paper. Life seems teaching some new, or deepening
the impression of some old, lesson, all the time.
You think A. may have looked scornfully at your little "spray." Well,
she didn't; she said, "What's that funny little thing perched up there?
Well, it's pretty anyhow." Among the rush of visitors to-day were Miss
Haines and the W----s. I fell upon Miss W. and told her about you,
furiously; then we got upon Miss Lyman, and it did my very soul good
to hear Miss Haines praise and magnify her. Never shall I cease to be
thankful for being with her at Dorset, to say nothing, dear, of you! Do
you know that there are twelve cases of typhoid fever at Vassar? and
that Miss Lyman is not as well as she was? I feel greatly concerned
about her, not to say troubled. I don't suppose I shall ever hear her
pray. But I shall hear her and help her praise. I don't believe a word
about there being different grades of saints in heaven. Some people
think it modest to say that they don't expect to get anywhere near so
and so, they are so--etc., etc. But I expect to be mixed all up with the
saints, and to take perfect delight in their testimony to my Saviour.
Can you put up with this miserable letter? Folks can't rush to Newark
and to Rochester and agonise in every nerve at the sufferings of others,
and be quite coherent. I have sense enough left to know that I love you
dearly, and that I long to see you and to take sweet counsel with you
once more. Don't fail to give me the helping hand.
The following was written to Mrs. Stearns on her silver-wedding day,
Nov. 15:
MY DEAREST ANNA: I have thought of you all day with the tenderest
sympathy, knowing how you had looked forward to it, and what a contrast
it offers to your bridal day twenty-five years ago. But I hope it has
not been wholly sad. You have a rich past that can not be taken from
you, and a richer future lies before you. For I can see, though through
your tears you can not, that the Son of God walks with you in this
furnace of affliction, and that He is so sanctifying it to your soul,
that ages hence you will look on this day as better, sweeter, than the
day of your espousals. It is hard now to suffer, but after all, the
_light_ affliction is nothing, and the _weight_ of glory is everything.
You may not fully realise this or any other truth, in your enfeebled
state, but truth remains the same whether we appreciate it or not; and
so does Christ. Your despondency does not prove that He is not just as
near to you as He is to those who see Him more clearly; and it is better
to be despondent than to be self-righteous. Don't you see that in
afflicting you He means to prove to you that He loves you, and that you
love Him? Don't you remember that it is His son--not His enemy--that He
scourgeth?
The greatest saint on earth has got to reach heaven on the same terms
as the greatest sinner; unworthy, unfit, good-for-nothing; but saved
through grace. Do cheer and comfort yourself with these thoughts, my
dearest Anna, and your sick-room will be the happiest room in your
house, as I constantly pray it may be! Your ever affectionate Lizzy.
_To Miss E.A.W., New York, Nov. 17, 1868_
You ask how I sleep. I always sleep better at home than elsewhere; this
is one great reason why we decided to have a home all the year round. I
have to walk four or five miles a day, which takes a good deal of time,
these short days, but there is no help for it. I do not think the time
is lost when I am out of doors; I suppose Christ may go with us, _does_
go with us, wherever we go. But I am too eager and vehement, too anxious
to be working all the time. Why, no, I don't think it _wrong_ to want to
be at work provided God gives us strength for work; the great thing is
not to repine when He disables us. I don't think, my dear, that you need
trouble yourself about my dying at present; it is not at all likely that
I shall. I feel as if I had got to be _tested_ yet; this sweet peace, of
which I have so much, almost startles me. I keep asking myself whether
it is not a stupendous delusion of Satan and my own wicked heart. How I
wish I could see you to-night! There is so much one does not like to put
on paper that one would love to say.
_Thursday, 4 P.M._--Well, my lunch-party is over, and my sewing society
is re-organised, and before I go forth to tea, let me finish and
send off this epistle. We had the Rev. Mr. and Mrs. Washburn, of
Constantinople, Dr. Chickering, and Prof, and Mrs. Smith; gave them cold
turkey, cold ham, cold ice-cream and hot coffee; that was about all, for
society in New York is just about reduced down to eating and drinking
together, after which you go about your business.
I am re-reading Leighton on 1st Peter; I wonder if you like it as much
as my John and I do! I hope your murderous book goes on well; then you
can take your rest next summer. Now I must get ready for my long walk
down and over to Ninth st., to see a tiny little woman, and English at
that. Her prayer at our meeting yesterday moved us all to tears.
_To Miss Eliza A. Warner, New York, Nov. 25, 1868_
Mr. Prentiss complained yesterday that no letters came, an unheard-of
event in our family history, and this morning found _twelve_ sticking in
the top of the box; among them was yours, but I was just going off to my
Prayer-meeting, and had to put it into my pocket and let it go too. I
am glad you sent me Mrs. Field's letter and poem; she is a genius, and
writes beautifully. And how glad you must be to hear about your books. I
can't imagine what better work you want than writing. In what other way
could you reach so many minds and hearts? You must always send me such
letters. Before I forget it, let me tell you of a real Thanksgiving
present we have just had; three barrels of potatoes, some apples, some
dried apples, cranberries, celery, canned corn, canned strawberries, and
two big chickens.
_After church, Thursday._--I must indulge myself with going on with my
letter, for after dinner I want to play with the children, and make this
day mean something to them besides pies. For everybody spoke for pies
this year (you know we almost never make such sinful things) and they
all said ice-cream wouldn't do at all, so yesterday I made fourteen of
these enormities, and mean to stuff them (the children, not the pies!)
so that they won't want any more for a year. I want to tell you about
some pretty coincidences; we went to church in a dismal rain, and Mr.
Prentiss preached on the _beauty_ of holiness, and every time he said
anything that made sunshine particularly appropriate, the sun came in in
floods, then disappeared till the next occasion. For instance, he spoke
of the sunshine of a happy home as so much brighter than that of the
natural sun, and the whole church was instantly illuminated; then he
said that if we had each come there with ten million sorrows, Christ
could give us light, when, lo, the church glowed again; and so on
half-a-dozen times, till at last he quoted the verse _"And the Lamb
is the light thereof,"_ when a perfect blaze of effulgence made those
mysterious, words almost startling. And then he wound up by describing
the Tyrolese custom on which Mrs. Field's poem is founded, which he
had himself seen and enjoyed, and of which, it seems, he spoke at East
Dorset last summer at the Sunday-school. [8] I read the poem and letter
to him the instant we got home, and he admired them both. It was a
little singular that her poem and his sermon came to me at almost the
identical moment, wasn't it?
I must tell you about an old ladies' party given by Mrs. Cummings, wife
of him who prepared my father's memoir. [9] She had had a fortune left
to her and was all the time doing good with it, and it entered her head
to get up a very nice supper for twenty-six old ladies, the youngest
of whom was seventy-five (the Portland people rarely die till they're
ninety or so). She sent carriages for all who couldn't walk, and when
they all got together, the lady who described the scene to me, said it
was indescribably beautiful, all congratulating each other that they
were so far on in their pilgrimage and so near heaven! Lovely, wasn't
it? I wish I could spend the rest of my life with such people! Then she
spoke of Mrs. C.'s face during the last six months of her life, when it
had an expression so blest, so seraphic, that it was a delight to look
upon it--and how she had all the members of the ladies' prayer-meeting
come and kiss her good-bye after she was too weak to speak.
And now the children have got together again, and I must go and stay
with them till their bed-time, when, partly for the sake of the walk,
partly because they asked us, we twain are going to see the Smiths.
I rather think, my dear, that if, as you say, you could see all my
thoughts, you would drop me as you would a hot potato. You would see
many good thoughts, I won't deny that, and some loving ones; but you
would also see an abominable lot of elated, conceited, horrid ones;
self-laudation even at good planned to do, and admired before done. But
God can endure what no mortal eye could; He does not love us because we
are so lovely, but because He always loves what He pities. I fall back
upon this thought whenever I feel discouraged; I was going to say _sad_,
but that isn't the word, for I never do feel sad except when I've been
eating something I'd no business to! Good-bye, dearie.
_To the Same, New York, Dec. 3, 1868._
I think I must indulge myself, my dear, in writing to you to-night,
it being really the only thing I want to do, unless it be to lie half
asleep on the sofa. And that I can't do, for there's no sofa in the
room! The cold weather has made it agreeable to have a fire in the
dining-room grate, and this makes it a cheerful resort for the children,
especially as the long table is very convenient for their books,
map-drawing, etc. And wherever the rest are the mother must be; I
suppose that is the law of a happy family, in the winter at least.
The reason I am so tired to-night is that I have been unexpectedly to
Newark. I went, as soon as I could after breakfast, to market, and then
on a walk of over two miles to prepare myself for our sewing-circle! I
met our sexton as I was coming home, and asked him to see what ailed one
of the drawers of my desk that wouldn't shut. We had a terrible time
with it, and I had to take everything out, and turn my desk topsy-turvy,
and your letters and all my other papers got raving distracted, and all
mixed up with bits of sealing-wax, old pens, and dear knows what not,
when down comes A. from the school-room, to say that Mrs. Stearns had
sent for me to come right out, thinking she was dying. I knew nothing
about the trains, always trusting to Mr. Prentiss about that, but in
five minutes I was off, and on reaching the depot found I had lost a
train by ten minutes, and that there wouldn't be another for an hour.
Then I had leisure to remember that Mr. P. was to get home from Dorset,
that I had left no message for him, had hid away all the letters that
had come in his absence, where he couldn't find them; that if it was
necessary for me to stay at Newark all night he would be dreadfully
frightened, etc., etc. Somehow I felt very blue, but at last concluded
to get rid of a part of the time by hunting up some dinner at a
restaurant.
When I at last got to Newark, I found that Mrs. Stearns' disease had
suddenly developed several unfavorable symptoms. She had made up her
mind that all hope was over, had taken leave of her family, and now
wanted to bid me good-bye. She held my hands fast in both hers, begging
me to talk. I spoke freely to her about her death; she pointed up once
to an illumination I gave her last spring: SIMPLY TO THY CROSS I CLING.
"That," she said, "is all I can do." I said all I could to comfort her,
but I do not know whether God gave me the right word or not.
On my return, as I got out of the stage near the corner of our street,
whom should my weary eyes light on but my dear good man, just got
home from Dorset; how surprised and delighted we were to meet so
unexpectedly! M. rushed to meet us, and afterward said to me, "I have
three great reliefs; you have got home; papa has got home; and Aunt Anna
is still alive." My children were never so lovely and loving as they
are this winter; my home is almost too luxurious and happy; such
things don't belong to this world. We have just heard of the death in
Switzerland of Mr. Prentiss' successor at New Bedford, classmate of one
of my brothers, and some one has sent a plaintive, sweet little dying
song written at Florence by him. Now I am too fagged to say another
word.
_Dec. 4th._--"I do not get _any_ time to write; each day brings its own
special work that can't be done to-morrow; as to letters, I scratch them
off at odd moments, when too tired to do anything else. What a resource
they are! They do instead of crying for me. And how many I get every
week that are loving and pleasant!
What do you think of this? I hope it will make you laugh--a lady told me
she never confessed her sins aloud (in prayer) lest Satan should find
out her weak points and tempt her more effectually! And I want to ask
you if you ever offer to pray with people? I never do, and yet there are
cases when nothing else seems to answer. Oh, how many questions of
duty come up every hour, and how many reasons we have every hour to be
ashamed of ourselves!
_Monday morning._--It was a shame to write to you, when I was so tired
that I could not write legibly, but my heart was full of love, and I
longed to be near you. Now Monday has come, a lowering, forbidding day,
yet all is sunshine in my soul, and I hope that may make my home light
to my beloved ones, and even reach you, wherever you are. I am going
to run out to see how Mrs. Stearns is. Our plan is for me to make
arrangements to stay with her, if I can be of any use or comfort. I
literally love the house of mourning better than the house of feasting.
All my long, long years of suffering and sorrow make sorrow-stricken
homes homelike, and I can not but feel, because I know it from
experience, that Christ loves to be in such homes. So you may
congratulate me, dear, if I may be permitted to go where He goes. I
wish you could have heard yesterday's sermon about God's having as
_characteristic, individual_ a love to each of us as we have to our
friends. Think of that, dear, when you remember how I loved you in Mrs.
G.'s little parlor! Can you realise that your Lord and Saviour loves you
infinitely more? I confess that such conceptions are hard to attain....
Can't you do M---- S---- up in your next letter, and send her to me on
approbation? Instead of being satisfied that I've got you, I want her
and everybody else who is really good, to fill up some of the empty
rooms in my heart. This is a rambling, scrambling letter, but I don't
care, and don't believe you do. Well, good-bye; thank your stars that
this bit of paper hasn't got any arms and can't hug you!
_To Mrs. Leonard, New York, Dec. 13, 1868._
There is half an hour before bed-time, and I have been thinking of and
praying for you, till I feel that I _must_ write. I forgot to tell you,
how the verses in my Daily Food, on the day of your dear husband's
death, seem meant for you:
"Thou art my refuge and portion."--Ps. cxliii. 5.
'Tis God that lifts our comforts high,
Or sinks them in the grave;
He gives, and blessed be His name!
He takes but what He gave.
The Lord gave and the Lord hath taken away.--JOB i. 21.
I have had this little book thirty-three years, it has travelled with me
wherever I have been, and it has been indeed my song in the house of my
pilgrimage. This has been our communion Sunday, and I have been very
glad of the rest and peace it has afforded, for I have done little
during the last ten days but fly from one scene of sorrow to another,
from here to Newark and from Newark to Brooklyn.... So I have alternated
between the two dying beds; yesterday Jennie P. went into a convulsion
just as I entered the room, and did not fully come out of it for an hour
and a half, when I had to come away in order to get home before pitch
dark. What a terrible sight it is! They use chloroform, and that has a
very marked effect, controlling all violence in a few seconds. Whether
the poor child came out of that attack alive I do not know; I had no
doubt she was dying till just before I came away, when she appeared
easier, though still unconscious. The family seem nearly frantic, and
the sisters are so upset by witnessing these turns, that I shall feel
that I must be there all I can. I am in cruel doubt which household to
go to, but hope God will direct.
Mr. Prentiss is a good deal withered and worn by his sister's state; he
had never, by any means, ceased to hope, and he is much afflicted. She
and Jennie may live a week or more, or go at any moment. In my long
hours of silent musing and prayer, as I go from place to place, I think
often of you. I think one reason why we do not get all the love and
faith we sigh for is that we try to force them to come to us, instead of
realising that they must be God's free gifts, to be won by prayer....
And now Mr. P. has come up-stairs rolled up in your afghan, and we have
decided to go to both Newark and Brooklyn to-morrow, so I know I ought
to go to bed. You must take this letter as a great proof of my love to
you, though it does not say much, for I am bewildered by the scenes
through which I am passing, and hardly fit therefore to write. What I
do not say I truly feel, real, deep, constant sympathy with you in your
sorrow and loneliness. May God bless you in it.
[1] Dorset is situated in Bennington county, about sixty miles from
Troy and twenty-five miles from Rutland. Its eastern portion lies in a
deep-cut valley along the western slope of the Green Mountain range, on
the line of the Bennington and Rutland railroad. Its western part--the
valley in which Mrs. Prentiss passed her summers--is separated from East
Dorset by Mt. Aeolus, Owl's Head, and a succession of maple-crested
hills, all belonging to the Taconic system of rocks, which contains the
rich marble, slate, and limestone quarries of Western Vermont. In the
north this range sweeps round toward the Equinox range, enclosing the
beautiful and fertile upland region called The Hollow. Dorset belonged
to the so-called New Hampshire Grants, and was organised into a township
shortly before the Revolutionary War. Its first settlers were largely
from Connecticut and Massachusetts. They were a hardy, intelligent,
liberty-loving race, and impressed upon the town a moral and religious
character, which remains to this day.
[2] Mrs. Arthur Bronson, of New York. A life of Mrs. Prentiss would
scarcely be complete without a grateful mention of this devoted friend
and true Christian lady. She was the centre of a wide family circle, to
all of whose members, both young and old, she was greatly endeared by
the beauty and excellence of her character. She died shortly after Mrs.
Prentiss.
[3] While supposing that her brothers had been burnt out and had,
perhaps, lost everything, she wrote to her husband with characteristic
generosity: "If they did not kill themselves working at the fire, they
will kill themselves trying to get on their feet again. Every cent I
have I think should be given them. My father's church and everything
associated with my youth, gone forever! I can't think of anything else."
[4] Mrs. McCurdy died at her home in New York in December, 1876. A few
sentences from a brief address at the funeral by her old pastor will not
be here out of place. "Her natural character was one of the loveliest
I have ever known. Its leading traits were as simple and clear as
daylight, while its cheering effect upon those who came under its
influence was like that of sunshine. She was not only very happy
herself--enjoying life to the last in her home and her friends--but she
was gifted with a disposition and power to make others happy such as
falls to the lot of only a select few of the race. Her domestic and
church ties brought her into relations of intimate acquaintance and
friendship with some of the best men of her times. I will venture to
mention two of them: her uncle, the late Theodore Frelinghuysen, one of
the noblest men our country has produced, eminent alike as statesman,
scholar, and Christian philanthropist; and the sainted Thomas H.
Skinner, her former pastor. Her sick-room--if sick-room is the proper
name--in which, during the last seventeen years, she passed so much of
her time, was tinged with no sort of gloom; it seemed to have two doors,
one of them opening into the world, through which her family and friends
passed in and out, learning lessons of patience and love and sweet
contentment: the other opening heavenward, and ever ajar to admit the
messenger of her Lord, in whatever watch he should come to summon her
home. The place was like that upper chamber facing the sunrising, and
whose name was _Peace_, in which Bunyan's Pilgrim was lodged on the way
to the celestial city. How many pleasant and hallowed memories lead back
to that room!"
[5] Old New Bedford friends.
[6] Fritz und Maria und Ich. Von Mrs. Prentiss. Deutsche autorisirte
Ausgabe. Von Marie Morgenstern. Itzchoe, 1874.
[7] She gave me the pet-name of "Fanny" because she did not like mine,
and there was an old joke about "John."--E. A. W.
[8] The custom related to a pious salutation, with which two _friends_,
or even _strangers_, greet each other, when meeting on the mountain
highways and passes in certain districts of Tyrol. _"Gelobt sei Jesu
Christ!"_ cries one; _"In Ewigkeit, Amen!"_ answers the other (_i.e._,
"Praised be Jesus Christ!" "For evermore, Amen!") The following lines
are from Mrs. F.'s Poem:
"When the poor peasant, alpenstock in hand,
Toils up the steep,
And finds a friend upon the dizzy height
Amid his sheep,
"They do not greet each other as in our
Kind English way,
Ask not for health, nor wish in cheerful phrase
prosperous day;
"Infinite thoughts alone spring up in that
Great solitude,
Nothing seems worthy or significant
But heavenly good;
"So in this reverent and sacred form
Their souls outpour,--
Blessed be Jesus Christ's most holy name!
'For evermore!'"
[9] Rev. Asa Cummings, D.D., of Portland, for many years editor of the
Christian Mirror; one of the weightiest, wisest and best men of his
generation.