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 FLER IHOMPSON 
 
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 SKOI 
 
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 MEMORIAL 
 
 OF 
 
 Eliza Butler Thompson. 
 
 By her daughter. 
 
 3>»{00- 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 ANSON D. F. RANDOLPH & CO., 
 
 900 Broadway, corner Twentieth Street. 
 
Copyright, 1879, 
 By Anson D. F. Randolph & Co. 
 
 Unversity Press: 
 John Wilson and Son, Cambridge. 
 
** gou ran, if van taiW, ht amanrj tfje ht^t of inorncn, 
 suc]^ as make otfjcrs rjlatJ tijat tfjcg incre iorn,'* 
 
 11500? 
 
TJiis sketch was written with the intention of 
 printing it, like the memorial of my two brotJiers^ 
 for family friends. 
 
 OtJiers, outside tJie cirele of relatives, zvho knezv 
 and loved my mother, and sJiared in the missionary 
 wo7'k of her later years, have expressed a wish to read 
 the story of Jier life, and for them it is published. 
 
 E. T. S. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 — ♦ — 
 
 CHAP. PAGE 
 
 I. FAMILY INFLUENCES 7 
 
 11. YOUTH AND MARRIAGE 29 
 
 IIL THE HEAT AND BURDEN OF THE DAY . . 75 
 
 IV. THE EVENING TIME 125 
 
CHAPTER I. 
 FAMILY INFLUENCES. 
 
I. 
 
 FAMILY INFLUENCES. 
 
 " That things are not so ill -with you and vie as 
 they might have been, is half 07ving to the 
 number who lived faithfully a hid Jen life 
 and rest in unvisited tombs. ^^ 
 
 MiDDLEMARCH. 
 
 \ FA]\IILY connection, curious in such matters, 
 -^ ^ has traced Mrs. Thompson's ancestry to a 
 certain nonconformist English clergyman, Stephen 
 Butler, who lived late in the sixteenth century. 
 
 Of the village where his rectory stood we know 
 nothing, and have only scattered hints of the forces 
 that blended in his mould. It is true the same anti- 
 quarian asserts that Stephen and all the Butlers de- 
 scended from a certain Count Brion of Normandy; 
 the name gradually changed to Boteler; and there 
 is record in Froissart's Chronicles of the honorable 
 deeds of Sir John Boteler in 1342. He bore the 
 same name with his ancestor, one of William's knights, 
 who came to England three centuries before. The 
 only definite tradition that remains is of the marked 
 
lo Family hiflitences, 
 
 religiousness of the family. The mottoes on their 
 shields are such as these, — 
 
 "Qu^ Recta Sequor." 
 "Mea Gloria Crux." 
 "Timor Domini Fons ViTyE." 
 
 " SUBLIMIORA PETAMUS." 
 
 So when it came to Stephen Butler to decide 
 between adherence to his convictions and worldly 
 success, he was true to the leading qualities of his 
 race. 
 
 He was one of the two hundred clergymen, in the 
 days of Parker and Laud, who were driven from their 
 livings for their refusal to subscribe to the Three 
 Articles. It is said that in the sermons preached to 
 their parishes on the last Sunday before they were 
 ejected, not one of these clergymen alluded to his 
 personal troubles, but each comforted his people, ex- 
 horting them to Christian faith and patience. *' They 
 knew that they were pilgrims, and looked not much 
 on these things, but lifted up their eyes to Heaven, 
 their dearest country, and quieted their spirits." 
 
 It was on the fly-leaf of his copy of Calamy's book, 
 giving an account of these men, that President Stiles 
 wrote, " Egregiis hisce sit anima mea cum Puritanis." 
 
 Succeeding persecution evidently did not dim the 
 '* Sublimiora " that Stephen Butler " sought," for in 
 1632 we find the name of his descendant. Deacon 
 
Family l7iJliiC7ices, 1 1 
 
 Richard Butler, on the records of the Puritan colony 
 of Cambridge, Mass. 
 
 Richard Butler was one of the company who went 
 through the wilderness in 1636, and formed the set- 
 tlement at Hartford, on the Connecticut River; and 
 more than one of the family lie in the old burial- 
 ground behind the Centre Church. 
 
 A hundred and fifty years later, Daniel Butler went 
 up the river from Hartford to Northampton, and 
 established himself there as a merchant. In 1801 
 his wife, Anna Welsh, died, leaving three children, — 
 Charles Parker, Anna, and Abigail Welsh. 
 
 October 26, 1802, he married Elizabeth Simpkins 
 of Boston. Their fourth child in a family of seven 
 was Elizabeth, born October 4, 1809. 
 
 Elizabeth Simpkins was the daughter of John Simp- 
 kins and Mehetible Kneeland. John Simpkins was 
 long a deacon in the Old North Church, and was the 
 last gentleman in Boston who clung to the fashion of 
 short-clothes and knee-buckles. The knee and shoe 
 buckles are still preserv^ed, with a bit of pink silk 
 from his wife's wedding-dress, remnants of her neck- 
 lace, and her little embroidered wedding-slippers, with 
 the high narrow heels. 
 
 At the time of her marriage to John Simpkins, 
 Mehetible Kneeland was a widow, — Mrs. Torrey. 
 Kneelands had been known in Boston from colonial 
 
1 z Family Influences, 
 
 times. She was descended from John Kneeland, who 
 is supposed to have been of Scotch origin, from the 
 fact that he was one of the founders of the Scots' 
 Charitable Society, estabhshed in Boston in 1657. 
 He was a man of wealth and mark. Beginning as a 
 stone-mason, he built the Old South Churdi and the 
 old Hancock House. He was one of the original 
 members of the Old South. As his fortune in real 
 estate increased, Kneeland Street was named for him. 
 The street extended from Washington (then Orange) 
 Street to the water, which then, in 1777, extended up 
 to Harrison Avenue (then Fleet Street), and at the 
 foot was Kneeland's Wharf. 
 
 His son Samuel printed the first Bible in Boston 
 in 1749. His second son, William, the father of 
 Mehetible, was a physician, President of the Massa- 
 chusetts Medical Society, and a person of note in his 
 time. 
 
 The daughter was trained in a straiter than the 
 straitest sect, in what was called Hopkinsianism, an 
 offshoot of New England Calvinism in the days when 
 the intellectual acuteness of that intellectual com- 
 munity was concentrated on theological science, and 
 everlasting salvation was held almost to hinge on 
 the framing of a sentence. 
 
 Dr. Hopkins taught that the love of self should be 
 so subjected that one ought to be willing to be lost, 
 
Fa77tily Infinences, 1 3 
 
 — were that for God's glory and the general good, — 
 and many earnest souls, through untold spiritual an- 
 guish, strained after that superhuman height of holi- 
 ness. Mehetible Simpkins was one of these, and was 
 famed among the clergy of her day no less for her 
 piety than for her theological learning. 
 
 " Many were the hours," says one of her descend- 
 ants, ** she spent with those stanch old divines, 
 Eckley, Emmons and Dr. Samuel Hopkins, talking 
 over the slow and gradual spread of Unitarianism. 
 When the church in which her husband was deacon 
 went over to that communion, he did not see differ- 
 ence enough to induce him to change ; but she went 
 alone and joined the Old South, the church of her an- 
 cestors. More and more the ministers used to come 
 to seek her counsel. She was regarded as a superior 
 woman, a mother in Israel, a helper in every good 
 work, feeling that every one ought to know and do 
 the right thing." 
 
 Their house was the home of the clergy of the 
 region, in their visits to Boston. They felt it a sort 
 of sin and disgrace to allow a minister to go to a 
 public house. The children found a certain relief 
 from the oppressive awe that surrounded these godly 
 men, in occasional incidents, as when the Rev. 
 Mr. Buckminster was entertained at one time. He 
 retired, full of the theological discussions that had 
 
14 Family Influe^ices. 
 
 been going on. In the night, disturbed by the un- 
 usual noises of the city street, he sprang up and 
 attacked the looking-glass, imagining himself fight- 
 ing with enemies. The crash of the broken glass 
 wakened him and the family simultaneously, with 
 some consternation. 
 
 Her household management did justice to the lofty 
 conceptions of unselfishness which marked her theo- 
 ries. She was a widow with two children, Samuel 
 and John Torrey, and with step-children when she 
 married John Simpkins, a widower with children, and 
 two or three children were born to them. In such a 
 kingdom, with such provinces, she so ruled as to be 
 remembered by every child with love ^nd gratitude. 
 The nobleness of duty overrode the tyranny of feel- 
 ing. With her own personal property she set up 
 one step-son in business. Another son, John, was 
 apprenticed, according to the custom of the times, 
 to a merchant who was to furnish board and clothing 
 while the process of training was going on. Finding 
 a sharp contrast between the old home and the new, 
 John came to her one day desperate and determined. 
 " He could not and would not stay ! He could not 
 bear it, no one could ! " She was quiet till all was 
 said, then calmly began, "John, do you have enough 
 to eat?" "Why yes." "Do you have clothes 
 enough to keep you warm?" "Yes, of course." 
 
Pamily Injliiences. 15 
 
 "Have you a bed to lie on at night?" "Yes." 
 " Then go back and fulfil your part. You have 
 nothing to complain of." 
 
 Fortunately there was enough of the same sturdy 
 fibre in the boy to respond to the somewhat heroic 
 treatment ; he went back, and lived to tell the story 
 in days of wealth and success. A gray-haired grand- 
 child ruefully recalls an instance of similar manage- 
 ment. He was visiting her when a little boy, and 
 had been promised as a great treat that he should 
 go with her to the Old South on Sunday afternoon. 
 He went out to play a little in the garden beforehand, 
 and when he came in found, to his bitter disappoint- 
 ment, that she had gone. She explained, on return- 
 ing, that if he did not care enough about going to 
 attend to the bell and come in when it rang, she did 
 not think it worth while to call him. She was a very 
 typical New England dame of the days of strong 
 nerves, few words, and excellent sense. She was not 
 quite so tender as true ; but the world perhaps was 
 not so universal a hospital then as now, and the ex- 
 hortation as to the lame and those that are out of 
 the way, " letting them rather be healed " than am- 
 putated, might not have been so essential. 
 
 In the month of May, 1802, a party of clergymen 
 and others were dining at the house. The conversa- 
 tion turned on the wants of the world and the dark- 
 
1 6 Family Influences, 
 
 ness of the heathen. Just as one good man set down 
 his empty wine-glass with a sigh over the sad state 
 of things, Mrs. Simpkins said, with sudden courage, 
 *' Gentlemen, I have often thought if every one of 
 you would, for every glass of wine you drink, give 
 one cent toward sending Bibles to the destitute, a 
 great work might be done." She spoke with a smile, 
 but the words were born of long-smothered ponder- 
 ing and prayer. 
 
 ** Well, well, here is my penny," said her hus- 
 band, laying it on the table, and the others followed 
 in a gallant little way, to humor a woman's playful 
 word. 
 
 The subject turned and the dinner went on. As 
 they rose from the table, each put the cent back into 
 his pocket, as the jest was over. Just as John Simp- 
 kins took up his, the wife quietly laid her hand over 
 it, saying, " No, my dear, you have given this to the 
 Lofd. Do not take it." He laughed, wondering at 
 her whim, not knowing or caring what was beneath 
 the words. 
 
 But when the moment for action, long desired, had 
 come, she went to her room and drew up a consti- 
 tution for a Cent Society, which stirs us yet by its 
 suppressed fervor and direct appeal. 
 
 The original paper remains, and reads as fol- 
 lows : — 
 
Family Iiiflttences. 1 7 
 
 " To the Friends of Religion. 
 
 ** A single cent, where millions are needed to carry 
 into effect the benevolent designs of our Fathers and 
 Brethren, who are engaged in sending the Gospel to 
 lands unenlightened with its genial rays, may appear 
 at first view small and inconsiderable; but should 
 the Friends of Zion adopt the plan of only one cent 
 a week and recommend the same practice to their 
 friends and connections, it is supposed a respectable 
 sum, without inconvenience to individuals, may be 
 collected to be applied to the purchase of Primers, 
 Dr. Watts' Psalms and Hymns, Catechisms, Divine 
 Songs for Children, and Bibles. Mrs. John Simp- 
 kins requests those who are disposed to encourage 
 this work that they would send in their names with 
 their money (quarterly, or as shall be most agree- 
 able to them), and she will engage to deposit the 
 same with the treasurer of the Massachusetts Mis- 
 sionary Society, for the important purpose of aiding 
 that very laudable institution. 
 
 "Boston, 26 May, 1802." 
 
 Names of subscribers and places of abode follow, — 
 twenty-three names, and all of Boston, — and the first 
 woman's missionary society in New England, prob- 
 ably the first in this country, was formed. 
 
1 8 Family Influences, 
 
 With this constitution there is a receipt, dated 
 May 30, 181 1, acknowledging '' eight hundred dollars 
 and one cent from Mrs. Mehetible Simpkins," and 
 signed by " D. Hopkins and Samuel Spring, Com- 
 mittee." 
 
 There is, besides, a little book, belonging evidently 
 a year or two later, with a longer additional address, 
 stating that since the organization of the society it 
 had received about eighteen hundred dollars. It is 
 headed : " Despise not the day of small things," 
 and closes as follows : " By these inconsiderable 
 means many Bibles and other pious books have 
 been put into the hands of the poor and destitute, 
 and it is hoped we may still be encouraged by the 
 prospect of great good in future, which by these 
 small appropriations may arise, for those who sit in 
 darkness to be brought into God's marvellous light. 
 Clirist noticed tJie ividoiv s mite.'' 
 
 The little grandchild, Elizabeth Butler, born in 
 Northampton in 1809, inherited in a marked degree 
 many of Mrs. Simpkins's characteristic traits. She 
 had the same reality of nature, moral earnestness 
 and persistency of purpose, with a certain soundness 
 of judgment and strong conscientiousness. 
 
 Nothing is left of the old home on Pleasant Street 
 now, but the great elms and the horse-chestnuts 
 which Mrs. Butler planted the first season after she 
 
Family Influences. 19 
 
 came a bride from Boston to Northampton. Tl;ie 
 deep garden that stretched back from the house, 
 where there were such races with Hector the dog, 
 and flowers that blossomed from the time of snow- 
 drops till frost, is covered with railway tracks and 
 buildings. The house itself was torn down last year, 
 so that now there is just the vacant green space 
 under the shadow of the trees. Riding by in a 
 lovely May afternoon, it seemed as if the house with 
 all its memories had been buried under that shade 
 " in sure and certain hope." 
 
 " How you children would have loved your grand- 
 father ! " was one of mother's common exclama- 
 tions, especially when some merry mood was on us. 
 He is remembered as tall and very stout, yet with 
 the lightest step in the house, with twinkling blue 
 eyes, the sunniest, kindliest temper, altogether the 
 dearest, merriest old gentleman who was ever hugged 
 and kissed and scrambled over by half a dozen chil- 
 dren at once, the delight of his own little girls and 
 boys and of all the small people of the neighborhood. 
 
 The hearty good-humor and love of diffusing joy 
 and physical comfort, the social, genial traits in the 
 household, were inherited from him. The Simpkins 
 home with all its excellences had been a little 
 austere, and Mrs. Butler with her numerous good 
 qualities had brought with her a slight tendency to 
 
20 Family Influences, 
 
 gloom. The lack of entire cheerfulness and content- 
 ment which is remembered was partly due, besides, 
 to habitual ill-health. Always delicate and liable 
 to frequent illnesses, with the most exacting ideal of 
 housekeeping and needlework, it is not strange that 
 with the care of three children at first, and subse- 
 quently of her own seven who grew up around her, 
 her spirits should not have been always buoyant. 
 There was, besides, a deeper reason. While she was 
 still quite young, her sister Sallie, one to whom she 
 was very tenderly attached, married Captain Bur- 
 roughs. Sallie was always frail, and soon faded away. 
 Some time after her death the affection which had 
 existed between Elizabeth and Captain Burroughs 
 deepened into love. He had sailed away and come 
 safely home from many voyages. There was now to 
 be one more to make his fortune sure, and on his 
 return from this voyage they were to be married. 
 His parting gift to her, just before sailing, is still pre- 
 served ; a pair of bracelet-clasps on which is painted 
 a maiden leaning in a pensive attitude against the 
 trysting-tree, holding in her hand a wreath. Over 
 her head is the motto '* Present or absent, ever dear." 
 With the paint was mixed a lock of the sister's hair 
 dissolved in an acid. 
 
 When he had been some time gone, Elizabeth one 
 night dreamed that she was standing on the shore, 
 
Family Influences. 21 
 
 looking out to sea, and saw his vessel. While she 
 was still watching it, a cloud suddenly fell and shut 
 it out from her sight. She woke with the saddest 
 impression that she should see him no more. After 
 a time a returning merchantman brought the news 
 that confirmed the forewarning. They had spoken 
 Captain Burroughs's ship just at nightfall. His vessel 
 was disabled from a storm, and they urged him to 
 leave it and come on board. He refused steadily, 
 saying he could not leave the cargo intrusted to 
 him, while one chance remained of saving it. In 
 the morning his ship had disappeared. That sorrow, 
 though it was out of sight, tinged all her after-life. 
 
 It was the common way of complimenting the 
 mother, to jest with the daughters and tell them 
 they would never be as handsome as she. Her 
 figure was tall and graceful, and her features regular, 
 with large dark eyes and an expression of refine- 
 ment. Her cheeks, when she lay in her coffin, still 
 retained a trace of the clear red which never left 
 them. Her children were instructed in household 
 arts with conscientious exactness. The sampler v;ent 
 with the catechism, for whatever the chief end of 
 man was found to be, the chief end of woman was 
 to " take two and leave two " as to threads in stitch- 
 ing, to cut out garments with economy, and ** beat 
 separately" the whites and yolks of innumerable eggs 
 
2 2 Family Infl2iences. 
 
 for the cakes which were the culmination of good 
 housewifery. The two housemaids were kept suffi- 
 ciently employed without being intrusted with the 
 finer mysteries of cooking; and Elizabeth was hardly 
 more than a little girl when she began to be chief 
 assistant, the one to wait upon her mother when the 
 great concoctions were proceeding, the faithful little 
 nurse in sickness. That she was willing to be relied on 
 was reason enough, as things were, why she should 
 take responsibility very early. Circumstances all 
 combined to develop her strong moral traits, and 
 duty, not enjoyment, was becoming the law of her life. 
 Of the three half brothers and sisters, Abby was 
 the one to whom she was most attached. How often 
 did she say, looking back to her childhood, *' Your 
 Aunt Abby was not so pretty as her sister Anne, 
 but she had a strong character. If she had lived, I 
 should have been very different. She was the only 
 one who really understood me. She took great 
 pains with me, talked with me about my faults, 
 showed me how to correct them, and used often to 
 say, ' Eliza, you have the material for a fine char- 
 acter if you can only conquer yourself I loved her 
 dearly, and when she talked with me about my irri- 
 tability and fondness for having my own way, and 
 explained how to guard against temptation, I felt 
 drawn to her all the more. I knew she loved me, 
 
Family Influences. 23 
 
 and I clung to her with all my heart." Abby's fatal 
 illness was lingering and long, but the little sister 
 Elizabeth was untiring in her devotion to her. Many 
 years after some one asked her, " How did you ac- 
 quire your wonderful skill in nursing?" *' I began 
 early," she said, and described her experience in 
 Abby's illness. " I loved her, and wanted so to stay 
 with her and to be of use to her, I tried my very best to 
 learn to wait upon her in the right way, and it ended 
 in my being permitted to remain in the sick-room 
 almost constantly." 
 
 When Abby died, it was a deep, permanent grief. 
 The child heart ached long from loss and the pe- 
 culiar loneliness that falls when one goes who holds 
 a key to our inner life. No after-friendship effaced 
 Abby's memory. Fifty years- later she could not 
 speak of her without a wistful, far-off look in her 
 eyes and a shadow on her lips. A lock of auburn 
 hair was found carefully preserved in her desk, 
 marked " Sister Abby," side by side with letters 
 from the half-brother Charles, — old yellow letters, 
 folded square and directed to '' Daniel Butler, Mer- 
 chant." Charles had a passion for the sea in his 
 boyhood, which his father opposed at first. Finally, 
 by the advice of friends, he sent him on a voyage 
 before the mast, with a captain whom he knew. It 
 was an effectual cure. He left home when the little 
 
24 Family Influences, 
 
 girls were very young, and while on a business trip, 
 died suddenly of yellow-fever, at Bayou St. Louis, 
 September 15, 1820. There was always a romance in 
 mother's mind connected with the bits of pretty 
 glass and china Charles had brought home from that 
 one voyage. They seemed inwrought with her first 
 dim, childish impressions of foreign lands, with the 
 strangeness of his sudden death and burial in the far- 
 away South. 
 
 Among other notable ways brought by Eliza's 
 mother from the good town of Boston, was that of 
 having all little girls taught how to make an entire 
 shirt before they were seven years old. This the 
 oldest daughter duly proceeded to accomplish, setting 
 so many careful, faithful stitches in the linen, and feel- 
 ing well rewarded for all her toil by her father's kiss, 
 w^hen it was presented to him. Just as conscien- 
 tiously she learned all varieties of embroidery on 
 linen and canvas and lace, all sorts of hemstitching 
 and cross-stitching, cushions and needle-books, which 
 were a marvel of exquisite finish and exact construc- 
 tion ; meanwhile she was being initiated more and 
 more deeply into the art of elaborate cookery, the 
 adaptations of sauces and gravies, the exact propor- 
 tions of brandy and wine in plum-puddings and 
 .mince-pies, the construction of perfect salads and 
 soups, and feathery tarts and jellies of which it 
 
Family Influences, 25 
 
 does not behoove a dyspeptic generation even to 
 dream. 
 
 Those were the days when the decrees of God 
 were held responsible for gastric fevers, and the 
 demijohn of " elixir pro." was the end of all strife. 
 
 The physician's word was as positive law in the 
 physical realm as the minister's in the spiritual, and 
 what physician in New England in our grandmother's 
 days ever suggested prevention rather than cure? 
 So the generous table was spread day after day, 
 with every thing that skill could devise; and the 
 fame of Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners spread 
 far and wide among the cousins and connections, to 
 whom the hearty hospitality of the house made even 
 the memory of the Pleasant Street home bright. 
 The best varieties of apples and pears, cider from the 
 farmer on the Pelham hills, who knew how to make 
 it exactly right, wine on the sideboard for callers, — 
 all had a certain importance as essential to physical 
 comfort. A Grahamite in cooking would have been 
 looked upon in their circle with as ill-concealed dis- 
 gust as a tor}' in politics or a liberal in theology. 
 
 Stanch whigs on both sides, strict Calvinists on 
 the mother's, girls and boys talked politics in the 
 week-time with as much zeal as if the daughters ex- 
 pected to vote with the sons ; and on Sundays settled 
 down to the catechism and Parson Williams's long 
 
26 Family Influences. 
 
 sermons, filling the square pew and getting a certain 
 discipline of endurance, till he came to the point 
 they were watching for, — "Let us now pass to the 
 application." 
 
 Not even when the damask roses were in bloom, 
 and orioles singing in the elm-trees, was a walk down 
 the garden allowed on that one long day of the week ; 
 yet in such a merry, affectionate household there 
 were a thousand reliefs, and Avhatever else was missed 
 they were sure to feel, at least on Sunday, that re- 
 ligion, as she understood it, was in the mother's mind 
 the one essential thing. 
 
 Eliza grew up very pretty. Her complexion was a 
 marvellous pink and white, her figure slender and 
 round, clear gray eyes, and curling dark hair. " We 
 used to think," says a sister, ** that Eliza would be a 
 perfect beauty, except for her mouth, for the teeth 
 were a little irregular." 
 
 She was so absolutely free from vanity or self- 
 consciousness as often to neglect the common girlish 
 arts for making one's self attractive. She hardly 
 knew or cared what ribbon became her, or how she 
 looked on any occasion. But suddenly one day her 
 mother awoke to the fact of her beauty, and the effect 
 on her white forehead of a particularly lovely curl 
 that formed itself naturally on the right side. Eliza 
 was solemnly summoned, and the curl cut off, *' for 
 
Family Influejices. 27 
 
 fear it would make her vain ! " — a touch of asceticism 
 whose absurdity nothing could hinder her strong 
 common-sense from condemning then and always. 
 The lock never grew long, but lay always in little 
 crinkles and waves very unconquerable, very trouble- 
 some in the wind, and very dear to those who loved 
 her face. In her matronhood, she said, with that 
 simplicity which never forsook her, '' It had never 
 entered m)' mind that I was pretty, but the short 
 lock has given me a great deal of trouble. I never 
 saw the necessity for cutting it off." 
 
 Nearly every spring, though she was not thought 
 delicate, she drooped and sank into slow fever, and 
 remembered always her feeling of lassitude and the 
 weariness of gradual creeping back to her old condi- 
 tion. But even then that spirit of *' making the best 
 of things " was strong within her, and she yielded to 
 inaction only so long as she must. As soon as possi- 
 ble she was again at her work-basket, always so care- 
 fully supplied with thread and needles and all other 
 appliances, the resort of younger sisters in all cases 
 of need, to the great trial of her patience ; or she was 
 running in the garden with Hector, the big dog whom 
 they all loved so much, or looking after the flowers 
 which her mother took vast pains to have blooming 
 all through the season. When Lafayette made his 
 tour of New England, in 1825, she was one of the 
 
28 Family Influences. 
 
 company of young girls who went out, dressed in 
 white, to scatter flowers in his way. Her love of 
 flowers and all external nature was evident very 
 early. Mt. Holyoke and Mt. Tom were personal 
 friends. That beautiful valley is dear to every one 
 who grows up in it, and nowhere lovelier than at that 
 river-bend which holds Northampton. Song and 
 story have since celebrated the charm of the old 
 town and the exquisite landscape, the view of the 
 meadows from the mountain, and the view of the 
 mountains from Round Hill, the great old tree 
 where Jonathan Edwards sat to write his sermons, 
 the glory of the elms in summer and the maples in 
 autumn, and the attraction of its refined society. It 
 all grew into the very soul of the children who played 
 under those trees, hunted wild-flowers in the meadows, 
 and picked arbutus every spring on the hills, had May 
 parties and crowned May queens, in the days when 
 the war of 1812 was the last event, before letters 
 were put in envelopes, when Monroe was president, 
 steamships and railways and the telegraph unknown, 
 and the semi-weekly Boston stage-coach the closest 
 connection Northampton had with the great outside 
 world. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 YOUTH AND MARRIAGE. 
 
II. 
 
 YOUTH AND MARRIAGE. 
 
 *' So from t/u heights of Will 
 Life's parting stream descends^ 
 
 And, as a moment turns its slender rill. 
 
 Holmes. 
 
 Each widening torrent bends^ 
 
 ** These are they that folloio the Lamb "whither- 
 soever he goeth^ 
 
 St. John. 
 
 "PORTUNATELY for my mother and those who 
 were to come after, the graded-school system 
 did not exist in her childhood. 
 
 There was no iron six-hours regime, with examina- 
 tions for promotion and the fever of hurry and com- 
 petition, to burn out the Hfe of young girls, while 
 individuality is buried under routine. Unfortunately 
 nothing better was in its place. 
 
 The daughter who had been trained in needle-work 
 and domestic management, taught the spelling and 
 grammar of her native tongue, geography, history, 
 and arithmetic, might or might not push on toward sci- 
 ence and the knowledge of other languages. If she had 
 
32 Youth and Marriage. 
 
 a strong intellectual bent and was favorably situated, 
 she could sometimes snatch what hung a little too 
 high for her. Ordinarily, with the prevailing opinion 
 that the ideal woman might be ignorant, though she 
 must be good, and owed a limitless duty to every thing 
 and every person about her, excepting to her own intel- 
 lect, girls accepted the situation, smothered their won- 
 der why there were not colleges for them as well as for 
 boys, and stitched into the wristbands and collars of 
 the brothers who were starting for Yale or Harvard, 
 their silent puzzle and longing. Smith College is 
 one of the first objects of interest to the stranger who 
 visits Northampton now; but it was fifty years too 
 late for the young girl who in 1825 had finished re- 
 citing history, drawing maps, copying extracts from 
 Percival, and running through the paradigms of the 
 first Latin Lessons. 
 
 There was no one to observe in her well-formed 
 head, her uncommon perseverance in noticing and in- 
 vestigating natural processes and classifying natural 
 objects, in her indifference to trifles and enthusiasm 
 for worthy ends, her soundness of judgment and 
 strength of purpose, indications of a mind that would 
 repay special training. 
 
 It was left for those who saw her collecting mosses 
 and shells when she was past sixty, valuing them not 
 wholly for their beauty, but delighting in the ugliest 
 
Youth and Marriage. 33 
 
 brown bit if it were a specimen of a class, to detect in 
 her the genuine scientific spirit, and to say as many did, 
 " What might she not have done in a special depart- 
 ment if she had been educated for it ! " 
 
 " I was generally considered a good scholar," she 
 wrote once to a friend, " and was so, according to the 
 system of instruction at that time. I learned easily 
 and loved to learn, but was not required to under- 
 stand. There was no one to superintend my studies, 
 and though I wanted to go beyond the common 
 English branches, my father thought it unnecessary. 
 When I left school I was supposed to have a very 
 good education." Years afterward, when she was 
 twenty- two, she began a course of study with Miss 
 Margaret Dwight, taking Euclid, mental philosophy, 
 and some other branches, writing careful abstracts. 
 It was valuable to her, though interrupted before it was 
 completed. She painted a little and well, flowers 
 and fruit, — sweet-brier, white lilies, and a little red 
 apple on a blue plate, still remaining as specimens of 
 her skill. 
 
 In her correspondence with her cousin, Anne 
 Payson, there is allusion to the books in which they 
 both were interested, Anne asking her if she has 
 read ** Saratoga," and whether the hero does not 
 remind her of Sir Charles Grandison. 
 
 Dancing and dancing-parties the small Eliza en- 
 
 3 
 
34 Youth and Marriage. 
 
 joyed heartily. In a letter written by her brother 
 John, just after returning to Yale from vacation, he 
 asks her '' how the agricultural ball passed off," and 
 says *' he is glad she did not go," as he does not 
 quite approve of so much gayety for so very young 
 girls, *' grandchildren dancing with their venerable 
 ancestors." 
 
 She was then thirteen. It could not have been 
 long after, that she made the visit to her Aunt Welles 
 in Hartford. Mrs. Welles was a sister of her father, 
 living on what was so long known as the W^elles 
 place, on Washington Street, and was quite blind. 
 That visit she always recalled with great interest. 
 My mother liked to describe the marvellous patience 
 of her aunt, her moving about the house without 
 help, her way of saying, if a thing was lost, *' I will 
 find it; " her going to closets and bureau drawers 
 and producing articles which others who could see 
 had vainly searched for; and the instinct which 
 guided her, on entering a room, directly to the guest 
 she wished to welcome, without hesitation or awk- 
 wardness. 
 
 The little niece sprang one evening to get a lamp 
 for her aunt who was going upstairs, and never forgot 
 the tone in which she answered, " My dear, the dark- 
 ness and the light are alike to me." 
 
 Mrs. Welles regretted, in her hearing one day, that 
 
Youth and Marriage. 35 
 
 no one in the different families had her name. So 
 easy a way of giving happiness did not escape the 
 notice of the child. She insisted that she would take 
 it, and did so, ever after signing her name with the W. 
 The Elizabeth of her christening had some time before 
 passed into Eliza, to avoid confusion with a cousin, 
 Elizabeth Butler, living on the same street. 
 
 After John had gone to college, the next event 
 that stirred the current of the family life was Eliza's 
 winter in Boston. She was invited by Mrs. Rollins, 
 a cousin, and set out with much of the same excited 
 anticipation with which a young Boston girl would 
 start for Paris now. The blue silk pelisse in which 
 she was arrayed is in existence still, with its belt 
 too short for any but the very slenderest waists that 
 have tried it, in tableaux, since, and wide balloon-like 
 sleeves, — '' mutton-legs," as they were called. 
 
 The faithful little thimble was packed away, there 
 was the last hug of Hector the dog, tears and kisses 
 all round the little group of which she was just then 
 the centre ; and the gray-eyed girl, with pinker roses 
 in her cheeks than ever, set out in the stage-coach 
 for the long journey, and her first glimpse of the 
 great world. That winter was an episode ever kept 
 quite by itself in her memory. To trace just the 
 effect of all the new experience, and to picture the 
 artless, strong, direct nature in its first contact with 
 
36 Youth and Marriage, 
 
 society as she was introduced to it on Beacon Street, 
 would need a master's skill. One can see it better 
 than say it. The theatre disappointed her ; she was 
 taken to witness different plays, but she said it all 
 seemed unreal. Reason overbalanced imagination 
 in her mind, and the "make believe" did not seem 
 to her worth while. Parties and balls had a zest. 
 The white satin bodice and scant India muslin, with 
 which she wore pomegranates and cherry ribbons, 
 were found years after, in the days when she had 
 come to look back on all that as a sin, and made the 
 occasion of half-reluctant descriptions of other lovely 
 costumes in which she danced away the night. It 
 was her delight, though she was strangely uncon- 
 scious of the charming picture she must have made, 
 with her fair face and waving hair, the exquisitely 
 turned arms, tapering to the slender wrist, and the 
 perfectly moulded hand, covered, but not concealed, 
 by the long kid gloves it was the fashion to wear, 
 nearly to the elbow. The only point of personal 
 beauty in which she ever confessed any satisfaction, 
 was a certain turn of foot and ankle, tapering and 
 with very high instep, which pleased her because it 
 was like her father's. 
 
 Her letters describing what she saw, and her new 
 sensations that season, her seventeenth winter, are 
 not to be found ; but those from home were care- 
 
YoiUh and Marriage, 37 
 
 fully folded away in her desk. They give glimpses 
 of a cheery, affectionate family life : the sister tells of 
 all the calls and visits ; Daniel describes how early 
 Nancy, the maid, woke him the ist of January, by 
 her '* Happy New Year!" at his door; and John 
 caresses and teases all in one breath. That she was 
 dearly loved and sorely missed is very plain. There 
 are sly allusions to her as " a young lady of fashion," 
 and hints of increasing sensitiveness to matters of 
 dress, in Maria's remark, ** If you do not like the 
 shape of the cap mother made you, send it back; " 
 and was it then or earlier she experienced misery in 
 having square-toed shoes bought for her when round 
 toes were in fashion? 
 
 One cannot repress a heartache, though her own 
 pangs were so long ago over, at the sudden breaking- 
 off of that joyful, free winter. All was still at high 
 tide, the dance with the officers at the Navy Yard ball, 
 concerts here and calls there, and long-anticipated 
 visits to cousins in Charlestown and elsewhere still in 
 prospect, when Sister Anne's letters begin to grow 
 mysterious. Hitherto they had been full of elaborate 
 advice on behavior and obligations, — "Do not let 
 the reputation of Northampton ladies, for good man- 
 ners, suffer at your hands." '' Appear properly on 
 all occasions, and keep us advised of your move- 
 ments." But now, after various inexplicable hints 
 
38 Youth and Marriage, 
 
 from Anne and mystifications on the part of the big 
 brothers, it comes out that Anne has promised to 
 marry Mr, B., a gentleman from the South, with five 
 children, and directly it is suggested that Eliza has 
 been gone from home some time. She clings to the 
 carrying out of her bright plans ; but the suggestions 
 become more definite, and at last comes the letter 
 which says, ** We must have your assistance in prep- 
 arations for the approaching wedding. You know 
 you are a dabster at work, and we want your help." 
 The postscript signed '' Your aff. father, D. Butler," 
 announced " that her passage is engaged in Thurs- 
 day's stage, and they shall expect her." So the 
 trunk was packed, rather soberly, w^e must think. 
 No more flutter under the little satin bodice; but 
 before the journey is over, loving thoughts of home 
 have partly covered the disappointment, and the 
 thimble comes out again, the gay pictures begin 
 to retire to the background, after all the stories have 
 been told and the pretty things exhibited, and while 
 she thinks she is only helping, as a sister should, 
 to make Anne's wedding-dresses, the currents have 
 changed, bearing her quite away from one shore and 
 towards the opposite. While they sat sewing, the 
 fates were weaving one more strong thread into the 
 character of the young girl, and drawing her closer to 
 the company of the elect, who are " not to be min- 
 istered unto, but to minister." 
 
Yotith and Marriage, 39 
 
 There is a strange sensation in taking up the 
 package of faded letters, tied with white ribbon, the 
 first of which has the news of Anne's engagement. 
 In the next there is the stir of preparation, the descrip- 
 tion of the house that is to be built, — and there it 
 stands still, white and stately on Round Hill ; then 
 after the wedding, the journals of the trip undertaken 
 within the year for Anne's failing health ; the account 
 of her cough, which is "a little better," — those coughs 
 that are always '* a little better." More serious letters 
 follow, in which Anne pours out the soul experiences 
 of the past years, which in health she had found it 
 impossible to utter to them. She tells them through 
 what doubts and conflicts she came to faith and joy- 
 ful trust in Christ ; then no more from Anne, but the 
 rest in her husband's handwriting, saying, " She fails 
 but is wonderfully supported, that her peace is some- 
 thing marvellous, that death has no terror, and heaven 
 a home of rapture to her thought," and soon that all 
 is over and " our precious Anne is no more." In the 
 next enclosure are the green leaves from her grave in 
 Petersburg, Va. 
 
 During that year Eliza had much care of the little 
 children who were left behind in the home on the 
 Hill, while the invalid mother was travelling. She 
 was at the house every day, and dearly loved Lucy, 
 the youngest little girl, with her sweet ways and 
 
40 Youth and Marriage, 
 
 pretty *' Din Aunt Izy," when she was tossed up and 
 caught. The child fell suddenly ill, and died before 
 the father's return. It was a sharp pain to the tender 
 heart that loved so deeply and so long when it loved 
 at all. To the last of her life her eyes grew dim 
 whenever she spoke of the child. 
 
 ** I never could understand," says a cousin, who 
 was very intimate in their home, " why Eliza should 
 say, as she sometimes did to me, that her tempera- 
 ment was not cheerful, that she inclined to sombre 
 thoughts, and had a good deal of sadness that she 
 could not shake off. It must be simply another ex- 
 ample of those who do not understand themselves, 
 for a merrier, sunnier creature never lived. She 
 was all heartiness, the embodiment of hope and 
 kindness." 
 
 But she knew the deep unrest that no one under- 
 stood and nothing quieted ; and the good angels 
 knew, as they watched her bending over her em- 
 broidery or waking weary after the night's ball, that 
 the forces that moulded her were culminating. A 
 better Friend than she knew was nearer than she 
 thought. 
 
 October 20, 1826, her sister Anne writes to her, 
 *' Oh, my dear sister, the steppings of Jehovah have 
 indeed been stately among us, and his name be for 
 ever praised that he has graciously condescended to 
 
Youth and Marriage, 41 
 
 visit us with the blessings of his grace. The lan- 
 guage of your letter did appear strange, as coming 
 from the gay and thoughtless sister that I parted 
 from a few weeks before. I had sensibly realized 
 the dreadful brink on which you stood, and had 
 prayed earnestly that you might be arrested in your 
 course ere it was too late. Let me tell you, my dear 
 Eliza; I was grieved to see you so obstinately deter- 
 mined not to interest yourself in the solemn concerns 
 of eternity. Your conduct was very frivolous, and I 
 looked upon you as standing upon dangerous ground. 
 I am sure mother was in bitterness for you. She 
 told me how Martha B., Elizabeth S., your favorite 
 companion, and yourself were opposing the work of 
 the Lord. You will now regret that you did not en- 
 courage, instead of using every effort to dissipate the 
 seriousness of little N. and M. in th^ early part of 
 the summer. Be careful now in every thing to set 
 them a good example. Be careful to guard your 
 temper, to watch over your thoughts, and pray 
 that you may be kept from the allurements of the 
 world. You are very young, and dangers will beset 
 you on every side, but put your trust in your Maker 
 and persevere. Realize that you are continually in 
 his presence. Seek at all times light and protection 
 from him, and he will be ready to hear you." 
 
 In September, 1828, Dr. Ichabod Spencer became 
 
42 Youth and Marriage, 
 
 pastor of the church in Northampton, and had a 
 peculiarly strong influence in forming my mother's 
 rehgious opinions and stimulating her spiritual life. In 
 her diary, under date of October 4, 1829, is this entry: 
 " I have completed the circuit of my twentieth year. 
 It becomes me at this time to review my life, to as- 
 certain if I have lived like an heir of immortality. I 
 do most earnestly desire to come out from the w^orld 
 and join myself to the church of Christ, to become a 
 devoted Christian, and never to be a reproach or dis- 
 grace to the religion of Christ." 
 
 ^'February 21, 1830. — I have not till now had an 
 opportunity of recording the fulfilment of the promise 
 I made on my birthday. I then promised soon to 
 profess my faith in Christ and give myself up en- 
 tirely to his service. On the first Sabbath of this 
 month I came forward and joined myself to the 
 people of God. I trust I was enabled to give up 
 every feeling and affection of my heart to be gov- 
 erned by his will. He answered my prayer, even 
 beyond my expectation, in delivering me from the 
 fear of man, and in strengthening me for the per- 
 formance of this duty. He granted me the light of 
 his countenance and the joys of his salvation. I 
 came in simple reliance on my Saviour, and experi- 
 enced no rapturous joy, but a calm, unclouded hope 
 that I w^as accepted with God, and the fulfilment of 
 
Youth and Marriage. 43 
 
 — ■ — — — ■■- ~ — 
 
 that promise, * Peace I leave with you, my peace I 
 give unto you.' O my Saviour, I have given my- 
 self up entirely to thy service. Grant unto me 
 patience to wait all my appointed time till my 
 change come, and while I remain on earth let me 
 be doing something for thy glory. I would not live 
 a useless life. Thou knowest my weakness, but thou 
 canst be touched with the feeling of my infirmities ; 
 thou hast been tempted even as I am, and I delight 
 to cast myself on Thee." 
 
 ^^ May 2, 1830. — I cannot better spend the after- 
 noon of this holy day than in reviewing my Christian 
 experience. How difficult the task ! Guide me, O 
 thou Spirit of grace, that I err not and record noth- 
 ing inconsistent with truth. From my earliest youth 
 I was subject to serious impressions; when a child, 
 I frequently resolved to be a Christian ; my soul 
 would tremble at the wrath of God, and melt into 
 contrition under a sense of his mercy; then I would 
 endeavor to pacify my conscience by a formula of 
 duties, and when the heartless manner in which they 
 were performed failed to satisfy, I would dismiss the 
 heavenly messenger with, ' Go thy way for this time ; 
 when I have a convenient season I will call for thee ; ' 
 but these seasons seldom returned after the age of 
 thirteen, though the remembrance of them would 
 sometimes imbitter my gayest hours, and spread a 
 
44 Youth and Mar^nage. 
 
 gloom over my spirits, even in the enjoyment of 
 what my wicked heart most coveted, and when revel- 
 Hng amidst the luxuriance and beauty of nature, the 
 monitory voice has come like a blight over my spirit, 
 and my accusing conscience would whisper, ' Shall 
 all nature utter the praises of its Creator, and shall 
 man, the only creature of his hand capable of rendering 
 him rational worship, — shall he withhold the tribute 
 of his praise?' Thoughts like these would some- 
 times disturb my peace, but they were quickly for- 
 gotten, and my soul plunged into the pleasures of sin. 
 In the spring of 1826, I returned home from Boston, 
 with a heart more than ever devoted to the w^orld and 
 more fully determined not to yield to the claims of 
 the gospel. Indeed, I was hardened in indifference 
 and ' cared for none of these things.' But God had 
 begun to pour out his Spirit upon the town, and my 
 attention was again drawn to the subject; but as my 
 conscience became alarmed, so also did my sin, and 
 I determined that I would not become a Christian 
 then. I was resolved to become a Christian before 
 I died, but it should be in my own time and my own 
 way, and my pride especially revolted at becoming 
 pious in a revival. With these determinations, I 
 went on. I was watched. I avoided the society of 
 Christians, and tried to escape from my conscience. 
 I remained in this state till the first of September, 
 
Youth and Marriage, 45 
 
 when one day Mr. S. called and conversed with me a 
 long time on the subject. I was quite angry at the 
 time, for I had formed my resolution and did not 
 wish to be disturbed. Of course what he said failed 
 to impress me, but after having obtained my permis- 
 sion to pray with me, he rose to leave, when, taking 
 my hand, he said solemnly, but affectionately, ' I have 
 done for you all that I can do, and by your own con- 
 sent you have been committed into the hands of 
 God, and remember you are dealing with him.' 
 This thought fell like a thunderbolt upon my soul. 
 I had been flattering myself that I was not opposed 
 to God, but only to the extravagance of Christians; 
 but now I felt that I was in the hands of God, and I 
 was alarmed. I felt that I was deciding for eternity. 
 I deliberately counted the cost of being a Christian. 
 All those obstacles which appeared so mountainous 
 before, now vanished into air ; but there was nothing 
 I feared more than the ridicule of those associates 
 with whom I had joined in pouring contempt upon 
 others. This vanished before the light of the Judg- 
 ment. I felt that there they could do me no good, they 
 could not even save themselves. I determined not 
 to hesitate any longer, but immediately gave m}'self 
 up to God ; then my fears were quieted, and my 
 mind, which had recently been full of anguish, was 
 now calm and peaceful. 
 
46 " Youth and Marriage. 
 
 " I was so ignorant of spiritual things it was a long 
 time before I could believe that one so vile as I had 
 been, could be a Christian. I could not think I was 
 the enemy of God, but I was afraid to call myself his 
 friend. I dared not apply his promises to myself, 
 yet when the thought of death came over me, I would 
 cling to the feet of my Saviour, resolved if I perished 
 to perish there. A death-like apathy settled upon 
 my soul, yet in all my darkness I never dared to 
 murmur against God. I knew the difficulty was all in 
 myself. Often have I risen from my secret devotions 
 feeling that my prayers were so cold and heartless 
 that they were little better than blasphemy. The 
 tempter would suggest it was more sinful for me to 
 pray than to neglect the duty, but conscience told 
 me that I stood more in need of prayer then than 
 ever, and, thanks be to God, I was never induced to 
 relinquish it, or any other form of religion, so that I 
 hope I have not brought any positive disgrace upon 
 religion. Through it all I continually offered one sin- 
 cere prayer to God that I might not be deceived. 
 
 " In the spring of 1828, God called me to mourn the 
 loss of a very dear sister, and I trust this dispensation 
 of his providence was not lost upon me. It taught 
 me to examine my own heart, to scrutinize carefully 
 my feelings and motives during her sickness. I could 
 not feel willing that she should live or die just as God 
 
Youth and Marriage. 47 
 
 saw best; no, I could not give her up; she must re- 
 cov^er and return to us once more. I recognized his 
 hand in her death, but I fear the httle resignation I 
 had, proceeded more from a conviction of the power 
 of God than from any true love or submission to 
 him. I trust the result of this dispensation was a 
 deeper msight into the iniquity of my heart, and the 
 determination to become more decidedly a Christian. 
 Through the summer I was constantly striving to 
 recommend myself to the favor of God by endeavor- 
 ing to overcome in my own strength the depravity 
 of my heart and to make myself more worthy of his 
 love. The result of this course was a complete failure. 
 I was wretchedly unhappy, I could find no happiness 
 in myself and none in my God ; and the world — 
 I loathed it: its pleasures were never so insipid, its 
 allurements were never so feeble ; and, unhappy as I 
 was, I preferred remaining in that state to returning 
 to its bondage. 
 
 " In the autumn Mr. Spencer was settled as our 
 pastor, and I owe it to his faithful, heart-searching 
 preaching, under the blessing of God, that I was ever 
 brought to hope that I was a Christian. One sermon 
 in particular was much blessed to me ; it was on 
 faith. He first explained true faith and then painted 
 its counterfeit. He said that one characteristic of 
 false faith was relying on the ACT of faith for salva- 
 
48 Youth and Marriage. 
 
 tion instead of the merits of Christ alone. This was 
 precisely my situation. I had, as I thought, given 
 myself up to God, and I felt I had a right to be saved. 
 I had often wondered, and had sometimes felt inclined 
 to murmur, that I could not be happy, but never, till 
 I heard this sermon, did I incline to suspect that this 
 might be my difficulty. When I did discover it, I 
 trust I was enabled to renounce all dependence upon 
 any thing but the blood of Jesus, and never, till then, 
 did I know what it was to rejoice in hope. 
 
 *' It was now my ardent desire and firm purpose to 
 be a spiritual and devoted Christian. I did not wish 
 to be known as a Christian only when I was at the 
 communion-table, but I wished to make it manifest 
 by my life and conversation that I had been with 
 Jesus. 
 
 '' I determined to give up every worldly pleasure, 
 every sinful amusement, and as far as possible to 
 absent myself from every fashionable party, and not 
 -to have it said of me, 'What does she more than 
 others?' but I did not wish to have my religion con- 
 sist in this. I wished to live a life of faith on the 
 Son of God, to be daily holding communion with 
 him and seeking by the influences of the Holy Spirit 
 to grow in grace. I wished to be laboring in his ser- 
 vice, and thus to be laying up for myself treasure in 
 heaven, and to be constantly prepared and looking 
 
Yotcth and Marriage. 49 
 
 forward to that day when I could go home and dwell 
 for ever with my Redeerper. 
 
 ''May 15. — Found two of my dear class in the 
 Sabbath School rejoicing in hope. I was over- 
 whelmed by the mercy of God, but now experienced 
 a reverse of feeling. I found that I was more anxious 
 to satisfy the church that I was engaged, than I was 
 to be strong in faith and have my heart humble and 
 prayerful before God ; and then my old besetting 
 sin, pride, would fain persuade me that I was very 
 good and that I was very much engaged. Then I 
 found that I was becoming cold and formal ; but 
 I could not rest in this state. I determined to arise 
 and go to my Father, and the thought came sweetly 
 to my heart, I could not be more than the chief of 
 sinners, and that was the very person Jesus came to 
 save. 
 
 ** February 6. — Dr. Spencer alluded to the prospect 
 of his separation from us. I wept bitter tears of 
 sorrow at the thought of losing so good, so affection- 
 ate, and so faithful a shepherd. In the afternoon the 
 claims of Home Missions were presented ; I felt that 
 I longed to do something in this work, and that I 
 was willing to go where the Lord should send me, 
 and do any thing, if I could be instrumental of good 
 to the perishing. I have drawn very near to God in 
 prayer, and he has enabled me to give up all that I 
 
 4 
 
50 Youth and Marriage, 
 
 have and am to him. I felt that Jie was my portion, 
 my guide, and I needed nothing more. I cheerfully 
 gave up my beloved pastor to him as a precious 
 gift that he had loaned me for a little, and now in his 
 mysterious providence recalled." 
 
 There is carefully kept in her desk a little note 
 which runs as follows, " The Miss Butlers are obliged 
 to decline the very polite invitation of the man- 
 agers of the cotillon party for to-morrow evening," 
 F'cbruary 2, 1830, and which was evidently preserved as 
 marking a decided change in her course of action. 
 
 " Every thing was strict and straightforward with 
 her," says her sister Maria. *' There was a distinct 
 line drawn between the church and the world. It 
 must have been in 1832, while she was visiting in 
 New York, and had been anxiously expecting a letter 
 from home, when a letter was brought to her on Sun- 
 day morning, and, knowing that it would be full of 
 chit-chat about Mr, B.'s wedding, she locked it in her 
 trunk and would not open it until Monday morning." 
 Her brother Daniel says : *' She was faithful in her 
 closet duties long before she united with the church. 
 Prayer and the study of God's Word were her life, and 
 made her what she was. She not only continued in 
 prayer, but became mighty in prayer, and will be 
 classed with those who have prevailed with God." 
 
 I quote from her diary under date of January, 1833 : 
 
Youth and Marriage, 51 
 
 ** In the presence of God, with the solemn reaHties of 
 eternity in view, I covenant to devote myself unre- 
 servedly to his service, to deny myself, to take up 
 the cross and follow Christ. I will remember that I 
 am not my own, and will be ready for any work to 
 which God shall call me. I beseech thee, dear 
 Saviour, if it be thy will, to let me carry the gospel 
 to the destitute. Prepare me for it by the discipline 
 of thy Spirit, that in humility and godly sincerity I 
 may follow thee whithersoever thou goest, and live like 
 a pilgrim and stranger on the earth." 
 
 " yiine 9, 1833. — For the last month my mind has 
 been much agitated with the question whether I 
 should remove my connection from the old church 
 to the new Edwards Church. I have prayed earnestly 
 for Divine direction, desirous of following only the 
 path of duty independently of every other considera- 
 tion, but whether I really possessed this feeling of 
 submission, He alone who searches the heart can tell. 
 I have decided to take the step. While my mind has 
 been thus engaged I find my heart has sadly run to 
 waste. At one time I was influenced by a spirit 
 of self-complacency, at another by pride, worldly- 
 mindedness, and fear of man, and, what was worse, I 
 found myself cherishing a spirit of party. These are 
 but a few of the wicked feelings I found rankling in 
 my bosom. My prayers were not fervent and spir- 
 
52 Youth and Marriage, ^ 
 
 itual. I indulged in wandering thoughts and vain 
 imaginations, and so my soul was paralyzed. But 
 God has not left my soul in the power of the Lion. 
 I think I can now say I have not an unkind feeling 
 toward any member of this church. Met this morn- 
 ing an hour before church with the Sunday School 
 teachers, to pray for our classes. If I ever feel I am 
 nothing Avithout the grace of God, it is when I stand 
 before my class. 
 
 " September 29. — Seated at my favorite window 
 enjoying the calm repose of this holy evening, I 
 would record the dealings of God with my soul. In 
 June I was much occupied in assisting to prepare for 
 a fair, but I did it as a task. My heart was not as 
 deeply interested as I thought it would be. But I 
 could not remain long in this state without being 
 sensible that I was very different from what a Chris- 
 tian ought to be. I found the fear of man had been 
 a snare to me, I was too apt to be satisfied with the 
 confidence and good opinion of others, and had not 
 sought as my single aim the approbation of God. 
 In July I was quite ill for a few days, and asked my- 
 self if I wished to die, to leave this world and go to 
 heaven; to my shame, I found I was not willing or 
 ready. I had been living for myself, and had hardly 
 begun to do any thing for the cause of Christ. I 
 prayed that I might recover and carry out the plans 
 
Youth and Marriage, 53 
 
 I had formed. I was reminded of the importance of 
 making the conversion of souls a prominent object 
 in my prayers. I found that had not been my cus- 
 tom, but that my own salvation and that of my 
 friends had been my principal object. I resolved 
 henceforth to obey the injunction of the Saviour in 
 his directions to his church, and offer as my first 
 petition, * Thy kingdom come.' I have been sur- 
 prised at the result of this course, a deeper interest 
 in the prosperity of Zion, more spirituality of feeling, 
 a stronger hope of my own safety, and a more inti- 
 mate communion with God. Yet this is but the 
 natural result of obedience to God. He is faithful 
 to his promises, and nothing but our unbelief makes 
 us surprised when we experience their fulfilment. I 
 little thought at this time for what my Heavenly 
 Father was preparing me, for what he had been 
 humbling me, then brightening my hope and strength- 
 ening my faith ; but soon in his providence he taught 
 me. My beloved father was laid on a bed of sick- 
 ness, and in three short weeks (September 15, 1833, 
 at the age of sixty-five) I followed him to the grave. 
 This was a sudden blow, and one that came nearer to 
 my heart than any other could have done. It seemed 
 at times as if I should be overwhelmed, as if my heart 
 could not endure this dreadful stroke ; but my faithful, 
 covenant God was with me. He put underneath me 
 
54 Youth and Marriage, 
 
 his almighty arm, he hid me in the secret of his 
 tabernacle, and by his grace he kept me trusting in 
 him. All the circumstances .of my dear father's ill- 
 ness were ordered in mercy, and we have reason to 
 hope that he slept in Jesus. This is enough to call 
 forth everlasting gratitude. I have long prayed to 
 be weaned from the world, and I trust this was in 
 answer to my prayer, and that henceforth I shall live 
 to the glory of God. I trust that, over the remains 
 of my departed parent, I laid hold of the precious 
 promises to the fatherless. God's love never before 
 seemed to me so precious. I wished to testify of its 
 sufficiency to all around. I felt I could endure any 
 thing that would thus bring me near to him." 
 
 In a letter dated September i8, 1833, to Rev. 
 William Thompson, a friend with whom she was at 
 that time corresponding, she says, *' On Sunday 
 evening my father's fever assumed a serious aspect 
 that proved to be the crisis of the disease. From 
 that hour he gradually sank until Friday morning, 
 when the final struggle began, and just as the last 
 rays of the setting sun illumined the western sky, his 
 spirit winged its flight to immortality. I feel that 
 my father came to Christ with a deep sense of sin, a 
 renunciation of his own righteousness, and a desire 
 to receive salvation as a free gift through a crucified 
 Redeemer. His soul was overwhelmed with the love 
 
Youth and Marriage, 55 
 
 of Jesus and the promises of God. This work was not 
 all deferred to the hour of sickness ; for weeks before, 
 his mind was deeply impressed with the subject, and 
 he told me he had formed a solemn resolution to live 
 to the glory of God. He was actually engaged in 
 arranging to transfer the business to my brother, that 
 he might have leisure to prepare for another world. 
 
 " On Friday morning he was perfectly conscious, 
 though not permitted to revive sufficiently to give us 
 his dying blessing. I know we have it, for he evi- 
 dently knew us all. His eye turned from one to 
 another, and watched us as we stood around his bed. 
 We feared his last agony would be severe, but God 
 in mercy spared us this, and led him gently through 
 the dark valley. But I will not attempt to describe 
 these sad scenes. If you have ever passed through a 
 similar affliction you know too well each circum- 
 stance : the alternations of hope and fear as day by 
 day you stand by the dying pillow ; and then, as hope 
 is fast receding, to watch the flickering pulse, that was 
 wont to beat so ivaimly with paternal love, and to 
 feel the last quiver tremble to your touch ; to see 
 that mild, bright eye, that ever beamed in fondness 
 on his child, fixed and glazed in death, — oh, there 
 is an anguish in this that none can know but those 
 whose hearts have been thus torn. I am sorry you 
 did not know my father when you were here, as you 
 
56 Youth and Mai^rzage. 
 
 could not have known him without esteeming him, 
 and you ought to know his worth rightly to appre- 
 ciate our loss. I believe I possessed his entire con- 
 fidence, and he regarded me, in common with my 
 sisters, rather as a friend than a child." 
 
 The winter of 1832 she spent with her brother John, 
 then a practising physician in Worcester, Mass. It 
 is of him she says in an early letter, " I have not only 
 confided in him as a brother, but have been warmly 
 attached to him as a friend." The records in her 
 diary of longing for his conversion, and his letters to 
 her, extending from her childhood to her marriage, 
 all carefully folded in the " red desk," are the reflex 
 of an ideal sisterly love, all tenderness, merriment, 
 moralizing, confidence, and unselfish devotion to his 
 comfort and his higher interests. His baby son, 
 Charles, she speaks of at this time as ** a fine child, 
 and so like my dear father." 
 
 It was some time during this visit that she first met 
 the one who was to be " nearest and dearest." The 
 family were at a little tea-party at the house of Rev. 
 John C. Abbott, and a theological student from An- 
 di)ver, William Thompson, was of the company. 
 His first and lasting impression of her face is as she 
 stood on the opposite side of the room, leaning to 
 look at an engraving, absorbed, calm, and uncon- 
 scious of every thing but the picture. 
 
Youth and Marriage. 57 
 
 She remembered him as one with whom she would 
 hke to talk again, but had begun to think that would 
 never be, when one day, soon after she went home to 
 Northampton, he called on her. The next day, they 
 climbed Mt. Holyoke together, and were in the midst 
 of a happy comparison of thoughts and purposes, 
 when, wishing to be free to touch bush or branch in 
 the wood path, and not liking to spoil the new gloves 
 she had on, she, like a prudent maiden, drew them off, 
 never thinking of the white hand, so beautiful it could 
 not but attract attention. Not knowing that guileless 
 soul, he was slightly repelled by what struck him as 
 a possible trick of feminine vanity. It was some- 
 thing simpler and nobler he had thought he saw in 
 her, and the little circumstance checked the friend- 
 ship. For a year there was no advance beyond a 
 fitful, occasional correspondence. " You will smile," 
 she writes him afterward, " when I say that your 
 silence has repeatedly done me good, by showing 
 me from my disappointment how much my heart 
 still cleaved to the world, and how much my happi- 
 ness still depended on objects of time and sense." 
 But her attraction toward the seldom seen stranger 
 was slowly dying out, and life beginning to take on 
 sober tints, as she walked on her way in the faithful 
 round of home and church duties, when suddenly 
 came her father's fatal illness. Impulsively, and as a 
 
58 Youth and Marriage, 
 
 vent to her overburdened heart, she told her anxiety 
 and distress to him, as a letter of his was just then 
 waiting for an answer. In response to his next one, 
 she told him of her father's death. His reply awak- 
 ened a deeper sentiment of friendship than she had 
 felt before. She recognized a comprehension of her 
 deepest experiences, and a sympathy sufficient for 
 even that time of distress. 
 
 " The links that bound their hearts together, 
 They were not forged in sunny weather, 
 Nor will they moulder and decay 
 As the long hours pass away ; 
 What slighter things cannot endure 
 Will make their love more safe and pure." 
 
 Early in December he was to visit her in North- 
 ampton. He had, in the fall, become a pastor in 
 North Bridgewater (now Brockton), Mass. The sud- 
 den prevalence of scarlet fever in his parish made 
 him feel it wrong to leave his people for any personal 
 end. She writes to him, December 9, 1833, "I am 
 sorry to have your intended visit deferred, though I 
 am the last one who would wish you to leave your 
 people in a time of special affliction, for your own or 
 my gratification. I know too well the value of a 
 pastor's visits at such a time wantonly to deprive 
 others of them." 
 
 To the same she writes, December 16, "Self- 
 reproach is a frequent and unprofitable exercise. 
 
Youth and Marriage, 59 
 
 I have found, upon analyzing my feelings, that it has 
 often been nothing more than a kind of penance for 
 the indulgence of some darling sin. I have been 
 contented to make myself unhappy, rather than 
 simply to repent and forsake my sin. Surely this 
 is unacceptable as well as unwise. It cannot please 
 our Heavenly Father to see us wretched. On the 
 contrary, the provision he has made for our happi- 
 ness proves that he desires it. How much we need 
 to offer the prayer, ' Lord, increase our faith.' If 
 Edwards's views of the dealings of God are correct, 
 surely no other feelings should be excited in our 
 hearts, when enduring affliction, but those of grateful 
 love. I think there is no way in which we can obtain 
 such a sense of the love of God, as by contemplating 
 the manner in which he enables his people to resist 
 and overcome sin ; we can never realize what an evil 
 and bitter thing it is, unless w^e are made to taste 
 some of its evils. 
 
 " A happy home has been my idol, and it was at 
 this the blow was aimed ; for, dear as this spot is and 
 ever must be to my heart, it can never seem like 
 home to me again. It is my desire to live hence- 
 forth like a pilgrim and stranger on the earth. I 
 know, if the spirit is willing, the flesh is veiy weak, 
 but I know, too. He is faithful who promised, who 
 also will do it." 
 
6o Youth and Marriage, 
 
 At Christmas time the deferred visit was made, 
 and they were pledged to each other. 
 
 " I am but too happy," she writes, January 3, 
 1834, "in the consciousness that I have given my 
 heart and my happiness to one who possesses my 
 entire confidence, and who I know will love me 
 better than I can ever deserve. In heart we are 
 already one. Henceforth my happiness will consist 
 in sharing your joys and sorrows, in relieving your 
 cares, and by every means in my power making your 
 home a peaceful and happy retreat from the anxieties 
 of your arduous duties." 
 
 yaimary 11. — "To say that I can part with so 
 many near and dear friends, under the thousand ties 
 that have been accumulating and attaching me to 
 this loved spot, even for yon, without pain, would be 
 a libel on the better feelings of our nature. Surely, 
 you would neither love nor respect me could you 
 believe it possible. Mr. Todd told me I should have 
 so many things to occupy my attention, I should not 
 think much of society. But enough on this point 
 My greatest fear is that I shall not realize your ex- 
 pectations. You have formed a much higher opinion 
 of me than I deserve. One thing I can say in sin- 
 cerity, I desire to be all that you have described, and 
 that from the first it has been my determination never 
 to let my feelings interfere with the most self-denying 
 
Youth and Marriage, 6i 
 
 duties to which you may be called. I wish to feel 
 that we are united in the service of our Redeemer, 
 that we belong wholly to him, and that we must 
 find our happiness in promoting the interests of his 
 kingdom. I feel that we must specially guard our- 
 selves on this point, lest we become so much en- 
 grossed in our personal happiness as to forget our 
 higher and holier obligations. We know our Heav- 
 enly Father is not displeased when we are happy in 
 the enjoyment of his rich blessings. We know, too, 
 that he is not pleased when we rest here. 
 
 *' Is it a continual effort for a true Christian to 
 keep his heart on spiritual things, or does it rise 
 spontaneously to heaven? David says, 'When I 
 awake I am still with thee.' Ought we, or ought we 
 not, to require this heavenly state of mind as an evi- 
 dence of discipleship? I have been much tried of 
 late with these questions, for I do not find that dead- 
 ness to the world which I think I ought to possess. 
 You will have a wayward heart to guide in the 
 straight and narrow way, but with all its imperfections 
 it will never know change in its devotion to you." 
 
 While she w^as still expecting and hoping to be a 
 pastor's wife, an old friend, Mrs. President Wheeler, 
 of the Vermont University, wrote her : " My dear, I 
 ^ know you do not intend to have your happiness con- 
 sist in having every earthly circumstance suited to 
 
62 Youth and Marriage, 
 
 your taste. The wife of a minister of the gospel 
 must rise above this and breathe in a higher air. She 
 must find her happiness in doing good, and her re- 
 ward not in the notice or admiration of the world." 
 
 In January, 1834, it was proposed to her friend 
 Mr. Thompson to leave his parish and take the 
 professorship of Hebrew in the new theological 
 seminary about to be established at Windsor Hill, 
 Conn. She writes, January 28 : "I felt unwilling at 
 first to say a word about it, lest it should influence 
 your decision improperly; but since you have asked 
 my opinion, I will give it frankly. The more I think 
 of the matter, the more I am averse to your acceptance 
 of the appointment. I cannot think your opportu- 
 nities of usefulness can be so great as in the station 
 you now occupy, and it does not seem to me so re- 
 sponsible or important an office. It may be one of 
 more ease and personal gratification, but I have 
 greatly mistaken your character if those motives 
 would influence you a moment. If you were truly 
 called of God to North Bridgewater, methinks you can 
 hardly have accomplished so soon the work appointed 
 for you there. I have heard Mr. Todd speak of this 
 institution, but so slightly that I hardly know whether 
 he approves of its establishment or not. Indeed, I 
 have hardly known any thing about it, and but little 
 more of Taylorism, to which it is opposed. As far 
 
Youth and Marriage. 63 
 
 as I am informed in this particular, I should agree 
 with them ; but I fear that if this has not been got 
 up in a party spirit, it will excite such a spirit. At any 
 rate, those connected with it must almost necessarily 
 be constantly engaged in controversy. That, cer- 
 tainly, is very undesirable. I have perhaps spoken 
 rashly. Further light may alter my opinion, but as 
 it is, it strikes me it would be foolish for you to go. 
 There is not sufficient inducement to make it your 
 duty to leave the ministry, especially when the call 
 for laborers is so great. If you decide to go, forget 
 what I have said, and be assured I shall acquiesce in 
 whatever arrangement you may be led in the Provi- 
 dence of God to make. 
 
 " I have mentioned it to no one but Daniel, and 
 he laconically replied, ' He had* better stay where he 
 is.' It shall be my increasing prayer that God will 
 guide you with heavenly wisdom, that you may be 
 delivered from all unhallowed motives and secure his 
 approbation." 
 
 February 4. — "I have feared, since I wrote, that I 
 spoke too hastily and too decidedly considering the 
 light I had on the subject, and though I have seen as 
 yet no reason for altering my opinion, I have thought 
 perhaps I ought not to have expressed one. Be as- 
 sured of this one thing, my loved friend, where you 
 are, there is my home and there shall I be happy. 
 
64 Youth and Marriage. 
 
 " I cannot tell you half how precious your minia- 
 ture is to me. It has a small black string attached 
 to it, and is entirely concealed in the folds of my 
 dress, so that I can wear it without attracting obser- 
 vation. The longer I look at it, the more distinctly 
 can I trace your image. 
 
 *' Willingly can I leave every other friend and 
 dwell with you. My friend, Elizabeth S., left this 
 morning for New York, to try the effect of change 
 and sea air. I fear she will never be better. Com- 
 panions from childhood, and bosom friends for years, 
 I often looked forward to the time when, in fulfilment 
 of a mutual promise, I should stand as bridesmaid by 
 her side." 
 
 April 4. — "I was in the garden this morning, 
 watching the progress of the flowers, and after some 
 searching espied a ' Forget-me-not,' the first flower 
 that has opened its delicate petals to welcome the 
 spring. I enclose it for you. Look on it and think 
 of ' one who will forget thee never! " 
 
 The following June, Mr. Thompson's call to the 
 Connecticut Seminary, which, after serious considera- 
 tion, he had declined in the winter, was repeated; a 
 committee visited him, and pressed his acceptance by 
 the most perplexing appeals to his conscience and 
 spirit of self-sacrifice. 
 
 "I did hope," Eliza Butler writes, "that the call 
 
Youth and Ma^^riage, 65 
 
 from Windsor would not be renewed. My personal 
 feeling about it remains unchanged, but you know, 
 my dear friend, I would not have that influence your 
 decision either way." 
 
 After long debate, the perseverance of the Connec- 
 ticut committee was rewarded by his consent to the 
 call of a council to whom the whole matter should 
 be referred. He accepted their decision, and after a 
 pastorate of one year, left Bridgewater for Windsor. 
 True to her word, when the decision was made, Eliza 
 Butler accepted it quietly, buried her bright dreams 
 of sharing with him the parish life, which had a pecu- 
 liar attraction for her, and poured- out her sympathy 
 for him in the experience which he wrote her was 
 " like tearing limb from limb." 
 
 Once before that she had written, " I dreamed 
 last night that you were here, and had decided not 
 to leave Bridgewater." But after this no more is 
 said. It was not till years had passed, and her chil- 
 dren were grown, that any one knew what it had cost 
 them both to go cheerfully to Windsor. 
 
 ** It matters little," she writes him, " in what part of 
 the vineyard it shall be, if we are found at last to be 
 faithful laborers. I feel in your society the wilder- 
 ness would lose its gloom and the desert its dreari- 
 ness. In contributing to your happiness and enjoying 
 your love, my days would pass on, I might almost 
 
 5 
 
66 Youth and Marriage, 
 
 say, unmarked by a shade of sorrow; but that would 
 be an unreal picture, too full of joy for this transitory 
 life. 
 
 '' I can never be sufficiently grateful for the gift of 
 such a friend, whose sympathy and affection I have 
 so much reason to value ; but, by the help of God, my 
 dearest friend, I will not suffer you to do the work 
 of an enemy and wean my affections from my 
 Saviour. I have found by bitter experience, that 
 even your love, precious as it is, would be a poor 
 compensation for the loss of his favor." 
 
 June 26. — " I do feel that our affection is not of 
 a selfish, worldly nature, but a hallowed flame, and 
 one that I trust will grow brighter and brighter to 
 eternity. The more my heart expands with love to 
 God, and I feel the presence of my Saviour, the 
 more strongly is my heart bound to you. I have 
 just returned from Miss D.'s, where I have spent an 
 hour in prayer and conversation with her and another 
 sister. Miss D. spoke of the importance of seeking 
 and carine for the health of the soul with the same 
 earnestness we do for the body. If we watch and 
 pray in any measure as we ought, shall we not know 
 when the soul is diseased, and apply the remedy? 
 Miss D. spoke of the duty of Christians inquiring of 
 each other, when they meet, the state of their soul's 
 health, and thought the reserve on this subject a 
 device of the adversary." 
 
Yo7ith and Marriage. 6y 
 
 The love that had been born in shadow was not 
 nursed wholly in sunshine. Aside from the trial of 
 feeling in regard to leaving Bridgewater, there were 
 perplexities of another nature. After her father's 
 sudden death, it was found he had so involved him- 
 self by loans to a relative who had failed in business, 
 that his estate settled far differently from what had 
 been expected. Instead of having the means to fur- 
 nish her new home with every comfort, as she had 
 hoped, in the autumn, she had the pain and mortifica- 
 tion of finding, before the spring opened, that her 
 outfit must not only be curtailed, but managed with 
 the utmost economy. Debts were held in that 
 family to be more binding than any matter of feel- 
 ing or personal comfort, and Eliza acquiesced in the 
 course taken by her mother, to pay from her own 
 private income her husband's obligations as far as 
 possible, while all outlay, even for the daughter's 
 marriage, was brought within the strictest limits. 
 
 The respect in which he had been held, and the 
 knowledge that his embarrassments were the results 
 of nothing more than excess of confidence and kind- 
 ness, did not prevent some of the wealthier creditors 
 from profiting by the honorable self-sacrifice of the 
 widow and children, while others less able refused to 
 allow them to straiten and cripple themselves. 
 
 It was with a rather heavy heart that Eliza wrote 
 
68 Youth and Marriao-e, 
 
 to Mr. Thompson, " If you had seen me last night, 
 you would have seen a long face and a sad one." . 
 After stating the difficulty, she says : " Your disap- 
 pointment is not the least fruitful source of sadness. 
 I did not like to have the family see how much I 
 felt, and it was not till I had retired to the solitude 
 of my room that I gave vent to my feelings. The 
 image of my beloved father came to mind, who would 
 have relieved me from all this care, but who was 
 now cold and silent in the grave, beyond the reach 
 of the wants or affection of his child. But I was 
 not alone. I felt there was One who by these little 
 disappointments was making me realize the perma- 
 nency and value of his love. Have we not, my be- 
 loved friend, committed our way unto him, and 
 besought him not to leave us to ourselves, and shall 
 we now withdraw our trust and murmur because he 
 is answering our prayer and leading us by a way we 
 know not? I think I can say, 'Though he slay me, 
 yet will I trust in him.' 
 
 *' I went out to Avalk this morning, called on Mrs. 
 T., found her in great anxiety for one of her children 
 who is quite ill, — that bright, black-eyed little girl you 
 saw there. The little boy has also been sick, and Mr. 
 B. has an infant son on the verge of the grave. Here 
 is real trouble, and I thought how selfish and sinful I 
 was to feel unhappy for a moment, because every 
 
Youth and Marriage, 69 
 
 wish of my heart could not be gratified. I hope 
 your feehngs are under better control than mine have 
 been. I have dreaded to tell you what I know you 
 would not love to hear, especially at this time when 
 you feel such a weight of anxiety ; but still I felt that 
 sooner or later you must know it, and I should not 
 mend the matter by deferring it." 
 
 In the next letter her unconquerable hope begins 
 to brighten. She thinks it much " harder for Daniel 
 than for herself, because after having been engaged a 
 year, this trouble will oblige him to defer his mar- 
 riage two years more." 
 
 Their wedding-day was finally fixed for September. 
 Her busy hands were more than full with sewing and 
 preparation, but till within a fortnight of the time, she 
 went on with her daily study and recitations at Miss 
 D.'s, only pausing then because she must, and prom- 
 ising herself that they should be resumed immedi- 
 ately after her marriage. 
 
 *' You would be gratified," she writes, *' to hear the 
 many kind expressions of affection and regret which 
 I hear on every side, not only from my particular 
 friends and associates, but from those with whom I 
 have incidentally been brought in contact in the 
 humbler walks of life. I shall be in danger of think- 
 ing of myself more highly than I ought to think." 
 
 Referring to some arrangements, she says, in a 
 
Jo Youth and Man^iage. 
 
 letter of August 28 : " We do indeed need to possess 
 our souls in patience. There is nothing that natu- 
 rally tries me more than this state of suspense, but I 
 am happy to say it has this time not in the least 
 ruffled my spirit. I feel at this moment perfectly 
 willing Providence should order each event as Infi- 
 nite Wisdom determines. I have in general been 
 able to take things quietly." 
 
 In the last letters before her marriage, she says : 
 " In thinking of the best means of promoting our 
 happiness and usefulness in the married state. It oc- 
 curred to me much advantage would accrue from the 
 habit of conversing with freedom and confidence on 
 our personal experience in religion. Unless we are 
 on our guard, there is danger that the duties of the 
 family and the thousand interesting occurrences of 
 the day will preclude this important topic. 
 
 " It requires no effort to picture myself by your 
 side on the banks of the beautiful river we visited in 
 July, with its deep green woods and its calm surface 
 reposing in the soft, still moonbeam. Aside from 
 the tender recollections associated with the falling 
 leaf, autumn is to me a hallowed season. If it is sad, 
 it is a cheerful sadness. The vigor and freshness of 
 spring seem like the commencement of a new exist- 
 ence, but when that freshness is gone and that vigor 
 decays, we feel that the fashion of this world passes 
 
Youth and Marriage. 71 
 
 away, and we are hastening to the rest of eternity. 
 This, while it chastens our happiness, need not dimin- 
 ish it, and while it makes us grave, need not make us 
 sad. 
 
 " It is almost impossible for us to realize the ex- 
 tent of the influence we shall exert upon each other, 
 both in spiritual and temporal things, and unless the 
 Lord hallow that influence, it will drag our aff'ections 
 earthward. My dear William, the bars of the grave 
 will undoubtedly close upon one of us, and leave 
 the other desolate, and were it not for the hope 
 of blessed reunion beyond its narrow precincts, the 
 thought of an attachment like ours would be miser- 
 able." 
 
 The last entry in her diary is dated August 24, 
 1834. " I am looking forward in a few weeks to the 
 most important earthly connection ever formed, one 
 that will materially afl"ect my happiness and useful- 
 ness in this world, and my hopes beyond the grave. 
 I bless God for giving me such a precious friend as I 
 possess in his servant, that I have been kept from 
 giving my affections to one who did not love Christ, 
 and have been permitted to bestow them upon one 
 who is consecrated to his service. And now, blessed 
 Saviour, smile upon us, and if we are permitted to 
 pitch our tabernacle and dwell together, may we so 
 regulate our affections and conduct that we shall aid 
 
72 Youth and Marriage. 
 
 each other in every duty, promote each other's 
 growth in grace, and exert a happy influence on 
 those around us. And now I renewedly consecrate 
 myself to thee ; all the afl'ections of my soul, this 
 precious friend, all that I have or may have, to thee 
 and thy service. Help me to resolve to perform the 
 duties of a wife, and the head of a family, according 
 to the requisitions of thy Word. I now resolve to 
 give my husband my undivided confidence and love, 
 to obey him in the Lord ; never to stand in the way 
 of his duty, or hold him back from self-denial and 
 suffering for the sake of Christ, but aid him in every 
 duty by my prayers, counsel, and efforts, as God 
 shall give me grace. His friends shall be my friends, 
 his interests mine. Resolved to honor God in my 
 family, to order my household according to his word, 
 to honor the Sabbath, and to be governed by the 
 directions of God in the various relations of the 
 family. Resolved to be hospitable to strangers, kind 
 to the afflicted, and above all to lend my influence, 
 time, and talents to the promotion of Christ's king- 
 dom in the earth. Blessed Saviour, thou hast heard 
 these solemn vows ; thou knowest my weakness and 
 depravity, — that, if left to myself, I shall not be able 
 to redeem them. Wilt thou magnify the riches of thy 
 grace, perfect thy strength in my weakness, and use 
 me and mine as instruments for thy glory." 
 
Yotitk and Marriage, J2> 
 
 The wedding was on the 25th of September, 1834. 
 
 " I very distinctly remember her appearance on 
 that morning," writes one of her cousins. '* She was 
 rather tall and slight; her whole bearing was en- 
 tirely self-possessed, and in her artless, girlish sim- 
 plicity she seemed to stand there because she had 
 been told to." In the little book which holds her 
 wedding bouquet, there is a pressed violet not wholly 
 faded yet. 
 
 Their wedding journey, which gave them a glimpse 
 of the Vermont mountains and Lake George, lasted 
 a week or two, and in October they arrived at Wind- 
 sor, where the Theological Seminary was opening its 
 first session. 
 
 It is amusingly characteristic of her life-long in- 
 difference to what she thought unessential, that in a 
 letter from her sister Maria, which met her at New 
 York on this trip, she is exhorted to wear " a white 
 shawl, not the red one, if the weather grows cool, as 
 the white one is more proper." 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 THE HEAT AND BURDEN OF THE DAY. 
 
III. 
 
 THE HEAT AND BURDEN OF THE DAY. 
 
 " Still thou turnedsf, and still 
 Beckonedst the tretnbler, and still 
 Gavest the -weary thy hatid. 
 • . • • • 
 
 To lis thon wast still 
 Cheer/id, and helpful, and firm \ 
 Therefore to thee it was given 
 Many to save with thyself'' 
 
 Arnold. 
 
 *• "X/'OUR mother was a lovely bride," a dear friend 
 used to say. " I shall never forget how her face 
 looked, when she first came into our house, in her 
 cottage bonnet tied down with a white ribbon. Her 
 complexion was exquisite, not red, but pink and 
 white, and besides being so pretty, she had such a 
 look of goodness." 
 
 One of her first joys was the meeting with her 
 husband's family, his father having removed from 
 Norwich to Windsor the year before. '' Her manner 
 was winning and very quiet," says a sister; " but what 
 drew us to her most, at first, was the expression of 
 her eyes, so beautiful, clear, and true," — 
 
 - *' Eyes too expressive to be blue, 
 
 Too lovely to be gray." 
 
yS The Heat and Burden of the Day. 
 
 From the moment of the first kiss of welcome to 
 *' WiUiam's wife," there was, to the end, on both sides, 
 warmth and constancy of love. 
 
 The strength of his mother's character impressed 
 her at once and increasingly. '* Your Grandmother 
 Thompson was a remarkable woman," was one of 
 her common sayings in after years ; and she always 
 insisted that the tie of blood could not have made 
 the two sisters more truly sisters to her. With so 
 much positiveness of character on all sides, one must 
 believe there was opportunity for friction; but for 
 them, 
 
 " Love was always lord of all.". 
 
 Whatever tears were to be shed, as separation and 
 death came in the different circles, there were never 
 mingled those of broken confidence. 
 
 For a year the home was in Mr. Ellsworth's family, 
 and there the first child came and went. 
 
 In October of 1835 their house was finished, and 
 they began housekeeping in it, gathering as many 
 family friends as possible around them when they 
 sat down for the first time at their own table. There 
 was no lack of quiet merry-making; but at the close 
 it was with the hush of hearts that realized what is 
 wrapped up in the founding of a new home, that 
 they knelt and consecrated it with fervent prayer. 
 
 The region of the Seminary was charming, as is all 
 
The Heat and Burden of the Day, 79 
 
 of the Connecticut Valley. One enthusiastic friend 
 of the institution, standing for the first time on the 
 brow of the hill and looking off on the winding river, 
 the meadows, and the old elms, exclaimed with em- 
 phasis, " The millennium will begin here." 
 
 The new Professor's house, however, was planted 
 literally in a sand-bank. There was not a blade of 
 grass or a tree, nothing to fill out the idea of home 
 to eyes from which the Pleasant Street picture had not 
 yet faded. 
 
 Eliza Butler had recorded, in the diary of her girl- 
 liood, her longings for a missionary life, and a desire 
 to ser\'e God in India or the Sandwich Islands. She 
 now found herself called upon to meet many of the 
 privations and to make the peculiar sacrifices of such 
 a life, with none of its romance to smooth the way. 
 The enterprise with which she and her husband 
 were identified was struggling, doubtful, unpopular. 
 Funds were scarce, the salary a pittance, the atmos- 
 phere necessarily one of debate and antagonism. " I 
 was at the sewing-society yesterday," wrote ]Maria 
 Butler, from Northampton, to her sister, during that 
 first year, " and the girls were mourning over you. 
 They said Eliza Butler was being spoiled, her letters 
 were full of nothing but Taylorism and Tylerism." 
 
 In her new surroundings she was easily fired with 
 the same ardent belief in the essential nature of the 
 
8o The Heat and Burden of tJie Day. 
 
 doctrinal distinctions of the Seminary, which had in- 
 spired its founders. Once convinced that Christ's 
 kingdom was to be furthered by the institution, all 
 her single-hearted devotion was turned into that 
 channel. 
 
 That remarkable hereditary resemblance to the 
 grandmother, with whom the church leaders of her 
 day had discussed doctrine and precept, now came 
 out in the granddaughter. She entered with zeal into 
 the theological discussions about her, and grasped 
 the various points with clearness and force. 
 
 It was said of her, by David N. Lord, of the Theo- 
 logical Review, who knew Mrs. Thompson in these 
 years, that he had never met a lady so intelligently 
 informed on theological subjects. It was partly due 
 to the cast of her mind, delighting in this as in any 
 other science, and partly to the profound genuine- 
 ness of her spiritual nature, which transfused with its 
 own warmth whatever related to religion. 
 
 There was no such thing as debasing the moral 
 currency in her presence. Something in the solid 
 dignity of that true face silenced the flippant word. 
 
 To the child at her knee uttering what to her 
 seemed passionate blasphemy out of its too early 
 protesting and stormy soul, she had something to 
 offer better perhaps than the convincing word, — 
 the sudden whitening of her cheek, which made evi- 
 
The Heat and Btirden of the Day, 8 1 
 
 dent beyond any doubt her own reverent love for 
 God. 
 
 The strong conservatism of her mind fitted her to 
 work naturally in her new relations. She was ex- 
 tremely tenacious in every direction, averse to all 
 changes, assenting with reluctance and long debate 
 even to those which time afterward taught her had 
 been altogether best. Wherever she took rest, either 
 in feeling, thought, custom, or place, there it was her 
 tendency to abide firmly. Up to the last of her life 
 she placed no reliance on the daily weather indica- 
 tions, because, not having cared to investigate the 
 grounds on which their value rested, she classed 
 them in general with " signs " and heathenish divina- 
 tions, which in her girlhood Dr. Spencer had taught 
 her were '* of the adversary." 
 
 She looked with alarm on changes of method as in 
 danger of involving change of essence. In that in- 
 tricate composition of forces by which some guard 
 and some explore, and the resultant is safe advance, 
 her part was with the guard. 
 
 That practical good sense whose germs had been 
 plainly visible in her earlier life, began to develop 
 rapidly under the new circumstances. 
 
 If there were theological students, they and their 
 rooms must be made comfortable ; and the house- 
 keeping had hardly begun, when a certain attic- 
 
 6 
 
82 The Heat and Burden of the Day, 
 
 closet was set apart for clothing and bedding for that 
 purpose. It was deposited with her by the ladies' 
 sewing-societies of the region, and much of it made 
 under her own supervision by the circle of ladies in 
 the town, over which she presided, and in which she 
 worked unsparingly for years. She distributed what 
 was gathered, with motherly sympathy and discrimi- 
 nating care. One great secret of her triumphant life 
 was her habit of distinguishing between great and lit- 
 tle things. Little things were not to be minded, — mo- 
 mentary discomforts, trifling annoyances, or physical 
 pain, unless it was extreme. Her tender heart and 
 her well-balanced mind went side by side with her 
 deep religious convictions, in the drawing of this line, 
 and kept her from great errors. When it was drawn, 
 it was found to bar out on the side of trifles, what 
 the majority of men and women find great enough 
 for controlling motives. She was thus free to follow 
 steadily worthy ends. She steered straight by the 
 unessential, content to miss much, while she pressed 
 toward the mark. It was this — this heroism of noble 
 purposes and high conceptions, and her courage 
 born of faith — that made her very face and voice 
 such a stimulus and help. *' Cloudy fears and shapes 
 forlorn " flew away where she entered. 
 
 All this, however, was not full grown when my 
 father and mother set about turning the sand-bank 
 
The Heat and Burden of the Day, Z'}^ 
 
 into a home. She remembered, afterward, more than 
 one heart-sinking, and more than one tear brushed 
 away before it could be seen. 
 
 The step from the girhsh Sunday-afternoon musing 
 ** by her favorite window " into the intricacies of hfe, 
 of which those musings had given her no hint, was 
 one to test the fibre of ardent aspirations. The 
 problems that meet all women who have any 
 strength of nature met her. Her experience was 
 nowhere shallow. But it was her habit to grapple 
 with difficulties rather than to sink under them or 
 to chafe too long. The young face, that looked con- 
 fidingly out from under the cottage-bonnet as she 
 stepped from the carriage, in the light of the yellow 
 maples and the sunset of that October day which 
 brought her to the Ellsworth mansion, concealed un- 
 guessed reserves of force. 
 
 Many a time, later, she laughed, in recounting how 
 the seeds they first planted in the garden blew away, 
 the soil was so light. But every trip to Northampton 
 brought back stores of bulbs, shrubs, and choice 
 apple-tree cuttings ; the perseverance that would 
 not be baffled found out that clay would conquer 
 sand, and before the children were old enough to 
 remember, maples and locusts, horse-chestnuts and 
 fir-trees, were growing everywhere. There were 
 willows by the little brook, shrubs in the ravine, 
 
84 The Heat and Burden of the Day, 
 
 terraces, vines on the arbor trellis, flowers of every 
 sort in the garden, and in every nook where they 
 could be put ; and for the winter, what blooming of 
 callas, of pink cactuses in blue jars, of heliotropes 
 and carnations, what trailing of ivies and passion- 
 flowers ! 
 
 In the spring, when the turf was green and the 
 orchard in bloom, and the bees were humming 
 among the hyacinths and daffodils, she delighted 
 to recall the contrast, with a feeling that the now 
 lovely place had been created by a determination to 
 succeed. 
 
 Little by little cares thickened. The time for pur- 
 suing Latin and philosophy did not come. Much 
 that had been anticipated slipped into the list of 
 things deferred, and a sort of unconscious, undra- 
 matic silence flowed over them, while the tides of 
 cheerful, active life rose and fell more and more 
 strongly above. 
 
 How can it be told what those years were ! The 
 enterprise to which her husband had given all the 
 hope and ambition of his youth dragged slowly on. 
 Every step was a struggle. Funds accumulated 
 slowly, and salaries continued small, while wants in- 
 creased. Every year large subscriptions were made 
 from that meagre sum to the Seminary, because it 
 was felt to be for Christ's sake, while the empty 
 
The Heat a7id Burden of the Day, 85 
 
 library shelves in the husband's study remained 
 unfilled, and the needs of the growing family were 
 supplied only by the closest economy and strictest 
 industry on the part of the young mother. The 
 slender white hands grew used to all sorts of house- 
 hold toil. Others gave thought, sympathy, money, 
 — they gave not only that, but literally themselves. 
 Never, but for a few months, in all the period of her 
 housekeeping, did she have a house-maid who could 
 render any but the most indifferent service. And 
 never, but for periods of a few weeks, had she any 
 one to assist in the care of the children. When there 
 were five, as when there was one, it was she who was 
 seamstress, nursery-maid, and often cook. 
 
 The week before her wedding, she said to her 
 friend Elizabeth, as they walked down the street, hav- 
 ing a last talk, that her great dread was of not being 
 equal to what would befall her. " I am not quick, 
 you know," she said. *' I cannot turn off things 
 as some can, and a great deal of the time I do not 
 feel strong." " No, Eliza Butler," was the answer, 
 " but you can endure. That will be worth more to 
 you than quickness." Her own sense of weariness 
 or illness she always concealed till it reached the 
 point of positive disease, and she had to succumb. 
 Often, she used to say, she had held herself in her 
 chair at her sewing, when from nervous exhaustion 
 
86 The Heat and Burden of the Day. 
 
 it seemed every moment as if she must scream and 
 throw the work aside ; but ahvays held herself there 
 until it was done, taking so many patient, intermina- 
 ble stitches in the little coats and aprons, before the 
 days of sewing-machines and ready-made garments, 
 sitting up late with the aching back and head, that 
 only mothers know, to turn and mend and make 
 over, after the hard long day and wakeful nights 
 with the babies, so that what her skill and labor 
 saved might go to pay the subscription to the Semi- 
 nary and build up the good cause. - 
 
 It was in such days as these that many a student, 
 oppressed with poverty and unable to meet his board- 
 bills, was welcomed for months at their table, with a 
 hospitality so cheerful that it was many a time -tm- 
 appreciated. Aside from the deliberate sacrifices 
 made for Christ's sake, no kind of pain or want ap- 
 pealed to her in vain. If there was ever a house 
 where there were " tears for all woes, a heart for all 
 distress," it was theirs. Effort, trouble, discomfort, 
 were not reckoned. In summer and winter, no 
 matter what the accumulated basket of sewing, or 
 whether Bridget was in the kitchen or not, she was 
 ready to go to the sick, to watch with them, to use 
 her skill in making the arrowroot or beef-tea, that no 
 one else could do quite so well. There was no com- 
 fortable hotel in the village, so that, among others, 
 
The Heat and Burden of the Day, %"] 
 
 their house naturally became a home for all friends of 
 the Seminary, travelling ministers, or agents ; and in 
 all cases there was but one thought, '' Blessed is he 
 that Cometh in the name of the Lord." 
 
 The only exception ever known was in the early 
 days of her housekeeping, when a certain brother 
 tarried long, and was finally discovered to have 
 adopted the guest-room closet as the depository of 
 his horse-blanket, when, with a spark of righteous in- 
 dignation, the young matron repaired to the study, 
 and announced that that she could not submit to. 
 
 Consecration was no mystery to her, but a most 
 practical experience. The social training of her 
 youth was offered on the same altar with greater gifts. 
 Seeing that the students needed more social life than 
 they were likely to have, for their pleasure and their 
 good, twice every year she gave them an entertain- 
 ment, inviting seventy or more, as it happened, quite 
 regardless of the fact that the cake must be made 
 with her own hands, and the ice-cream churned by 
 an interminable process in her own cellar. She had 
 seldom time to arrange her hair, in these days, after 
 the fashion of her girlhood, but sometimes for these 
 special occasions she did, and her appearance is well 
 remembered, as she welcomed her guests with a 
 sweet sincerity that set the whole evening in the 
 right key. 
 
88 The Heat aftd Burden of the Day, 
 
 More than once it happened that after the invita- 
 tions were given, her husband would be attacked 
 with violent sick-headache, to which he was subject 
 nearly every week. She would come from bathing 
 his head, to receive her company, without a sign of 
 disquiet, or hint in face or manner, of confusion and 
 disappointment. 
 
 How she was valued by the students is well told 
 by the tribute of Dr. E. W. Bentley, read at the 
 Seminary anniversary in 1879. 
 
 " Very rarely, for a long course of years, has this anniver- 
 sary failed of the light and cheer of Mrs. Thompson's pres- 
 ence. Indeed, so identified was she with the social element 
 of our anniversary, that to many of us this day's home-coming 
 is akin, in its chastened sadness, to the Thanksgiving anni- 
 versary in the homestead whence the mother's face and form 
 are gone for ever. Mrs. Thompson was the connecting link 
 between many of us and much that is plea^antest and longest- 
 lived in our seminary associations. Whatever may be true 
 since the removal of the Seminary to the city, and the conse- 
 quent widening of the social circle around it, I feel warranted 
 in saying that at East Windsor Hill, our seminary ' home- 
 life ' centred largely in Mrs. Thompson. Our circumstances 
 there were somewhat peculiar. Our numbers all told were 
 few, and class distinctions, however informal and loosely 
 held, narrowed still more the area of our restricted intima- 
 cies. Most of us were fresh from our large college associa- 
 tions with their attendant and varied excitements, and we 
 found it hard to settle ourselves down into the narrow grooves 
 in which our seminary life seemed to drag itself along. And 
 
The Heat and Bitrdcii of the Day. 89 
 
 the outside 'neighborhood was nearly as contracted as the 
 Seminary. The famihes who cared for our acquaintance, 
 though cultured and refined and hospitable, were still infre- 
 quent and scattered. And thus isolated, the homelike ease 
 and restfulness of Mrs. Thompson's parlor and sitting-room, 
 near at hand, drew us thither when we cared to go nowhere 
 else. In those days iSIrs. Thompson's family circle was un- 
 broken. The law of love hedged gently in her group of 
 children. . . . Happening in at whatever hour, we found a 
 cheerful welcome. Doubtless we wearied her often with our 
 budgets of personal interests and petty concerns ; but if so 
 she never disclosed the fact. Encouraged by her sympathy, 
 we made her the confidante of hopes and struggles and as- 
 pirations, such as grown-up boys intrust only to their mothers 
 or elder sisters. In .the occasional social gatherings to which 
 we were invited in the neighborhood, it was Mrs. Thompson's 
 quick notice and kindly tact that placed us at once at ease, 
 and drew the best side of us socially to the front. Some of 
 us — I speak for the more awkward and bashful ones among 
 us — almost uniformly rated our enjoyment of the hour by 
 her presence or absence. 
 
 " Still another service Mrs. Thompson rendered us. She 
 was an admirable critic. She grasped a subject firmly, and 
 examined it firmly and leisurely. And especially did its 
 strong points never escape her. She had in full training an 
 eye for proportions. Nothing that was mismatched or un- 
 balanced or lop-sided eluded her notice. Hence her sug- 
 gestions concerning subjects and modes of treating them — 
 subjects which in many cases subsequently grew into essays 
 and addresses and sermons — were of special use to us in 
 our raw apprenticeship. In our debates and public exer- 
 cises, which she did penance in attending with persistent 
 regularity, her presence and intelligent interest gave us cour- 
 
90 The Heat and Burden of the Day, 
 
 age and stimulated endeavor. Some of us will never forget 
 how patiently she followed us through our protracted discus- 
 sion of the ' Maine Law,' beginning some time in January, 
 in the Seminary chapel, and ending along in March, down at 
 the South Windsor Lecture Room. An immense service of 
 this kind, a service which only a rare delicacy of perception 
 like hers could discern and appreciate the importance of, 
 Mrs. Thompson rendered to the students year after year ; 
 encouraging them to undertake literary work, broadening 
 their area of thought, and keeping them toned up to a high 
 key of earnestness and zeal. 
 
 " Another way in which Mrs. Thompson served us most 
 efficiently was through her devoted attachment to the Semi- 
 nary and her familiarity with its principles and aims. To 
 present this service in its entirety would compel me to en- 
 large upon the peculiar position of the Institute at that time, 
 and to speak of difficulties and temptations which tended to 
 shake our faith in it and to break down our loyalty to it. 
 But this is neither the time nor place for such a showing. 
 It is enough to say that, both from within and without, a 
 pressure was put upon us, sometimes annoying and at all 
 times troublesome. We were young men with aspirations 
 for usefulness and ambitious of success. We were desirous 
 to know and obey the truth, but at the same time did not 
 want, if we could help it, to be put without the pale of popu- 
 lar sympathy and support. 
 
 " And in steadying us under these malign influences, I 
 think no agency was more potential than Mrs. Thompson's. 
 She seemed to have an instinctive knowledge of the presence 
 and weight of these disturbing forces, and combated them 
 with a quiet tact and assiduity. She believed in the Seminary 
 with all her heart. She understood its relations to other semi- 
 naries, and to the commonwealth of the churches. She com- 
 
The Heat and Burden of the Day, 9 1 
 
 prehended its mission, and was rooted and grounded in the 
 faith of its distinctive character and work. And the earnest- 
 ness and enthusiasm of her convictions were contagious. She 
 seemed never to be troubled with doubts and misgivings. 
 Whoever else was discouraged, her faith was unshaken. I 
 believe there were times when, if Mrs. Thompson had lost 
 heart or hope, the Seminary would have been closed by the 
 wasting away of its classes ; and I certainty know that there 
 were times when the work which she did in keeping up 
 courage and inspiring content among the students was 
 simply heroic. I am free to confess that the fulness of my 
 sympathy with the Seminary and my confidence in its errand 
 and life, came to me through the persuasiveness of Mrs. 
 Thompson's far-sighted and strong convictions. 
 
 " Still another channel of Mrs. Thompson's influence over 
 the every-day life of the Seminary was her piety. It would 
 have been strange if she had not been a theologian. The 
 activity and acuteness of her intellect, playing in a theo- 
 logical atmosphere, rendered that a necessity. Her piety 
 rested back upon a foundation of truth systematically laid. 
 And to that foundation she adhered with unswerving fidelity. 
 She was unyielding as a rock, where principle was concerned, 
 true as steel to her conscientious views of truth and duty. 
 
 " But on the other hand, out of her theology, as out of a 
 deep and carefully cultivated soil, there grew a verdure of 
 exquisite grace and beauty. What her head perceived and 
 what her heart felt, her voice, eye, and hand showed forth. 
 Loving, genial, gentle, tenderly considerate of the happiness 
 of others, stirred to sympathetic action by the slightest signal 
 of sorrow or want, she easily made for herself a straight 
 passage-way into the inner recesses of the life of those about 
 her. With a winning sweetness she touched here a doubt, 
 and it was dissolved ; there a fear, and it vanished away ; and 
 
92 The Heat and Burden of the Day. 
 
 anon a hope, and it flashed into a flame. And so graceful 
 and loving was the ministry, that you discerned in it far less 
 of her than of Him in whose name she ministered. 
 
 " And this blending of strength with beauty, of rigidity 
 with grace, of ornament with use, was a lucid commentary 
 upon the truths which we were daily handhng. A system 
 which issued in such a life, and a life that so adorned the 
 system, we knew had an eternal fitness and a divine sanction. 
 The argument from such an example was conclusive. We 
 were not laboring in vain nor spending our strength for 
 naught. The Word, in manner and form as unfolded to us, 
 was suited to win the world to heaven." 
 
 Whatever the emergency, the greater it was, the 
 calmer she grew, concentrating all on the duty of the 
 moment, and not showing, till all was over, the strain 
 of self-control. Some traits of her great-grandfather, 
 the wise old physician, showed here. 
 
 Doctors rejoiced to meet her at the sick-bed, know- 
 ing she could be relied on not to flinch or fail, and 
 never to let her own ease hinder the doing of what 
 ought to be done. Can any one wdio ever felt what 
 her care in sickness was ever express or ever forget 
 it? The touch of her hand was an anodyne. It was 
 so tender and so firm, while her sweet, pitying look 
 carried a kind of assurance of relief. It was 
 
 " Continual comfort in a face," 
 
 when she bent over the hot pillow, soothing, minis- 
 tering, bringing broth that was exactly right, watch- 
 
The Heat and Burden of the Day. 93 
 
 ing the long nights through, and for successive weeks 
 giving no sign of weariness, except in the fading of 
 the pink in her cheeks and the slow whitening about 
 her dear, patient mouth. 
 
 She was all this to others besides husband and 
 children. It was her hand that smoothed the way to 
 death for the mother-in-law, whose home was with 
 them for the last year of her life, and whom she 
 treated with the most unfailing love and honor. It 
 was her privilege to watch by her own mother in her 
 last illness, in 1849, and be with her at the close. 
 When the fatal illness came to her niece at Piermont, 
 there was no hand like Aunt Eliza's to wait upon her, 
 feeding her soul with living bread while she com- 
 forted the wasting body. How many dying eyes 
 she closed, into how many dying ears she spoke the 
 name of Him who lived in her, while she so loved and 
 gave herself for them. 
 
 In 1842 she had what was supposed to be a fatal 
 attack of lung-fever. The physician, a most incom- 
 petent one, had given her up. A weeping group 
 was standing round her bed, expecting the great 
 change every moment, when her lips moved slightly, 
 and they caught a whisper. It sounded like ''spirit." 
 It was thought to refer to her parting soul ; and they 
 were straining their ears to hear if perhaps she would 
 finish what would be her last word of faith, when the 
 
94 ^'^^ Heat and Burden of the Day, . 
 
 same whisper came again. " Oh," said the doctor, 
 starting from his paralysis, *' she means for us to give 
 her spirits. Quick ! she may have it. Is there any 
 here?" Before the spoon could be brought to her 
 lips, her jaws were set so firmly that they were 
 obliged to pry them open, and he succeeded in pour- 
 ing a little into her mouth. She swallowed it ; another 
 spoonful was brought, and she swallowed that. The 
 pulse began to beat faintly again, while every breath 
 was held in that agony of suspense almost worse than 
 despair. The treatment was repeated, and she came 
 back to her husband, and the three little children 
 who were sleeping, all unconscious of the love that 
 was stronger than death. 
 
 She well remembered the experience, the feeling 
 that she was slipping away, the thought that she 
 miist not die, that brandy would save her, and the 
 effort to utter the word. 
 
 It was a very characteristic act ; one flutter of fear 
 would have turned the scale, but of fear she knew 
 little. 
 
 Phantoms that haunt the darkness, possible bur- 
 glars, all imaginary dangers, were idle folly to her 
 mind. The differing temperament of some of her 
 children was a puzzle to her. If a brooding dove 
 should hatch orioles, or a swan sea-gulls, there 
 might be something of the same surprise. The 
 
The Heat and Burden of the Day. 95 
 
 causes of the desire for a lamp at night, the dread 
 of going alone into a dark room or even into the 
 cellar, -the ecstasies and glooms and unregulated 
 outbursts, were beyond her ken. She yielded to the 
 decision of the father, that these things should be 
 respected as beyond the child's control, and they 
 were well comprehended by him, — but with an evi- 
 dent mortification, as at a sign of weakness or lack 
 of right reason. Any thing in any direction that 
 could be termed silly, she could ill brook. 
 
 There are faithful, true mothers, who }'et are never 
 exactly motherly ; but this one had not only the 
 mother-heart for all the suffering world, the brood- 
 ing, helpful impulse toward all sorrow and need, but 
 the sweet comfortableness that knows just how to 
 gather the tired baby limbs into her arms, and smile 
 and kiss away the little troubles. Their play was 
 dear to her, and her laugh was as merry as theirs. 
 No matter what mountains of sewing were waiting 
 and pressing, she took time to devise some happy 
 surprises for the New Year, birthday-cakes and 
 wreaths as each birthday came round ; to consider 
 dolls for the girls and kites for the boys. 
 
 Not all the instruction she perseveringly gave 
 them in Scripture or Catechism so interpreted in- 
 finite love and sacrifice to their hearts, as her patient 
 step on the stair, climbing with tired feet to soothe 
 
96 The Heat and Burden of the Day, 
 
 their fright or toothache. Love that could do and 
 suffer and never fail, was the one thing that was 
 always sure. They might sometimes weary a little 
 of the distinction between moral and natural ability 
 and inability, their precise connection with Adam's 
 fall, and the exact way in which imputation of sin 
 and righteousness fits into the Divine government; 
 but their own existence was not surer than the deep 
 unselfishness of her daily life, and her most impressive 
 teachings were those most unconsciously given. 
 
 " The blessed Master, who can doubt, 
 Revealed in saintly lives." 
 
 They knew something real came from that daily 
 morning visit to the only quiet room where the door 
 could be locked, and the serious eagerness on her 
 face when she sat studying her red Bible stole pro- 
 foundly into their hearts, while it was still a hope- 
 less puzzle what could so delight her in the Prophets 
 and the Psalms. 
 
 ** Other worldliness," that half-hypercritical, half- 
 fanatical way of ridding one's self of the duties of 
 this life by absorption with the next, is apt to react 
 on those nearly connected in disgust and scepticism. 
 UiLivorldliness is as comforting as it is logical. 
 The realness and simplicity of her nature would have 
 made the life of a genuine " society woman " Impos- 
 sible to her. 
 
The Heat and Burden of the Day, (^j 
 
 That intricate system of half truths and whole 
 falsehoods, in which words and deeds are nicely ad- 
 justed to immediate effect, and social advantage is 
 the widest horizon of the mind, seemed to her a 
 mournful waste. In her vocabulary lying was lying, 
 no matter how skilfully done ; and her habit of call- 
 ing things by their right names made her unconscious 
 directness as inconvenient and uncomfortable at times, 
 as the presence of John the Baptist at Herod's court, 
 or as would be the entrance of St. Francis d'Assisi 
 into a company of modern Epicureans. 
 
 Her confiding disposition and her own genuine- 
 ness made her slow in reading the diagnosis of souls 
 poisoned by the malaria of insincerity. She had 
 none of the sharp suspiciousness which results 
 sometimes from a morbid self-distrust, and some- 
 times from the limitations of a shallow and calculat- 
 ing nature; but when — as in a life of seventy years 
 who does not? — she found herself deceived and dis- 
 appointed, she did not grow bitter. There would be 
 a time of quiet thinking, a little absent-mindedness, 
 unusual to the company of children who expected to 
 find her in a certain chair by the west-window, at her 
 work-basket, all eyes and ears for them at every in- 
 rushing from play or school. If some one of them, 
 vaguely seeing what was not understood, stole out 
 for a damask rose to fasten in her dress, she would 
 
 7 
 
98 The Heat and Burden of the Day, 
 
 turn with a warmer kiss and a sweeter smile than 
 usual, finding in the love that remained compensa- 
 tion for what was lost. The first sharp pang over, and 
 the matter thought through, her resolve was taken. 
 
 The letters signed " Yours fondly, faithfully, and 
 for ever," by hands that so easily traced more than 
 the heart meant, were left lying where they were. 
 If there was no more happiness to be had from that 
 source, there might still be some to give. It seemed 
 to her ignoble and unworthy to allow pride to over- 
 rule affection. She could still be kind, though she 
 had been mistaken. She could better bear to be 
 thought lacking in " proper resentment " than to 
 know herself lacking in the quality that "beareth 
 and hopeth all things." 
 
 *' It is a talent to love. I lacked it," says the 
 mother in " Daniel Deronda." " Others have loved 
 me, and I have acted their love," — the key of more 
 tragedies than hers. 
 
 The " talent of loving " this mother had. More 
 than one person to whom she was unfailingly generous 
 and patient would be startled to know how accurately 
 she had weighed their motives, and from how much 
 deeper a source than careless good-nature, sprang 
 the unfailing cordiality of her hand. 
 
 That constancy and love are not marketable arti- 
 cles as the world goes, did not weigh with this 
 
The Heat and Btirden of the Day. 99 
 
 woman, who followed implicitly that One whose 
 kingdom is not of this world. Having loved his own, 
 did He not love them unto the end? Knowing long 
 and well the falseness of a friend, did He vary in his 
 tender patience? Was He not content to bear and 
 hide all personal wounds, if He only might win the 
 weak, tempted one to a better way? Did He not 
 bend to wash his feet at the last moment, if possi- 
 bly that final touch of gentleness might save him? 
 She would argue, " It is enough for the disciple to 
 be as his Lord." 
 
 She used sometimes to say, " I read and hear a 
 ereat deal about wasted love. I do not like it or 
 believe it. Such writers call something love that is 
 not it. True love is the rarest thing in the world. 
 There can't be too much of it, and whoever has it 
 to give is the better for it; it can't be wasted." 
 With her usual thoroughness the doctrine was ap- 
 plied in all departments. One morning her daughters 
 came in from the garden with a basket of flowers, 
 with exclamations of delight over their beauty, as 
 they arranged them in the vases, declaring they 
 loved them more than could be told. ** No," said 
 she, looking up from her sewing, '' you don't love 
 what you are not willing to work for. When you 
 are as ready to weed and transplant as you are to 
 arrange, you may say you love flowers." 
 
I oo The Heat and Burden of the Day, 
 
 Her fondness for Scotch history and the Scotch 
 character was ahvays veryrnarked. The stories of the 
 Covenanters, of Claverhouse and his troopers, were 
 household words. She hked to talk of the Highland 
 independence, and to alternate " Scots wha hae with 
 Wallace bled," w4th " Hush, my dear," in singing 
 the children to sleep. 
 
 Snatches of Burns's poetry were often on her 
 lips. She particularly liked the " Epistle to a Young 
 Friend." 
 
 " Ye '11 try the world fu' soon, my lad ; 
 And, Andrew dear, believe me, 
 Ye '11 find mankind an unco squad, 
 And muckle they may grieve ye." 
 
 Approving with a positive nod when she came to 
 the verse, — 
 
 " But ah ! mankind is unco weak, 
 And little to be trusted ; 
 If self the wavering balance shake, 
 'T is rarely right adjusted." 
 
 Occasionally, too, she would recite remembered 
 bits of Percival, — 
 
 " I saw on the top of a mountain high, 
 A gem that shone like fire by night." 
 
 But on the busy week-days there was seldom time 
 for reading aloud. In the pressure of baking and 
 brewing, mending and making, there was scarcely 
 
The Heat and Burden of the Day. loi 
 
 ever a quiet hour when the mother could allow her- 
 self to gather the children round her to hear a story. 
 One day in the week was different from all the rest. 
 Before half past ten, the time for the Sunday morn- 
 ing service, all five of the children were made ready 
 for church, and the Sunday-school lesson reviewed. 
 All went together to the service in the Seminary 
 chapel, morning and afternoon, and to the Sunday- 
 school at noon. Then there was time to learn the 
 Catechism and the hymn to recite at evening prayers, 
 and while the feeling of repression began to relax, 
 the light falling in longer rays across the meadows 
 and the garden, all the fibres of the soul sensitive 
 from the influences of the day, after the hymn had 
 been sung, was the time for reading Pilgrim's Prog- 
 ress. A common book read in her clear voice and 
 natural intonations, if it was the only one, and at 
 that hour, would have been remembered always ; 
 but when fiction of all other sorts was forbidden, 
 and children's books were almost unknown, the vivid 
 imagery of that great work seized the imagination 
 with an intense hold, and all human life easily re- 
 solved itself into a succession of solitary pilgrimages 
 through the Slough of Despond, up the Hill Diffi- 
 culty, into the cave of Giant Despair, over the land 
 of Beulah, across the river, and beyond the gates of 
 the shining city. 
 
I02 The Heat and Burden of the Day. 
 
 The book was begun when the youngest child was 
 a baby in the cradle, and read over and over with 
 notes and comments, till the baby was old enough 
 to read it herself, holding that and the kitten together 
 in her lap with an equal affection, in the low chair by 
 the open fire. 
 
 When my mother had been married about ten 
 years, the proposition came to her youngest sister to 
 go on a mission to Syria. The circle of young ladies 
 in Northampton, to which the sister belonged, made 
 a great outcry against it, protesting that it was a 
 monstrous sacrifice, and that she should not so bury 
 herself. To them a round of tea-parties and the 
 general comfortableness of refined society seemed a 
 more rational end of existence than to share in the 
 work of putting the story of Jesus Christ into the 
 language of millions, to whom his words and ways 
 were quite unknown. My mother judged differ- 
 ently of ends, and the thought that one so dear to 
 her should not do the best thing was more than 
 she could bear. She broke away from the tangle 
 of household care, and went to Northampton to 
 help the sister fight her battle and hold to her 
 choice. Who that knew her but can see just how 
 she enveloped the right with so cheerful, clear an 
 atmosphere, that the way seemed plain and possi- 
 ble. When her own hands had made the wedding- 
 
The Heat and Burden of the Day. 103 
 
 cake, and packed the trunks that were to be unpacked 
 so far away, and her strong faith and courage had 
 held up the parting one through the farewells and 
 the setting out, only then she found space for her 
 own tears, and to acknowledge the sharp heart-ache 
 of the separation from one who from babyhood had 
 been her pet and darling. 
 
 Distances in those days were greater than now, 
 and for the one who remained in her native valley, 
 it was a long good-by to her who went to live in the 
 shadow of Mt. Lebanon, and among Syrian palms 
 and oleanders. There was no expectation of her 
 return. *' Until the resurrection of the just," was as 
 real a part of the good-by, as if the coffin lid had 
 closed upon the cherished face. 
 
 The arrival of letters in envelopes queerly cut 
 through in crosswise shape was an event in the 
 household, suggesting to the children their first no- 
 tions of quarantine, — very vague ones, quarantine 
 figuring in their minds as a sort of fierce tyrant, 
 dressed like a Koord, according to the pictures in 
 the geography, and missionary life assuming a some- 
 what serious character to their thought, from this 
 dim connection with Asiatic cholera, as well as from 
 the necessity of writing on so very thin paper and 
 having the letters cut in the post-office. 
 
 How eagerly she read these letters, entering into 
 
I04 The Heat and Burden of the Day, 
 
 every experience with a love untouched by time or 
 distance, welcoming the distant nieces and nephews 
 as they came to the home she had never seen, pack- 
 ing boxes from time to time for the missionary sister, 
 with such tender heartiness, teaching her children that 
 it was a privilege to send their most cherished keep- 
 sakes to those who had gone so far away to teach 
 the heathen people the wonderful love of Christ. 
 
 In later years she wrote to a married daughter: 
 '' I have noticed that the time of young motherhood, 
 when the children are small, and all one's strength 
 apparently demanded for the care of their physical 
 wants, is a time of great spiritual danger." 
 
 But in these very years my mother added to her 
 untiring faithfulness in household duties, persistent 
 striving after closer union with God, feeling that 
 spiritual life was something deeper than a succession 
 of right actions. 
 
 That saints in cloisters and retreats should aspire 
 toward holiness and yearn for personal communion 
 with God, we ever find inspiring, and so keep Fene- 
 Ion and A Kempis on our tables for a portion of our 
 daily food ; but there is surely a deeper reverence 
 due to the mother who, training five children under 
 disadvantages such as beset ours, still under and 
 through all seeks growth in the life of the soul, and 
 to know the will of God in every thing. 
 
The Heat and Burden of the Day, 105 
 
 " Aunt Eliza is not a saint," said a young niece, 
 hearing her called so; " she is bright and happy like 
 the rest of us," seeing no asceticism and not pene- 
 trating her secret. 
 
 One has only to recall the instances he has known 
 of women whose youthful diaries were full of relig- 
 ious fervor, nearly as ardent as that we find in Eliza 
 Butler's, and whom, a few years later, he has found 
 measuring things by purely worldly standards, all 
 absorbed in securing playmates of good social con- 
 nections for John and Addie, in arranging Nannie's 
 first party, and selecting baby's sashes, having re- 
 duced their religion to a decorous church-going, a 
 mechanical Bible-reading, and a general intention to 
 do ** about right," — he has only to recall it all, to feel 
 there is something worth recording in this living fire 
 of piety, '' which many waters of earthly care could 
 not quench, nor floods of toil drown." 
 
 The youngest child was still a tiny baby in her 
 arms, when Dr. Spencer published his *' Pastor's 
 Sketches," a unique book in its record of soul treat- 
 ment. His old parishioner read it, and wrote him. 
 His answer has a certain pathos, and reveals his 
 estimate of her. 
 
 My very dear Child^ — It has given me much pleas- 
 ure to read your kind letter. The reading is associated 
 with many tender and sacred recollections of past days, 
 
io6 The Heat and Burden of the Day, 
 
 when the sun of your youth and mine (comparatively) was 
 shining in its strength. Now, you the mother of five 
 children ? How time rolls on ! And are your cheeks as 
 rosy as ever, and your fine hair as flowing ? Ah, time 
 changes us ! Would that it always prepared us for our 
 last change ! I am glad to hear you have not forgotten 
 the serious scenes amid which we once walked together. 
 I am glad if the recollection encourages you or makes you 
 grateful. I trust that the same grace which met you so 
 early in life, and consecrated the bloom of your youth and 
 beauty to God, will attend you to the end, and make you 
 as lovely in the last stage of 3'our pilgrimage as we used 
 to think you in the first. I am greatly obliged to ycu and 
 to your husband for your kind opinion of my Sketches. 
 You will not be sorry to know that I am receiving daily 
 more and more evidences of its utility. 
 
 Farewell, my dear girl. Live near to Christ ; you shall 
 soon be near to him in all the bliss and splendors of im- 
 mortality. God grant it to you, is the fond prayer of 
 
 Your affectionate friend and pastor, 
 
 I. S. Spenx'er. 
 
 Two years after, she passed through a deep ex- 
 perience in the long, terrible illness of her husband. 
 For many weeks he was so prostrated that the 
 slightest sound \vas torture to him. It was necessary 
 to send all the younger children from the house, 
 while she wrestled with death for him. The burden 
 of fear and anxiety was an awful one. The physi- 
 cians attributed his recovery almost wholly to her 
 superhuman efforts and persistent nursing, never 
 
The Heat and Burden of the Day. 107 
 
 leaving him night or day to any other hand, and 
 never relaxing her labor, even when his life was 
 wholly despaired of. But the mental conflict was 
 most severe. When he slept she drew near to God, 
 and, after throes of anguish, of which she afterward 
 spoke, but could not describe, she was at last able to 
 leave all to her Father in heaven, in submissive con- 
 fidence. She rested in Him. After these profound 
 conflicts the cloud passed over, and the family were 
 united again, unbroken. 
 
 The children were now coming to an age when 
 their education became a perplexing question. The 
 village where the Seminary had been established had 
 been gradually stranded by the advances and changes 
 of the times. The stage-coach that ran twice a day 
 in 1834, and made the Hill sufficiently accessible, 
 in 1850 seemed lumbering and antiquated. The 
 new railroads just missed the town ; schools grew 
 poorer rather than better. The devices of govern- 
 esses and home education, by which the parents had 
 so far contrived to shield the children from the de- 
 fective public schools, were growing insufficient. 
 The way to long training in distant academies was 
 not clear. Just then the Trustees of the Seminary 
 decided on establishing a classical academy in the 
 place, thinking it would somehow prove a valuable 
 auxiliary to the institution. For the ten years that 
 
io8 The Heat and Burden of the Day, 
 
 it survived, the school was of a high order. The 
 course was thorough, and the teachers persons who 
 have won distinction in different departments since. 
 President Chadbourne, now of Wilhams College, 
 opened it, and was for some time its principal. 
 
 One of the great anxieties was relieved, and the 
 father and mother took up their burdens with lighter 
 hearts, and the glad thankfulness with which it had 
 always been their habit to receive each event as 
 coming directly from God's hand. The opening of 
 the school brought a new care, as well as a new re- 
 lief; the children of friends came to be in her family, 
 while they were fitting for college, which meant that 
 she was a mother to them all. Her warm sympathy 
 and bright, cheerful spirit drew them to confide in her. 
 Her laugh was so merry, they could not think she 
 had forgotten what it was to be young; and her over- 
 flowing kindness, and sweet, tender pity, when they 
 were sick or tired, or " needed brooding," as she used 
 to say, drew them all to rest in her. There was no 
 one of them all whom she did not try to win to a 
 Christian manhood, as it was impossible for her not 
 to try to do for every one she knew. 
 
 In 1865 a nephew wrote her: "I wish to learn 
 more particularly of your dear household. It was 
 a real home to me. It was more, my spiritual birth- 
 place, and I shall never cease to recall with deep 
 
The Heat and Burden of the Day, 109 
 
 emotion the scenes of '55. It would be delightful 
 if we could turn the hands on the dial back, not to 
 make it traverse these ten years again, but to enjoy 
 for a day the reviving of some precious hours gone. 
 I do not fancy you much changed, but that sorrow 
 has done for you what it has done for us all. What 
 a family of boys, besides your own, look back on your 
 motherly care and affection, — the Cs., M., N., — you 
 must feel so old when you think how many you have 
 helped to train. Sometimes when I have been sitting 
 a long while talking with chum, that is to say, look- 
 ing into the open fire, I wish that I might exchange 
 No. 21 for your sitting-room, and my dreamy com- 
 panion for your own self. Do you ever sit up late 
 nights now, to talk with naughty, but well-meaning 
 boys? 
 
 *' Believe that I am more than ever a son of your 
 heart, which, though it sound sentimental to others, 
 is real to me." 
 
 In 1879 the same nephew from Dresden wrote of 
 her : '' So blessed has been the life of her who has 
 gone, so full of helpful sympathy, prayer, and work, 
 that I find myself saying constantly, ' Heaven is the 
 place for such as she.' I always felt warmly attached 
 to Aunt Eliza, as all who came near her as I did, 
 have ; but she was so especially associated with the 
 feeble beginnings of Christian hope, that this feeling 
 
I lo The Heat and Burde7i of the Day, 
 
 became more tender and sacred than it otherwise 
 could have done. Her earnest love beamed through 
 her wise counsel, illuminating it and making me in 
 love with the truth which I had disliked and shunned. 
 How well I remember her gentle pleading and chari- 
 table allowance for my weaknesses ! The blessing she 
 was to me in helping me to a surrender of the affec- 
 tions, and guarding me against the error of mere 
 intellectual acceptance of the gospel, was the out- 
 come of what she w^as, a loving Christian woman." 
 Another nephew, touching on this same relation, 
 writes : '' Her loving heart and kindly deeds made 
 her lovable, but it seems to me that there was besides 
 some rarer gift which must have affected many besides 
 myself. Her strength of character was of the kind 
 which draws and not repels, and which makes those 
 stronger who are reached by it. There was nothing 
 which settled my feelings more, after hearing the 
 conversation and arguments of an unbeliever, than a 
 sight of Aunt Eliza's face and hearing her speak of 
 the best things. There is no argument for the truth 
 of Christianity like such a life." 
 
 A little essay written by her for a circle of ladies 
 w^ho met every fortnight for charitable work, and com- 
 bined some literary exercises with it, is interesting, 
 because so unconsciously reflecting herself. 
 
The Heat and Btu^dcn of the Day. 1 1 1 
 
 WOMANLY CHARACTER. 
 
 In drawing a character as perfect as human nature 
 will allow, two things are necessary : consistency with 
 itself, and adaptation to the circumstances in which it is 
 placed. The personal attractions of a female are, in 
 themselves considered, of little consequence ; they win 
 the admiration of the beholder, but, if not connected with 
 intelligence and amiability, they soon pall upon the taste 
 and lose their power to charm. 
 
 In order to form a consistent character, we must begin 
 with that purifying, life-giving principle which alone is the 
 foundation of all true excellence, namely, pure religion. 
 There may be, and often is, intellectual greatness without 
 this, but, where the cultivation of the heart is neglected, 
 the character must be incomplete. The human heart is 
 naturally devoted to its own interests, and if there is no 
 counteracting principle the character will become selfish ; 
 and there is no principle sufficiently powerful to stem the 
 current of the soul but religion, which manifests itself in 
 humility, self-denial, and love to the whole human family. 
 The individual we are attempting to describe would con- 
 stantly watch over her own heart, would suppress every 
 unkind and selfish feeling, would often compare herself 
 with the perfect standard of duty, and, while conscious of 
 her own imperfections, she would bear with patience the 
 frailties of those around her, or, in the words of inspira- 
 tion, she would possess the " charity which seeketh not her 
 own, thinketh no evil, hopeth all things, believeth all 
 things, rejoiceth m the truth." In one word, she does to 
 others as she would have others do to her. But if she 
 thus assiduously cultivates her heart, she does not neglect 
 her understanding; she considers it a talent committed 
 
112 The Heat and Burden of the Day. 
 
 to her, for which she must give account, — consequently 
 she improves her mind, not that she may obtain a reputa- 
 tion, but that she may better discharge the duties of her 
 station. True female delicacy shrinks from notoriety. 
 
 While she is thus rendering herself an ornament to her 
 sex and a blessing to society, she claims no praise for 
 herself, but ascribes it to that spirit imparted to her by 
 Him who became poor that she might be rich, and laid 
 down his life that she might never die. 
 
 Her affections are not supremely attached to the objects 
 of this world, but she looks beyond the grave to those 
 joys which eye hath not seen nor the heart of man con- 
 ceived. While she is happy in the performance of duty 
 here, she looks forward with delight to the time when she 
 shall refresh her soul from the river of life, in the presence 
 of her Redeemer. A character like this is adapted to a 
 world of disappointment and sorrow. Her treasure on 
 high and her heart there also, she enjoys prosperity with 
 moderation, and in affliction she is strengthened by know- 
 ing that all things work together for her good. She seeks 
 instruction from every dispensation of Providence, and 
 thus her soul gains purity and is preparing for the society 
 of the blest spirits in another world. 
 
 May this character be ours ! 
 
 By her strong grasp of certain principles of living 
 and her sincerity in acting upon them, she solved 
 practically more than one problem on which volumes 
 have been written to no great purpose. 
 
 The problem of domestic service was perplexing 
 to her as to all American housekeepers, but she met 
 it with patience and courage. From the first she 
 
The Heat and Burden of the Day. 1 13 
 
 treated her domestics with consideration and kind- 
 ness. In the very early years of her housekeeping 
 the question ''What shall we do with our kitchens?" 
 presented itself in a rather startling way. The in- 
 cumbent was a young woman who had never seemed 
 very strong, but showed nothing unusual in any way, 
 until one morning the mistress appeared at the usual 
 time, to find the fire unmade and no signs of Amanda. 
 She hastily called her, while she herself prepared 
 breakfast, expecting the girl's step on the stair every 
 moment. At last she went to her room and found 
 her still asleep. No effort to arouse her had any 
 effect, the stupor was so absolute. She went down 
 to care for the family, puzzled, but supposing she 
 would wake of herself soon. The girl did not appear 
 until nearly noon, mortified and unable to explain the 
 cause of the prolonged sleep. After that she would 
 frequently fall into the same state in the daytime, and 
 while in it could do what was impossible when in her 
 ordinary condition. Her eyes would remain tightly 
 closed, and while so she could read fluently, when at 
 other times she blundered and stumbled and could 
 scarcely get through a simple verse. 
 
 Other persons became interested in the case, and 
 on one occasion Dr. Tyler came in, and himself tied his 
 large red-silk handkerchief, thickly folded, over her 
 eyes, while they were tightly closed ; then, holding a 
 
 8 
 
114 ^'^^ Heat and Burden of the Day. 
 
 Bible before her upside down, opened to an unfa- 
 miliar passage in the Old Testament and asked her 
 to read, which she did correctly, and equally well 
 when it was held behind her. 
 
 It was more interesting scientifically than practi- 
 cally ; but the mistress pitied the maid, connected as 
 the phenomenon was with failing health, and bore 
 with the inconvenience for months, until at last rela- 
 tives were found to care for her. Whoever she 
 employed soon felt her to be a friend. She inquired 
 into the condition of their clothing, and, usually find- 
 ing them poorly provided for, helped them plan, 
 often cutting out garments with her own hands, over- 
 whelmed with cares as she was, not resting till they 
 were comfortable. 
 
 One Bridget, celebrated in the family annals for 
 uncommon impertinence and unskilfulness, was the 
 trial of her soul for eleven years. Having decided 
 that she was as competent as any one that could 
 be obtained, she concluded to bear what could not be 
 cured ; endured her unreasonableness, advised and 
 taught her as far as possible, insisting on her laying 
 by part of her wages every month, and then, when 
 her uncommon wealth began to attract lovers whom 
 her personal charms would hardly have won, my 
 mother spent many an hour in counteracting the 
 wooing of young men who drank and would have 
 
The Heat and Burden of the Day. 1 1 5 
 
 made poor Bridget miserable. We used to think it 
 a rather wasted effort then, not seeing how ideally 
 beautiful and right it all was, and how she had struck 
 the key in which it is now found all real labor-reform 
 must be set, before employers and employed can be 
 harmonious. By self-sacrifice and kindness she saved 
 the ignorant creature as far as lay in her power, and 
 was really in the end better served than those who take 
 fire at each provocation and think of the employed 
 only as troublesome parts of the machinery. 
 
 Her spirit of helpfulness was well illustrated by her 
 course in regard to singing. She was thirty eight 
 or nine years old, and had never been trained in 
 music, when a movement was made to organize a 
 chorus choir for the Seminary chapel. It was urged 
 that every one who ever sang at all should unite, and 
 help as far as possible. That, she thought, included 
 her, and, knowing very well how small a musical 
 talent she had, she attended the training-school regu- 
 larly, joined the choir, and sang so evidently with the 
 spirit that no one could suspect her of an exaggerated 
 idea of her own gifts. 
 
 New tests of character and strains on faith and 
 feeling were constantly coming in these busy years. 
 The boys and girls, who were babies only the other 
 day, were grown and ready for college and boarding- 
 school. Any change that took one of her children 
 
1 1 6 The Heat and Burden of the Day, 
 
 from her immediate care was to her a great one. It 
 was with prayers and tears she parted from her 
 sons one after the other. " I shall never forget," she 
 wrote once to the oldest, "how I felt when you first 
 put on boy's clothes. It was the beginning of your 
 growing up." This was another step. But with 
 what letters she followed them, what boxes at Thanks- 
 giving, if they could not come home, what welcomes 
 for vacations ! 
 
 It would be as easy to analyze the flowers in 
 one's wedding bouquet as to tell precisely what she 
 did and said that made her such a mother. In her 
 excellent judgment there was a sense of strength and 
 wisdom to guide, and her deep, warm love was an un- 
 failing refuge. One says " Mother," and stops as we 
 say " God," not able to explain, but aware of Him 
 under and around and everywhere. 
 
 One of the pleasant occasions, after cares began to 
 lessen a little, and there was time for backward 
 glances, was the silver wedding, which was celebrated 
 by a family gathering in the fall of 1859. At that 
 time she wrote the following letter to her children : — 
 
 My beloved Children, — Yesterday was the anni- 
 versary of the day when we were planted among the 
 families of the earth, and, as it also completes the first 
 quarter of a century, it seems desirable to record the deal- 
 ings of God with us as a family. 
 
The Heat and Burden of the Day, 117 
 
 One of the first resolutions formed after my face was 
 turned Zionward was, never to allow myself to become 
 interested in any one not a Christian, or to whom I could 
 not look up with respect. That, under existing circum- 
 stances, -.was nearly equivalent to a resolution to live a 
 single life. When our union was formed, the prospect as 
 regarded worldly matters, was one of privation and self- 
 denial ; a friend, on hearing the amount of salary expected, 
 said to me, " That would not buy my pins." " I know it," 
 I replied; "but it will probably support me." We took 
 this word for our heritage, "Trust in the Lord and do 
 good; so shalt thou dwell in the land, and verily thou 
 shalt be fed." God has made good his promise. As a 
 family, we have never wanted any good thing. We have 
 always had enough for ourselves and a morsel for those 
 that were needy. In that dark hour when death seemed 
 standing just outside the door, and I was forced to look 
 widowhood, orphanage, and poverty in the face, this cov- 
 enant promise of a covenant-keeping God was a strong 
 tower ; by grace I ran into it, and was safe. It did not 
 include the luxuries of life, — things, in our view, incon- 
 sistent with the self-denying spirit of pilgrims and stran- 
 gers, — and therefore we adopted as plain and simple a 
 style of living as w-as consistent w^th health and respecta- 
 bility. You can testify that I have not spared myself 
 when personal effort was needed. Amid all the trials and 
 vicissitudes of family life, never, for o?ie 7nome?7f, have I 
 regretted the step taken, neither have I found uncalled 
 for the sober views with which we took it. With me it 
 was second only to consecration to the service of Christ. 
 God only knows the number and the strength of the trials 
 and temptations which awaited us, but out of them all he 
 hath delivered jus, and made us thankfully acknowledge 
 that they were the needed discipline. 
 
1 1 8 The Heat and Burden of the Day, 
 
 Time has not weakened our mutual attachment : it is 
 stronger and more perfect to-day than at any former 
 period. 
 
 We received you as precious gifts from our Heavenly 
 Father, intrusted to our care, — not wholly ours, but to be 
 trained for his service and subject to his call. We felt 
 his command imperative to bring you up in his fear and 
 teach you his precepts. You are consecrated to his 
 service ; the world has no claim upon you. You under- 
 stand in what sense I use that term "the world." In 
 another sense it has the strongest claim. It demands 
 that your influence shall be like salt thrown into the 
 turbid waters, purifying and sanctifying. It has been my 
 desire to train you to feel that there is no object worth 
 living for but the glory of God and the good of others. 
 
 This has not presented itself to me in the light of a self- 
 denying dut}^, but as a high privilege ; and if Christ should 
 condescend to use you in his service I would say : " It is 
 enough ; now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace." 
 
 From this standpoint I look back upon so many mis- 
 takes of judgment, so many imperfections and short- 
 comings, such weakness of faith, such risings of rebellion, 
 such ebullitions of selfishness and pride in my heart and 
 life, that I am constrained to say, if there is any good 
 thing in any of us, it is all of sovereign grace. God has 
 taught us that the power to control human spirits is pecu- 
 liarly his own. Often when my purposes in this respect 
 were crossed, and I have been driven in despair to seek 
 the aid of Almighty power, he has appeared for my help 
 and wrought deliverance. Let us recall the mercy of the 
 Lord in healing our sicknesses, in preserving our going 
 out and our coming in, and that there is no dishonored 
 name in our household. 
 
The Heat and Burden of the Day, 1 1 9 
 
 Take courage for the future, review your principles and 
 motives, and renew your consecration to Christ. Let no 
 inducement of present comfort or worldly gain turn you 
 aside from the position of greatest usefulness. 
 
 Watch jealously the golden chain of fraternal love. 
 Cheerfully make any personal sacrifice rather than suffer 
 it to be tarnished. I have no fear that your filial love will 
 fail. The history of the next twenty-five years is in the 
 mind of our glorious Head. Let us commit ourselves to 
 Him, in the sure and certain hope that all will be well. 
 
 Your loving Mother. 
 
 These words of trust had not been many years 
 written when the storm of war burst over the coun- 
 try, convulsing, shattering, sweeping away so much. 
 Like all true women of that time, my mother threw 
 her intense feeling into the form of active service, — a 
 leader in her own circle in the movement for sending 
 hospital supplies and comforts to the soldiers on the 
 field. She would turn, witli the tears still wet on her 
 cheeks from reading the accounts of battles, to cut 
 out havelocks and se\v bandages. But it was to 
 come nearer. In August, 1862, her youngest son, 
 Samuel, enlisted. He had finished his studies at 
 Phillips Academy in July, and was about to enter 
 Yale. He was only nineteen, just in the beauty of 
 his youth and the opening of a manhood that prom- 
 ised all which a mother's heart dreams. 
 
 It was such a knightly act as his whole training and 
 
1 20 The Heat and Burden of the Day, 
 
 her own spirit had helped prepare him for. When 
 the grave words, " I think I ought to go," fell from 
 his lips, that had grown ten years older that summer, 
 she could not oppose him, but the quietness came 
 that always fell on her when the depths were stirred. 
 She worked and smiled, but said little. " To suffer 
 and be strong " was the part of women in those 
 terrible days. 
 
 Her face grew white as the time came nearer when 
 he must go, but she mostly hid her tears, turning her 
 sweet face, a centre of calm, on the surging sea of 
 family excitement around her. In her heart hope 
 was strong that he might come back, not knowing 
 that his clear eyes saw through to the end. ** I knew 
 how it would be when I enlisted," he told her when 
 he lay dying. 
 
 It was soon all over. A few weeks' marching and 
 bivouacking, hunger and thirst and the scorching 
 southern sun, did their work on his frame, nobly 
 moulded, but too finely organized to bear such strains. 
 There was the one awful day of Antietam, one flash- 
 ing out of the pent-up passion and fire of which he- 
 roes are made, — a story to tell to children's children, 
 of how he sprang to his dead captain's place, shout- 
 ing, "■ Form on me, boys, form on me ! " leading his 
 men and rallying the scattered regiment ; how, in the 
 horror of the confused rout, he helped a wounded 
 
The Heat and Burden of iJie Day. 121 
 
 comrade from the field, crossing and recrossing the 
 bridge in the full face of the enemy's fire, yet carry- 
 ing still his overcoat cape on his arm, that the women 
 who loved him might be spared every pang that he 
 could spare them ; how, when night fell, he dragged 
 himself fainting to the woods, able to do no more 
 than remember to draw that covering over him, 
 while the darkness closed in and the rain fell, and 
 for him the short, sharp battle of life was done. 
 
 Six weeks from the day that he marched down the 
 Hartford street with the Sixteenth on their way to 
 Virginia, he lay wrapped in the fiag, under his laurel 
 crown, with the white lily on his breast, in the home 
 whose light and pride he had been. 
 
 Almost his last words were to his mother, as she 
 bent over him, trying to soothe his mortal weariness. 
 "Kiss me, mother: I am going before long." "I 
 shall follow you soon, my son," said she, as if from a 
 heart breaking with an anguish it could not bear. 
 
 That was the going down of the sun (to more 
 than one life), the beginning of ever-lengthening 
 shadows. The mother bore the great shock bravely, 
 but, always after, her heart was divided. While she 
 clung no less to those who stayed, she was always 
 longing to go to him who would not return to her. 
 
 " I was surprised," said a friend who spoke to her of 
 him sixteen years after he went, " to see the tears spring 
 
12 2 The Heat and Burden of the Day. 
 
 to her eyes, so that she could hardly speak. Her 
 ordinary cheerful manner had not prepared me for 
 this." The fruits of her sorrow were '* peaceable," 
 but the absent was unforgotten. 
 
 Not long after Samuel's death, her oldest son, 
 Charles, went abroad to study the German methods 
 in schools of technology, preparatory to assuming 
 the charge of the one about to be established in 
 Worcester, Mass. She was thoroughly interested in 
 his object, but her wound w^as still too fresh for her 
 to think, without the most tremulous yearning, of the 
 risks of travel and distance. It was one more added 
 to those experiences of watching, waiting, and prayer 
 without ceasing, that make up the mother's hfe. 
 
 One by one, the children married. She received 
 each new son and daughter, as they came into the 
 family, with a warm affection that never ceased to 
 bless them with the belief that they were really taken 
 into her heart and held as her own. 
 
 In the fall of 1869 the wedding of the youngest 
 daughter gathered friends and kin together for the 
 last time under the roof of the Windsor home. It 
 was not without significance that when the rooms 
 were dressed that last time with wreaths and branches 
 for the festival, it was under an arch of bittersweet 
 that all passed outward. There had been laughter 
 and tears, fear and hope, in the home which the two 
 
The Heat and Burden of the Day, 123 
 
 who loved God and each other had begun thirty 
 years before. The young girl who had come with 
 that serious sweetness in her eyes, confiding and cour- 
 ageous, had ripened, through sunshine and shower, 
 into the matron whose presence there and every- 
 where was a benediction. She had been strong as 
 a wife to share a difficult lot, and to the children so 
 wise and tender and true that the halo which crowns 
 unselfish lives was visibly surrounding her. There 
 was no unmingled bitterness in the pathos of the last 
 song, the wedding-song that closed the drama lived 
 out in that house. Its varying harmonies had con- 
 stantly returned to the chord of faith on which they 
 were built up. She had so steadily looked at the 
 things which are unseen, she could not be shaken 
 beyond recovery by any change that touched only 
 the external. 
 
 The Seminary had been removed three years be- 
 fore to Hartford, and now there seemed no reason for 
 any longer retaining the house at Windsor, even for a 
 summer home. Only women tenacious of local asso- 
 ciations, who know what it is to weave their very 
 heart-life into the homes in which they come as 
 brides, where their children have been born and 
 reared, where they have watched over their sick and 
 buried their dead, can understand what it cost her, at 
 her age, to break those ties. She shrank from it, 
 
124 The Heat and Burden of the Day, 
 
 and for a while opposed it, but, convinced that it was 
 best, she conquered herself once more, and with a 
 composure marvellous to those who knew what she 
 felt, she yielded and prepared for the breaking up. 
 
 In two weeks from the wedding-day the house was 
 empty. Many of the bulbs and flowers she had 
 loved so much she scattered among her friends and 
 children, and the sweetest lilies and roses in gardens 
 widely separated to-day are reminders of her. 
 
 *' There 's rosemary, that 's for remembrance ; pray 
 you, love, remember; and there is pansies, that's for 
 thoughts." 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 THE EVENING TIME. 
 
IV. 
 
 THE EVENING TIME. 
 
 " What still is left of strength employ 
 This end to help attain, 
 One common wave of thought and Joy 
 Li/ting mankind again^ 
 
 ^^ Blessed is that servant whom his Lord 
 when he comet h shall find so doing.^'* 
 
 ^ I ^HERE is no closer test of character than what 
 -*- one chooses to do when he is free to choose. 
 Many women coming out of a somewhat aimless 
 girlhood into matronly cares drift into a generally 
 right course. The very stress of circumstance forces 
 them into a kind of faithfulness to duty. Natural 
 instinct and ordinary conscience dictate a degree of 
 devotion to those most nearly dependent on them 
 for happiness. When the children are grown and 
 the pressure lifted, a certain propriety in caps, and a 
 judicious vibration between knitting, crocheting, and 
 the Kensington stitch in buttercups, are felt to be all 
 the world has a right to demand of them. Occasional 
 
128 The Evening Time, 
 
 mild concessions to the urgencies of charitable 
 collectors, or the rare sending around of the carriage 
 to take church invalids to ride, leaves in their 
 minds a savor of unusual rectitude, as of voluntary 
 service on the part of discharged soldiers. 
 
 With Mrs. Thompson, life at twenty had individual 
 purpose and genuine consecration. The lesson of 
 the last fourteen years is only that she 
 
 " Obeyed the voice at eve 
 She had obeyed at prime." 
 
 The era of household care was past. In the hotel 
 and boarding-house her time was her own, but as a 
 neighbor remarked, " There was not a busier woman 
 in Hartford than Mrs. Thompson." 
 
 It had never been her way to endure life, but to 
 conquer it by her faith in special Providence, and 
 her whole-souled choice to serve rather than be 
 served. It was so, still. 
 
 The round of action in the restricted circle of 
 home, exacting and intense as it had been, had not 
 narrowed her sympathies. In her busiest days she 
 had still thought; she had observed and reflected. 
 In her love for her own she had not absorbed all 
 her capacity for loving. As the history of families 
 and individuals had passed before her, it had been 
 more than food for passing remark. She had traced 
 results back to causes, effects to governing principles ; 
 
The Evening Tmie, 129 
 
 so that it was not only with ripened experience, 
 but intelligent moral convictions and unwithered 
 ardor, that she came to " Life's late afternoon." 
 
 She was scarcely established in Hartford before 
 she was known as one whose advice as well as labor 
 was of value in the different departments of church 
 work. It was not that ease had no charm for her, 
 but usefulness had more. She rose above the lesser 
 into the greater good. 
 
 By some mysterious magnetism the poor and she 
 came into communication. Rickety attic-stairs which 
 she could justly have excused herself from climbing 
 on account of her increasing stoutness and the weak- 
 ness of her ankles, knew her step well. 
 
 She abhorred waste, and in the breaking up of 
 the old home she had saved material which could 
 be made into useful garments, but which, given away 
 as it was, would be of little value, it not being 
 probable that poor v.'omen would have either time 
 or skill to expend in that way. There was the very 
 soul of Christianity in the way those buttonholes 
 on the little children's quilts were worked, when they 
 had been warmly wadded, the mist gathering in her 
 kind eyes while she said to herself, there would be 
 at least two or three little girls who would not be 
 very cold that winter. There was a thoroughness 
 in her way of doing good that marked it as springing 
 
 9 
 
1 30 The Evening Time. 
 
 from a source quite different from that which prompts 
 the careless turning over of superfluities to the poor, 
 with a vague behef that even that ought to be set 
 down as very much to one's credit. With the great 
 ocean of suffering and want around us, she felt that 
 the least a Christian woman could do was to give 
 not only things but herself Doing the most possible, 
 she felt to be only following afar off in the steps of 
 our Master. Into the organization of the Woman's 
 Christian Association she threw herself heartily. 
 One of their first efforts was the building of the 
 Church Street Home for Working-Girls. She worked 
 untiringly as a manager, and in the superintendence 
 of the means for religious culture, thoroughly be- 
 lieving that the deepest sources of happiness lie in 
 faith and the acquaintance of the soul with Jesus 
 Christ, and that only half the work of kindness is 
 done when physical wants are met. She knew too 
 well what a woman's life is, to suppose it can be fed 
 by bread alone. 
 
 She was zealous in making pretty articles for the 
 fairs held to free the Home from debt. When she 
 was taking her summ.er rest by the sea-shore or 
 among the mountains, a bit of embroidery designed 
 for the winter sale would be in progress at odd 
 moments, or arrangements of shells and mosses for 
 the same purpose. When her eyes were too tired 
 
The Evening Time, 131 
 
 for either, there was knitting ; for there would surely 
 be a demand at the sale-tables for her children's 
 mittens. Meanwhile nothing beautiful on sea or 
 shore escaped her eye, and nothing rare or inter- 
 esting as a specimen. A lace cap she held as 
 a necessary inconvenience ; a bit of sea-corn was a 
 treasure. Her love of shells amounted to a passion, 
 if any thing amounted to that in her well-balanced, 
 even nature. She delighted in collecting them and 
 in every thing concerning their history, imparting 
 her own enthusiasm to her grandchildren, who were 
 never tired of seeing her press the mosses, and of 
 helping her collect all the odd things the sea tossed 
 up. They found the greatest pleasure in their 
 bathing and their swimming-lesson, if grandma were 
 in the company, for no one else was quite so merry, 
 or entered into it all with such a zest. 
 
 Indeed, her relation to her grandchildren was so 
 beautiful as to quite give the lie to the writers who 
 tell us we must go to French chateaux or English 
 homes to find specimens of the real grandmothers, 
 who used to form so lovely a part of the family 
 picture. 
 
 She took each one into her heart as they came 
 to the different homes. She overflowed with anxious 
 sympathies for every ailment of their infancy, shaping 
 the little socks for their feet with the same care and 
 
132 The Evening Time, 
 
 interest with which she wrote quarterly reports or 
 prepared addresses for benevolent societies. She 
 lingered over the bits of white and blue with the 
 fond smile of her own young motherhood, and 
 recalled the old skill in embroidery when she was 
 past sixty, that what she had wrought might be 
 among the first dresses worn by a grandchild. 
 
 Her life must have been a puzzle to the persons 
 who cannot conceive of woman's activity in organized 
 form, the conservatism of her immense reserved force 
 of sympathy and wisdom, without some sad sacrifice 
 of the more primal and intimate ties that depend on 
 womanly tenderness. 
 
 She had too ample a nature and too genuine, ever 
 to dream that any thing can be more important than 
 what concerns the comfort and good of children. 
 She felt a certain fine indignation toward the very 
 hint in theory or practice. Had her instinct not 
 sufficed, she was able, by one or two direct strokes 
 of her sound sense, to cut a knot that needed no 
 unravelling. Her arguments on points in regard to 
 which she was fully informed were apt to be con- 
 clusive. 
 
 The most irritable egotist, intent on asserting the 
 comparative expanse of his own nature by curtailing 
 the possible stretch of others, would have felt no 
 alarm as to the traditional feminine traits of this 
 
The Evening Time. 133 
 
 woman, if he had seen her, the fair face tinged with 
 the pink color that had never forgotten how to come 
 and go, surrounded by her group of grandchildren. 
 They clung to her, confiding their little plans and 
 thoughts, as sure of her sympathy as of the package 
 of stockings and mittens that came every Christmas, 
 knit by her own hand. 
 
 One of her last visits she made at Worcester, the 
 home of her oldest son ; the children first spied the 
 carriage that brought her, and before the parents 
 knew what was in progress, she had been triumphantly 
 seized and conducted to the playroom in the third 
 story, where she was shortly after found, with hat 
 and travelling wraps still on, listening, all smiles and 
 attention, to the boys' eager explanations of their 
 minerals and shells. 
 
 Under all, there was her characteristic earnestness 
 and deep conviction of what was more than passing 
 joy. She studied the characteristics of each one, 
 trying to strengthen them where they were weak, 
 and fix the awful must of duty below the tides of 
 feeling. '* I want to get a hold upon them," she 
 used to say; '' then what I say will have some in- 
 fluence." The precepts of a grandmother who made 
 them shell necklaces, cared about all their games, 
 .and had such kisses for them all, sank into their very 
 souls. 
 
1 34 T^^^ Eventing Time. 
 
 Whatever happened in the four homes of her chil- 
 dren, — at Worcester, Reading, Fitchburg, or Middle- 
 town, — to write to mother about it was the first 
 impulse. Whether it was joy or sorrow, they were sure 
 of her sympathy, and in perplexity her advice w^as felt 
 to be a light. When nothing happened they knew that 
 simply to be informed of the daily current of their 
 lives was part of her happiness, and when mother's 
 prayers could be enlisted in behalf of any individual 
 or object for which they were w^orking, they knew 
 the strongest available force had been brought into 
 play. Her visits were a west-wind of cheerfulness 
 blowing over weariness and care. Every thing felt 
 steadier, simpler, and surer when she was in the 
 house. Tangles began to clear up. Whether it 
 was the fresh thought she brought down-stairs from 
 her morning Bible reading, — a tonic for the spiritual 
 life of the day, — or the thimble and scissors that in 
 spite of all protests insisted on being felt where they 
 were needed, or the little package of flower-seeds 
 for the garden, or the receipt for pickles produced 
 from the portfolio where it was lying in peaceful 
 proximity to the memoranda of the Constantinople 
 Home, or whether it was the sight of the lovely face 
 asleep in the arm-chair after dinner, — altogether, 
 sunshine came with her. It could not seem an 
 unmixed misfortune to be born into the world where 
 she was. 
 
The Evening Time. 135 
 
 As always, the circle of blessing spread out from 
 the single home, and her children's friends came to 
 value acquaintance with the mother as something 
 to be treasured. 
 
 A lady who knew her in this way writes : "Your 
 mother's sweet voice and manners drew me to her, 
 and it was easy to talk freely with her of precious 
 interests. I was made better by knowing her. She 
 did good in such a simple, genuine way, no one 
 could know her without being stimulated to a broader 
 life." 
 
 After the civil war was ended, and the great 
 question of African slavery settled in this country, 
 there were prophetic souls who felt that the next 
 problem that would occupy us and be slowly solved, 
 was that of the training and the sphere of women. 
 Events have proved that they were right. The 
 vastness and the complications of the problem have 
 become more manifest with each new theory and 
 test, until the wisest admit it to be capable of solu- 
 tion only by experiment. Happily, in our free 
 atmosphere and in our general system, itself an 
 experiment, this is possible. Looking back seventeen 
 years, the least sanguine progress that inspires fresh 
 patience ; the improvement in physical training, 
 already visibly telling in larger cities ; the hundred 
 new avenues of industry for women where there 
 
1 36 The Evening Time. 
 
 was one then ; Vassar and Smith and Wellesley where 
 then there was only the unctuous speculator of the 
 boarding-school ; the unnumbered societies for self- 
 improvement where the best women of communities 
 gather to study and consider questions in social 
 science, as well in Kansas and Illinois as in New 
 York and Massachusetts, — all these tangible proofs 
 of advance, and others, in spite of what is undone, it 
 seems, might stir the silent sleeper in the Haworth 
 churchyard with a thrill of joy, or her whose grave 
 in Florence is to many a pilgrim one of its holiest 
 shrines. Truth and time are strong enough to out- 
 wear all prisons. 
 
 The new structure of womanly life was to be like 
 the universal Church, " fitly framed together by that 
 which every joint supplieth." Each need not com- 
 prehend the whole. Each may dream that his own 
 little arch spans the building, but as many as follow 
 where they are led by the Spirit, must surely find 
 their work at last built into the great cathedral 
 existing in completeness now only in the miind of 
 God. 
 
 To the majority of refined and conservative women, 
 the first strokes on this new building sounded as 
 those that form a log hut, a barbaric framework, 
 with which they scorned to have any thing to do; 
 but before they were aware, and not knowing what 
 
The Evening Time, 137 
 
 they did, the spreading, subtle impulse drew them 
 on, and women in the churches, to whom responsi- 
 bility and opportunity were one, began to ask them- 
 selves if there was no more which they could do 
 for women in heathen countries than to read the 
 " Missionary Herald," and favor the regular contri- 
 butions of their husbands to the Missionary Boards. 
 The spirit which moved Mehetible Kneeland sixty- 
 seven years before, when she went to her room to write 
 " One cent where millions are needed," revived 
 again in Boston, as all good spirits, however hindered, 
 do revive, and in 1869 a new Woman's Board of 
 Foreign Missions was organized. 
 
 The movement slowly spread throughout New 
 England and the West, not without persistent labor 
 on the part of the earnest spirits inspired to push 
 it on. One of those spirits Mrs. Thompson was. 
 She added devotion to this work to her activity in 
 other directions, and was made president of the 
 Hartford Branch of the society. Her official duties 
 embraced not only care of the regular meetings, of 
 subscriptions in Hartford, the attendance on the 
 annual meeting in Boston, but the organization of 
 auxiliary societies through the county, correspond- 
 ence with missionaries, and all those incidental cares 
 which fall to one known to be interested in such an 
 obiect. 
 
1 38 The Eve? ling Tmie. 
 
 If any one had said to my mother in 1865 that she 
 would ever address public meetings, or preside over 
 large bodies assembled to deliberate on any sub- 
 ject, she would have needed no further proof of 
 his insanity. She had never been able to summon 
 courage to announce in her own parlor, that the 
 next meeting of the sewing-society would be held 
 at Mrs. John Smith's, but, after fruitless efforts to 
 raise her voice sufficiently, had always ended in going 
 privately to each lady in the room to mention the 
 appointment. 
 
 That, at her age, powers so absolutely dormant 
 should suddenly develop, was a study of great in- 
 terest to her friends. Some one has said that any 
 woman who could rule a household well could 
 manage a kingdom. In her case, experience in 
 care-taking, with her clear, composed, definite habit 
 of mind, was found to adapt her unusually to the 
 duties of a presiding officer, while her ardent piety 
 diffused itself like leaven through the assembly. " I 
 could always feel," said one, *' when Mrs. Thompson 
 led in prayer, that the spiritual plane of a meeting 
 was raised." Once having conquered her shrinking, 
 she found her voice could be distinctly heard in any 
 part of any room where she tried to use it. Pushed 
 on, step by step, by the pressure of evident duty, 
 she found herself praying and speaking in crowded 
 
The Evening Time, 1 39 
 
 churches, with as much ease as she felt in ghding 
 through the ball-room in the days of her girlhood. 
 *' If she had not spoken," some one said, " it would 
 have been a blessing to have her lovely face to look 
 at as she sat on the platform ; " but when she rose, 
 with the dignity that comes from self-forgetfulness and 
 absorption in a great thought, to plead the cause 
 of suffering women in Turkey, or India, grounding 
 every appeal on some solid principle, there was felt 
 to be in her, force as well as sweetness. That unusual 
 knowledge of the Bible which she had gained by 
 life-long study, was singularly telling. It had a sort 
 of vitality, tested as it had been by the successive 
 steps of her practical life, seeming from her lips 
 something tangible, as a ship's compass or a harbor 
 light. To an age in whose vacillations and perplex- 
 ities of religious thought it was not her part to share, 
 she offered that most precious of all helps, the solid 
 fact of a genuine Christlike life, consciously built 
 up on confidence in Him. 
 
 It was said by one who met her only at these 
 missionary meetings, *' There was a motherliness 
 about her; you felt you could give her your confi- 
 dence, and it would not be misplaced ; " and it was not 
 uncommon for one to whisper to another as she passed 
 up the aisle, " If there was ever a good woman it is 
 she." After her work was done, one who had worked 
 
140 The Eve?iing Time, 
 
 with her wrote : '' She was a tower of strength, both 
 in the Branch of which she was president, and in the 
 Board at Boston. She was wise and judicious in 
 counsel, true in friendship, equal to an emergency, 
 and breathing so naturally the spirit of prayer that 
 she carried all hearts with her very near the throne. 
 There w^as a warm-hearted sincerity in her that made 
 friends of all. Who that attended the meeting of 
 the American Board in Hartford can forget her 
 warm welcome, her large hospitality? Yet she found 
 the time amid all her cares to do helpful things for 
 others." 
 
 In the establishment of the school for girls at 
 Constantinople she felt an intense interest, and raised 
 large sums for it by the most untiring personal effort. 
 It is perhaps the most definite memorial of her 
 missionary work. In one of its rooms her picture 
 hangs, and a missionary , teacher writes of the girls 
 going up to it and saying, *' To look at her helps me 
 to be good." In correspondence with Miss Stark- 
 weather, Miss Strong, and other missionaries sent 
 out by the Woman's Board, she opened the treasures 
 of her Christian experience and made her own 
 strength a strength to them. In the '' Life and 
 Light" for February, 1879, a letter from Miss Strong, 
 missionary in Mexico, records an incident, — one 
 probably of many that are unrecorded : — 
 
The Evening Time. 141 
 
 " It was a time of great depression in the mission 
 at M. Death had taken away some of the most 
 efficient native helpers. At last one of the only two 
 remaining missionaries was stricken down with the 
 epidemic. The disease had spent its force, but it 
 seemed doubtful whether the frail body would rally. 
 How desolate and afflicted we were within those 
 lonely walls ! The days passed wearily on in my 
 weakness in an upper room, for I too was prostrated, 
 under the care of a native woman and her daughter. 
 Well I remember the sad days, the intense anxiety 
 that the missionary whose burdens had been so heavy 
 in the burial of the dead and the relief of the sick, 
 when outside help and sympathy from the foreigners 
 were repelled because of contagion, might be spared, 
 and the little band of praying ones might not be 
 bereft of their teacher. 
 
 '' As I lay on my couch, growing feverish and rest- 
 less over my perplexing thoughts, suddenly a strange 
 calm came over me. I felt as if I were a little child 
 again, and had been soothed and hushed to rest in 
 my mother's arms. Just then my friend came in to 
 inquire how I was, fearing to hear the same sad 
 answer heard so often before. But to-day I said joy- 
 fully, ' I am better, decidedly better! I think I shall 
 get well. The strangest feeling has come over me the 
 last hour, as if I had new life. I don't understand 
 
142 The Eventing Time. 
 
 it,' and soon added, * I believe I know what it is. I 
 am sure some one is praying for me. I think I will 
 try to prove it. I asked my nurse to bring me my 
 * Daily Food,' and, turning to the day of the month, 
 I marked it, saying to myself, ' I may hear about 
 this day in another place.' From that hour, inspired 
 by new courage, I began to recover, and was soon 
 able to resume my duties. Weeks passed by, and 
 I had almost forgotten the incident, when one day 
 I received a letter from a friend, in which was the 
 following sentence : ' In January I attended the meet- 
 ing of the Woman's Board in Pilgrim Hall, Boston, 
 and I wish you could have heard the earnest prayers 
 offered for you, especially by Mrs. Thompson, Presi- 
 dent of the Hartford Branch.' I compared the date 
 with the one in my ' Daily Food,' and the coinci- 
 dence was complete." 
 
 Among my mother's papers there is an essay on 
 the history of missions in India, closing thus : " The 
 question is asked. Why w^ere women sent at this 
 juncture? Simply because the work could not be 
 done without them. They were not only ready to 
 go, but cheerfully laid themselves on the altar, and 
 never regretted the sacrifice. What would the Pil- 
 grim fathers have been without the Pilgrim mothers? 
 Their patient endurance, their unwavering faith, sus- 
 tained the courage of the men, who emulated their 
 
The Evening Time, 143 
 
 bravery. Woman was made a helpmeet for man. 
 Death is ever busy thinning the ranks of missionary 
 workers, but the reserves come promptly forward to 
 fill the gaps. Many of us may live to see the day 
 when India shall be a Christian nation, shedding light 
 on that dark continent. When China and Japan fall 
 into line, then will be our time to sing our hallelujah. 
 Shall we not vie with each other in obeying the 
 dying command of our Lord, and in blessing others, 
 receive a rich reward ourselves? This is God's way. 
 ' The Lord turned the captivity of Job when he 
 prayed for his friends.' " 
 
 She felt strongly in regard to the harmony between 
 home and foreign missionary work. Practically, in 
 going through the county to establish foreign mis- 
 sionary societies, she found that the women most 
 ready to enter into the work were those already most 
 engaged in caring for our own frontier. At the last 
 meeting she attended, in January, 1879, and in her 
 last public address, she spoke on this subject, saying 
 there was no conflict between the two, and, while 
 upholding enthusiastically the home work, insisted 
 that more intelligent knowledge of the foreign field 
 was the great thing needed, and that our work abroad 
 must not be left to suffer. 
 
 No woman in Hartford was more untiring in the 
 preparation of home-missionary boxes, or more quick 
 
144 '^^^ Eveiimg Time, 
 
 to respond to special calls from the West for help, 
 or to spend long afternoons in the extra service of 
 sewing and arranging, that comes to a few after such 
 boxes are nearly ready. One who was associated 
 ■with her in these ways said, when she had gone, " We 
 so enjoyed those afternoons. We shall miss Mrs. 
 Thompson's laugh as much as her prayers;" and 
 another, w^ho was of a despondent, questioning turn, 
 said, " How shall we live without her? She had the 
 most childlike soul I ever knew." 
 
 One more great sorrow was to fall before the time 
 of her own release. In 1868, just after the ordina- 
 tion of her second son, William, my mother had 
 written as follows in *' The Waif," a family letter which 
 circulated weekly among her children : " September 
 will henceforth be to us the beginning of months. 
 Perhaps no one of the events that mark that period 
 [referring to its being the month of her own and her 
 two daughters' wedding-days, of the birthday of the 
 oldest son, and of the fatal battle of Antietam], is 
 of more vital importance than the one just passed, 
 the setting apart of the son and brother to be an 
 ambassador of Christ. The mother's thoughts re- 
 verted to the days of childhood, the early conse- 
 cration, that terrible illness and reprieve from death, 
 the alternate hopes and fears, through early youth 
 the constant effort to train you to the service of 
 
The Evening Time. 145 
 
 Christ, his gracious acceptance, sealed at last, as it 
 seemed to me, by that solemn service." 
 
 She had a peculiar satisfaction in his work as well 
 as in his character. From his boyhood he had 
 been one concerning whom friends involuntarily said, 
 ** Blessed are the pure in heart," — a thoroughly true, 
 chivalrous, noble soul ; but, with much good work 
 done, and more just opening before him, he fell 
 suddenly ill on his return from a summer vacation, 
 and died on the 17th of September, 1876, at his 
 home in Reading, IVIass. 
 
 She had known once before the withering of 
 hopes, the sudden going down of the sun before the 
 morning dew was dry ; but this blighting of promise 
 fell with a heavy chill. It was not only all she 
 hoped to see him accomplish that had faded away, 
 but, as they felt themselves turning to go down the 
 slope, the parents found their hearts more and more 
 leaning on him. He had the steadfast, unfailing con- 
 siderateness, united with his sterling qualities, to make 
 him a son to comfort one's old age. 
 
 She was with him to the last, catching his dying 
 
 words of assured faith and his heavenly smile, as he 
 
 had glimpses of what was just before. " My precious 
 
 mother," she would hear him whisper, as his eye 
 
 followed her here and there in the room. A few 
 
 days after he went, one of the family said, smiling 
 
 10 
 
146 The Evening Time. 
 
 through her tears, *' Mother, there Avill never be a 
 time for you to go. We cannot Hve without you, 
 and we certainly cannot die without you." But 
 another said when she had gone out, seeing how she 
 shook under this last blow, " I hope she need not 
 have this to go through again. I hope no more of 
 us will be taken till she is at rest," and that prayer 
 was heard. 
 
 She did not allow her grief to hinder her entering 
 with a peaceful delight into a long-anticipated fes- 
 tival, the celebration on the 17th of the following 
 February, of her husband's seventieth birthday. The 
 gathering, an entire surprise to him, was held at the 
 home of his only remaining brother. Dr. Augustus 
 C. Thompson, of Boston Highlands. He had been 
 one of the happy group who welcomed the same 
 brother when he brought his young wife home to 
 them forty years before, and had been much in the 
 home by the Seminary in those days, marrying 
 Elizabeth Strong, Eliza Butler's old Northampton 
 friend, whom he now brought for a while to Windsor. 
 The gathering was full of memories as well as of 
 rejoicing. One of these two sisters, of whom my 
 mother had written long ago, *' The tie of blood 
 could not have made them nearer," had married 
 Eleazar Lord, a merchant of New York. Her beau- 
 tiful home on the Hudson became associated, as time 
 
The Ev Citing Time. 147 
 
 went on, with some of the choicest hours of rest and 
 refreshment in my mother's busy years. Watching 
 the white sails go by on the Tappan Zee, strolHng 
 in the cedar groves, gathering bittersweet, and 
 breathing in all the exquisite charm of that land- 
 scape, she took breath there for fresh toil. With 
 equal readiness she had responded to the summons 
 that called her to the same home in times of sickness 
 and sorrow, smoothing the dying pillow of the niece 
 to whom in her school-days she had rejoiced to give 
 a mother's care; sharing the anxiety that came with 
 Mr. Lord's slow decline and death, and at last, in the 
 closing scene, when the sister went through a bap- 
 tism of fire to rejoin the husband and child. All 
 these sorrowful changes, as well as those in her own 
 home, and the others of the group, became vivid 
 when the kindred that remained gathered to wish 
 joy to the one who had come to seventy years. Yet 
 it was a happy day. To see him she loved best 
 surrounded by loving appreciation, was enough to 
 call out her sweetest smile of content. 
 
 That company had hardly scattered before the 
 sudden removal of her daughter Elizabeth to Kansas 
 was a fresh strain on her love and faith. While Mr. 
 Spring's pastorate was in Fitchburg, that home, like 
 the others, was within a few hours' journey of Hart- 
 ford, but Kansas seemed far away. The separation 
 
148 The Evening Time, 
 
 was peculiarly trying, coming to her while the wound 
 of William's death was still fresh, and those that 
 remained instinctively clung closer together. They 
 all knew well that the change meant not only more 
 infrequent visits, but a numbing sense of distance in 
 case of sudden illness, or the coming again of that 
 messenger whose summons had twice broken the 
 circle. Considerations of health and other indica- 
 tions made the path so plain that there Avas nothing 
 but to follow where Providence led, and those who 
 went took with them the blessing of her cheerful, 
 trustful acquiescence. 
 
 During this year she wrote to her son Charles in 
 regard to some changes in the family connection : — 
 
 " So the history of families closes up. One gen- 
 eration goeth and another cometh. Shall we not 
 live more as seeing the invisible? While performing 
 the duties and enjoying the blessings of this life, 
 shall not its hold be light upon us, and our position 
 that of listening for the boatman's oar to take us 
 to the other side? The attractions over there are 
 growing stronger and stronger, and its rest and 
 blessedness more and more alluring. As I write, 
 how many thoughts come trooping through my 
 brain, thoughts of love and loving trust ! You were 
 always inexpressibly dear to me, but now there is a 
 peculiar tenderness mingled with the love, a sense 
 
The Evening Time. 149 
 
 of preciousness, as you stand before me, the only 
 one left of * the three beautiful lads.' May the Lord 
 spare you till after our work is done, and may we 
 all go up to receive the crown with as firm a trust 
 and as clear a title as those who are already there ! 
 
 *' A number of very sudden deaths lately make us 
 feel that we are sure of nothing here, and invariably 
 I have a throb of grateful relief when I hear your 
 father's step on the stair. 
 
 *' I quoted that remark about sending so much 
 money out of the country for missions, at our meet- 
 ing last week, and made some comments upon it. 
 The command embraces all nations. The condition 
 of our sex, for whom we especially labor in unchris- 
 tian lands, is wretched, so far below any thing possible 
 in this country, that the call is imperative to apply 
 the only remedy, the gospel of the Lord Jesus. 
 Think of Christian churches and Christian families 
 standing as so many beacon-lights in the terrible 
 darkness. The five loaves and two small fishes are 
 being fed to the multitudes, and by and by we will 
 bring back the twelve baskets full to bless our own 
 dark places. More ought to be done for both home 
 and foreign work, and they react upon each other." 
 
 In September, 1878, she writes to the same son: — 
 
 '' How strange it seems that it will be forty-four 
 years to-morrow that your father and I have walked 
 
150 The Evening Time, 
 
 side by side ! How different every thing seems from 
 what it did that bright, beautiful morning, when we 
 went forth, hand in hand, from the parental roof, so 
 unconscious of what we were actually doing. We 
 have known joy and sorrow^ smiles and tears, but 
 the result is all that could be desired. We have 
 grown into each other, and the union was never 
 more perfect than to-day. Can it be that it is forty- 
 two years since I received you, a helpless infant, to 
 my loving care? I can truly say that you have been 
 a joy and comfort to me ever since, not w^holly un- 
 mixed, it is true, like every thing earthly, with anxious 
 care, but the blessed Master has borne that for me, 
 and given me loving-kindness and tender mercy. 
 My prayer is that in coming years your children may 
 give you occasion to say as much. 
 
 ** In my dealings with the great Intercessor I have 
 held on to you and yours, and in the covenant of 
 his love I think he has held on to me and granted 
 my requests. He has taught me what I could and 
 what I could not do, and when I laid the latter unto 
 him, he did it in his own time and way. I am com- 
 ing to feel it is to him I am to carry all my anxieties 
 for your children's highest interests. They are the 
 children of the covenant, and many^ prayers are 
 registered for them on high. The boys were so 
 affectionate during my last visit it did my heart good. 
 
The Evening Time, 151 
 
 I feel I have a hold upon them which may tell for 
 their benefit in future years, when I am gone beyond 
 their sight. How soon that time may come, who 
 can tell? They may go before me and leave me 
 like a shattered trunk. ' As He will.' The things 
 of time seem more and more unimportant. The 
 certainties of the coming eternity are the only 
 realities. I am reading John's Gospel, and was never 
 more impressed with the infinite tenderness of the 
 great God, our Saviour. His justice and holiness 
 stand out like the great rocks, but the mercy over- 
 flows them all." 
 
 Mrs. Thompson had felt it a very tender mercy 
 that the home of her daughter Mary should be at 
 Middletown, only an hour's ride from Hartford. 
 Though she missed keenly the frequent sight of the 
 daughter's face, one great pleasure of the last year 
 of mother's life was in receiving her letters written 
 during a tour in Europe. Those six months she was 
 following the absent daughter everywhere and sharing 
 all her experiences. While the party were in Scot- 
 land she wrote with great enthusiasm of her love for 
 that country, and for the first time expressed the 
 desire she had always had to visit it. It was a dream 
 of youth that had survived all her years of care, 
 kindling again just now when she was so near the 
 life where the desires of the heart are granted. 
 
152 The Evening Tirne. 
 
 Directly after Mary sailed, my mother went for a 
 time to Falmouth, — the home of Mrs. Jenkins, her 
 husband's only remaining sister, where for many 
 years she had been in the habit of spending happy 
 weeks. For the first time it was noticed she did not 
 care for the sea-bathing that had always been a great 
 delight to her. There were some other signs of 
 diminished strength, but it was felt to be the most 
 delightful of all the visits she had ever made. The 
 sisters had long, inspiring conversations on subjects 
 that lay nearest their hearts, while she was the very 
 life of the picnics proposed by the younger members 
 of the family party. As some one wrote of her, 
 ** Mrs. Thompson was never old." The earth was 
 beautiful to her, and the innocent joy of the young, 
 while she felt herself nearing a more unfettered and 
 satisfying country. 
 
 From Falmouth, she went to Magnolia Beach, a 
 region she had before greatly enjoyed, and returned 
 in very good health to Hartford in September. 
 
 There she felt more than ever the distance of the 
 daughter whom she had been used to feel so near. 
 The time before the middle of November, when she 
 was to return, seemed insupportably long. It had 
 been her habit, if she could not reason herself into 
 cheerfulness, to take some course that would induce 
 it. Many a day, when, sitting in her room, loneliness 
 
The Eventing Time. 153 
 
 began to oppress her, and her heart began to sink, 
 not with great sorrow, for which only God was her 
 refuge, but with that indefinable depression which 
 grand considerations do not touch, she would lay 
 aside her sewing or reading, and go out to spend 
 an hour with a friend. Happily she had one or two 
 with fineness enough to perceive that it is often the 
 bravest hearts and least complaining that most need 
 comfort. Or she would decide that it was time to 
 attend to the collection on some street, or consult 
 in regard to the Church Street Home, or call on 
 some one in sickness or sorrow. Any thing that 
 savored of weakness, *' parading one's own troubles," 
 as she used to say, or letting a gloomy face implore 
 sympathy, was her especial aversion. There were 
 very few who penetrated the secret of her cheerful- 
 ness, or knew that the sunshine she carried with her 
 was often won by courageous combat. 
 
 This autumn, it was her old habit of flanking the 
 enemy she could not vanquish in any other way, that 
 made her so ready to shorten the time of waiting by 
 yielding to her brother Daniel's urgency to visit him 
 in Green Bay, Wisconsin, in connection with the 
 Foreign Missionary meeting at Milwaukee. Just 
 entering her seventieth year, and unused to taking 
 long journeys alone, she was half-startled by her 
 own courage when she found herself fairly on the 
 
154 1^^^^ Evening Time, 
 
 way, but she said it seemed to her '' Providence 
 arranged every thing." 
 
 The home in Green Bay, where her brother had 
 Hved for forty years, she had never seen, and several 
 members of the family. It was a great joy to her 
 to renew the old ties as well as to take into her arms 
 the brother's grandchildren. She entered warmly 
 into the interests of each one, and left behind her a 
 fresh spirit of hope and cheer in the household 
 atmosphere. 
 
 The relatives in Chicago, with whom she spent a 
 few days, retain similar impressions, her face and 
 manner remaining as the memory of a lovely picture, 
 seen there for the first and the last time. It was 
 such a greeting and farewell as she would have 
 chosen if she had known what lay beyond the next 
 turn in her road, for she held that loving fellowship 
 with God and with men, rather than secluded medi- 
 tation on '* our great and last change," is the best 
 attitude in which to be found when the cry is made, 
 *' Go ye out to meet the Bridegroom." 
 
 From Green Bay she wrote to her daughter Mary : 
 **The day of wonders has not ceased ! I am actually 
 here ; ' Out West,' at Daniel's. Think of it a minute 
 and take it in ! Daniel wrote for your father and 
 me to arrange for a visit in connection with the 
 meeting of the Board. Father could n't come, and 
 
The Evening Time, 155 
 
 of course I could n't come alone, and so settled the 
 matter with a secret feeling that I wanted to come. 
 D. was so disappointed, and urged it so strongly, 
 that I concluded, as I lacked thirteen months of being 
 seventy, I could go alone yet ! I don't see that the 
 West is particularly different from the East; the 
 large corn-fields in place of our tobacco please me, 
 but the rivers have no banks and the brooks arc 
 muddy canals. This journey answers one good 
 purpose, sJioi'tening the time. You don't know how 
 I miss you on going back to Hartford. I can't bear 
 to stay there and know that neither of you is within 
 call [referring to her daughter-in-law, Mrs. William 
 Thompson, whose home was in Hartford, and who 
 was now with friends in Europe]. 
 
 " I am rather ashamed, but it is a new revelation 
 of the fact that my life is very much wrapped up in 
 my daughters. You may know that your loving 
 care is making my last years very happy. I slept 
 well on the cars, soothed by the lullaby of the engine. 
 The scenery among the Alleghanies was very fine. 
 Imagining the clouds to be snow-capped Alps, we 
 could fancy ourselves in Switzerland, but here it is 
 Jlat. Just before I left Hartford, Mr. F. took me out 
 to the cemetery. The grass had just been cut, the 
 Japan lilies were in full bloom and looked elegantly. 
 It was a little cloudy, and there was a tinge of autumn 
 
156 TJie Evening Time, 
 
 on the scene. I thought of the contrast between 
 this and their present abode, of the joy and the glory, 
 and, hke old Pilgrim, almost wished that I were 
 among them. It won't be long. In nineteen days 
 I shall be sixty-nine. There may be many days yet 
 of labor and enjoyment. ' As Thou wilt.' " 
 
 October 18. — "There is a certain bounding of the 
 heart, when I think this may be the last letter I shall 
 write to you in your wanderings. When I returned 
 from the sea, the thought of that long three months 
 before you would come almost paralyzed me ; but 
 the Western journey, and now the annual meeting of 
 our Board with its attendant cares, have so broken 
 the time, the remainder seems short. I met L. 
 on the street yesterday while I was hunting maple 
 leaves for Miss T. to take to Ceylon. He laughed, 
 and said he thought he should find me in some such 
 work. Our next communication will be face to face. 
 The Lord grant it in his time ! How mercifully he 
 has kept us all in our going out and our coming in ! 
 Shall we not trust him for the future? I have read 
 the fortieth chapter of Isaiah several times lately, 
 and every time with new delight. This wonder- 
 working God says to us in the next chapter, ' Fear 
 thou not, for / am with thee.' Did he not hold you 
 with his hand when you slipped on the mountains? 
 He will hold you, and the waters too, in the hollow 
 
The Evening Time, 157 
 
 of his hand when you are tossed on the billows. I 
 was hardly rested from my journey, which seems 
 more and more like a dream, when the annual meet- 
 ing of our Board came on. I entertained Miss T., 
 and enjoyed it very much. She is a valuable woman. 
 I bought her a large doll, and Mrs. P. is dressing it, 
 to be used in attracting young people around her. 
 I hope some of the ladies will give her some games, 
 ingenious puzzles and toys. The meeting was fully 
 attended, and it is said, the best we ever had. This 
 was a great comfort to me, as I felt rather ^f*^/ in the 
 morning after visiting Monday with Miss T. and 
 others, callers, taking tea at J.'s, a * faculty meeting ' 
 at Mrs. M.'s, some copying after coming home, and 
 a wide-awake night ! I hope we shall do more effec- 
 tive work in the year to come. In what I said at the 
 close I urged the thought, prominent here and at 
 Milwaukee, of personal responsibility. Miss M. from 
 St. Augustine was here, and told us about the In- 
 dians who were taught there. How little Mrs. M. 
 and I thought, when as children we played under 
 those old elm-trees, that at this end of our lives we 
 should be striving together to plant trees of right- 
 eousness in the garden of the Lord. Many childish 
 experiences came fresh to mind ; filling my apron 
 with corn from father's crib, slipping through a 
 hole in the fence and feeding it to the lambs. The 
 
158 The Evening Time, 
 
 creatures looked just as sweet to me, when I saw them 
 in the pastures in Wisconsin, as they used to then. 
 
 " It will take all winter to relate all our experiences 
 on both sides of the \vater. I thought I knew before 
 how much I loved you, but I did not." 
 
 The party returned from Europe in November. 
 The faces of the father and mother were the first to 
 welcome them at the parsonage door in Middletown, 
 my mother feeling her cup of joy to be quite full 
 then, and in the succeeding weeks. Thanksgiving 
 Day was kept there, and then she went back to Hart- 
 ford, busied in preparing a Christmas-box for her 
 children and grandchildren in Kansas. Snow-storms 
 and accidents delayed it, so that it did not arrive till 
 the middle of January. She was troubled, but sure 
 she should hear of its coming at last, saying: ''The 
 Lord has never failed me yet. I committed that box 
 to him, and I believe he will take care of it." 
 
 The last letter she received from that home was 
 the one announcing its arrival at last. It made her 
 happy that the Christmas-tree was relighted, and all 
 the joy realized which had been planned. Among 
 the gifts for the children, were two picture-frames 
 their grandmother had made from shells she had 
 gathered three years before on the shore of a pond 
 in Goshen, where their grandfather had played when 
 he was a boy. 
 
The Evening Time. 159 
 
 In December a granddaughter of Mr. Ellsworth was 
 married at Windsor. It was in the same home which 
 had welcomed father and mother in 1834. It has 
 seemed beautiful since, that her unconscious farewell 
 to that scene and circle should have been in attend- 
 ing this gathering with him. It was with wedding 
 harmonies that different scenes of her life had closed. 
 Whatever dirges there had been, nothing had ended so. 
 It had all been in the spirit of the Greek chorus, — 
 
 " Sing sorrow, strife and sorrow. 
 But let victory remain." 
 
 To that motto of the early Christians, *' To suffer and 
 to love," she had always added, '* Hope to the end." 
 
 On New Year's Day my father and mother made 
 many calls together. The day was fine, making the 
 drive and the interchange of " Happy New Year ! " 
 specially cheerful and joyous. 
 
 " I used often to watch Dr. and Mrs. Thompson 
 from my window as they Avent by," says a lady who 
 lived near them, ** and think how beautiful it was to 
 see persons at their age lovers still. It seemed to 
 mean so much more than with the young." 
 
 On the loth of January my mother set out with 
 friends for Boston, to attend the wedding of Dr. 
 Augustus Thompson's eldest daughter, the child of 
 her old friend Elizabeth Strong. 
 
 On the way she spent Sunday at Worcester, her 
 
i6o The Evening Time, 
 
 face wearing, all the while during the visit, a peculiarly 
 serene, happy expression, though she was not quite 
 well, having started from Hartford with rather a 
 severe cold. There was a detention of two hours at 
 the station on Monday morning, owing to a delayed 
 train. " Mother was beautiful about it," Mary wrote. 
 " She sat like a saint, knitting, and talking with me, 
 in a remote corner of the station, seeming to acqui- 
 esce sweetly, and concluded to stand by Providence 
 still." She was prevented by this from being present 
 at the opening meeting of the Woman's Missionary 
 Society in Boston, which she had so much wished to 
 attend. On Tuesday afternoon she was there. She 
 took her seat in the audience, not feeling quite well ; 
 but when asked to come forward and open the meet- 
 ing with prayer, gave a characteristic reply, " Yes, if 
 I am needed." The earnestness of her prayer is 
 remembered, as well as the heavenly spirit of her 
 address in reporting for the Hartford society. She 
 spoke of the work in Connecticut as not so much 
 spreading as deepening, and of the return of Miss 
 T. to India. Miss T., she said, went back with the 
 romance of the missionary life quite over, and her 
 affection for her native land stronger than ever, yet 
 for the love of Christ she was glad to go. As 
 she leaned forward over the desk, emphasizing 
 the constraining power of the love of Christ, the 
 
The Evening Time. 1 6 1 
 
 audience was deeply moved, feeling the almost tangi- 
 ble presence of the Saviour, and a certain thrill of 
 new devotion to him. She closed by urging all to 
 increased activity *' for Jesus' sake." *' For Jesus' 
 sake," wrote Mrs. Dr. Noble, of Chicago, " it seems 
 was her last imperishable word ; a sweet and lofty 
 motive for all we try to do in this missionary work." 
 
 Wednesday morning, the morning of the wedding- 
 day, my mother went up to the room where her 
 sister Mrs. Jenkins was confined with an influenza. 
 She sat by her bedside, speaking of many things, 
 her journey, her winter plans, &c. The death of a 
 friend was spoken of, and Mrs. J. said : '* How soon 
 that may come to us ! " ** Yes," replied my mother, 
 " we must look that in the face. At our time of 
 life that cannot be far off," and, speaking in the most 
 cheerful tone, added : *' I rejoice to think it is so. Is 
 it not the entrance to what we have been anticipating 
 all our lives? Can we not trust the One who has 
 brought us so far? He will not fail us at the last. 
 The thought of death is any thing but a gloomy one 
 to me ; " little dreaming that death was then standing 
 only just outside the door. 
 
 On Wednesday evening, January 15, her niece 
 was married. My mother had yielded, without ar- 
 gument, to a little more elaboration of lace and 
 
 trimming than usual, in her dress for the occasion, 
 
 n 
 
1 62 The Eveniiig Time. 
 
 saying: ''It does not seem necessary to me, but it 
 will make you happier, and I am content." Many 
 afterward said she had never seemed so beautiful as 
 on that evening. Her hair was never gray, but dark 
 and waving as in her youth, and she had marvellously 
 retained the delicacy of her complexion, w^hile a life- 
 time of true thinking and noble living had traced the 
 loveliness of the soul on every feature. 
 
 It had been planned that she should go up to 
 Andover the next day to see the portrait of her son 
 Lieutenant Samuel H. Thompson, which had been 
 painted the preceding summer for presentation at 
 the Phillips' Centennial. A snow-storm set in, which 
 grew heavier, and the inevitable exposure of the 
 week had somewhat increased her cold as well as 
 that from which her husband was suffering, so the 
 cherished plan was given up. But the train which 
 carried her back to Hartford that Thursday was 
 taking her from her last disappointment. 
 
 When they arrived home it was early evening, a 
 cold wind was blowing, and the snow was falling 
 heavily. Both husband and wife felt each anxious 
 for the other. On leaving the car, Dr. Thompson 
 saw that quite a depth of snow lay between the door 
 of the waiting-room and the carriage, and, not daring 
 to have his w^ife step in it, went before and brushed it 
 away with his feet. As he did it, he felt a strange 
 
TJie Evening Time. 163 
 
 chill strike through him, and remembers nothing 
 more that happened for many weeks. The next day 
 a physician was called, and the disease developed into 
 a serious case of t\'phoid pneumonia. The wife as- 
 serted that her cold was not severe, and insisted on 
 taking the main care of her husband. Nothing 
 would induce her to relinquish the responsibility 
 to any one. She did not express her fears as to 
 his recovery, except in hints, and before him kept 
 an even, cheerful manner; but those who watched 
 her saw the tears dropping down her cheeks while 
 she was measuring his medicines. Twice before, her 
 nursing had brought him back from death, and it 
 was evident she felt that he was in peril, but that she 
 might be able to save him again. As she was lying 
 down one day, during that week, she took up a little 
 collection of Scripture promises, ** Words of Comfort 
 and Consolation," and began to read. She felt her 
 self-command give way, and laid the book down, shak- 
 ing her head and saying : '' This won't do. It won't 
 answer to have any feeling now." " No, mother," 
 said her daughter, *' we must be sticks and stones 
 to be able to go through." Well as she knew her 
 mother, she was astonished, not onh' by her fortitude 
 in persisting in nursing when not really able to sit 
 up, but at the strength she summoned to control her 
 emotion, lest it should make her less able to serve 
 the dear one. 
 
164 The Evening Tiine. 
 
 The last Scripture on her Hps was the twenty-third 
 Psalm, which she recited, without faltering, by her 
 husband's bedside on Saturday morning. 
 
 The last thing she read was a sketch by Aldrich, 
 in the November Atlantic, " Our New Neighbors at 
 Ponkapog," a charming little story of the nest-build- 
 ing of a pair of orioles. It effectually diverted her 
 mind for a half-hour, and one of the last sweet smiles 
 her daughter saw on her face was w^hen the meaning 
 of the story flashed upon her. 
 
 The week wore on, and Saturday the sick one 
 seemed slightly more comfortable. My mother in- 
 sisted on sending her daughter away for a little 
 rest, saying, " What would become of me if you 
 should break down?" So rather than pain her by 
 insistence, she went. The last person who saw her, 
 late on Saturday evening, after friends had left, was 
 a faithful person on whom she had long depended 
 for certain services. The woman saw her look of 
 extreme exhaustion, and begged to be allowed to 
 stay and relieve her as far as possible through the 
 nieht. She hesitated a moment, as if thinking it 
 would be a comfort, but then refused her offer, as 
 she had that of the lady with whom they boarded, 
 saying: ''No, Kate; Saturday is a hard day for you 
 and Margaret. You are too tired and must rest. I 
 can do it one more night as well as I have before, 
 
TJie Evening Time. 165 
 
 and then we will see." That was the end ; the over- 
 strained cord snapped at last, and when Mrs. W. 
 came up early on Sunday morning, she found my 
 mother partially unconscious. Physicians and nurse 
 were hastily summoned, pronouncing it an aggra- 
 vated case of typhoid pneumonia. So much con- 
 gestion of the brain accompanied it, that she felt no 
 pain, and was conscious of nothing, except a con- 
 tinued care of her husband. She would say faintly: 
 '* I must go to him ; he needs me ; no one else can 
 take care of him." This lasted until Monday, when 
 the nurse's assurance that she was doing every 
 thing for him, and that he was pleased with her care, 
 quieted her. " That is good," she said. " Then it is 
 all right, all right," and never spoke again, except 
 when roused by a question. 
 
 The husband had seen enough on Sunday morn- 
 ing to alarm him, and continued to ask questions and 
 send messages to her, though so low that he re- 
 membered nothing at all of it after\vard. **Tell her," 
 he said, *' I would come to her if it were possible; 
 but if I were there I could not do much for her. Say 
 to her, * /will never leave thee nor forsake thee ; ' and 
 another time he said : " If she has any moment of 
 consciousness, repeat to her, ' Because I live ye shall 
 live also,' and ' Them also that sleep in Jesus, will God 
 bring with him.' " The shadow of a smile crossed her 
 
1 66 The Eveiiijig Time, 
 
 mouth. ** Father sends many precious messages. 
 He says very sweet things," said one, hoping- for an 
 answer that might be taken back. '* Very sweet 
 things," she rephed. "And ahvays has?" ''He al- 
 ways has." 
 
 A nephew repeated to her the verse in regard to 
 the four men in the fiery furnace, *' And the form 
 of the fourth was hke the Son of God." She said 
 slowly, " As the Son of Man, the Son of Man." Mr. 
 H. repeated to her a verse of Baxter's : — 
 
 ** My knowledge of that life is small, 
 The eye of faith is dim ; 
 But 't is enough that Christ knows all, 
 And I shall be with him." 
 
 " And that 's enough," she said. 
 
 On Wednesday morning her son came in and 
 said, " Good morning, mother." She replied, " Good 
 morning, my son," evidently understanding. Yet 
 when asked how she felt, she always replied, " Very 
 well, very comfortable." Every effort was made to 
 stimulate her, that she might stay till her daughter, 
 who was on her way from Kansas, might reach Hart- 
 ford. As that hope died out, one said, " You will 
 see Will and Sam, mother, before you see L." "Not 
 quite yet," she answered. " What shall we tell her 
 when she comes?" She replied with a message of 
 love, and at four o'clock that afternoon, January 29, 
 she was not, for God took her. 
 
The Evening Time. 167 
 
 In those four days she had not felt pain. At the 
 last it seemed like translation rather than death, and 
 no one who loved her has since been able to think of 
 her otherwise than as going on with some ministry of 
 love, in a life of which she used to say her anticipation 
 was that it would be " activity without weariness." 
 
 *' Say ye to the righteous, It shall be well with 
 him," was the message sent that week by her friend, 
 Mrs. R. ; and the thought of every heart was, " She is 
 with Christ, which is far better." 
 
 A merciful deafness had suddenly seized her hus- 
 band, so that he was shielded from the hint of those 
 last scenes, suspecting enough to occasion his rapidly 
 growing worse, but not knowing what had passed till 
 many weeks later. 
 
 The precious form was laid in his room at the 
 Seminary, that all might be, as soon as possible, 
 quiet in the house, where he lay hovering between 
 life and death. The next morning thirty years had 
 slipped away from her, and her face was that of the 
 matron of forty, lovely, and lighted up as with some 
 peaceful and grand thought. 
 
 She lay where her husband's portrait could look 
 down upon her, and the faces of the sons who had 
 been waiting for her. Her white hands, with the shin- 
 ing wedding-ring, seemed to speak, — those blessed 
 hands that had '' done good, and not evil, all the days 
 of her life." 
 
1 68 The Eventing Time. 
 
 Never were the callas and the heads of wheat 
 more fitly offered than to her, nor the white hhes-of- 
 the-valley, which she held in her hand. 
 
 It was a sweet thought in one friend, to have bits 
 of sea- moss woven with the wreath of roses which 
 she sent. 
 
 The last services were held on Friday afternoon. 
 It was at the moment when Dr. Daggett was offering 
 prayer, and all hearts were uniting in his petition for 
 the recovery of him who was so anxiously watched 
 in his sick-room that afternoon, that a slightly favor- 
 able change was noticed in him. He fell into a quiet 
 sleep, and the fatal sinking was checked. 
 
 A choir of students sang the chant, — 
 
 " Abide with me, fast falls the eventide, 
 The darkness deepens ; Lord, with me abide. 
 When other helpers fail and comforts flee, 
 Help of the helpless ! oh, abide with me." 
 
 falling with singular sweetness on the ears of those 
 who were beginning to feel what it would be to miss 
 such love as hers out of a selfish and fickle world. 
 ** We ought to dry our tears," said Professor Riddle, 
 " and then we shall see how rounded and symmetri- 
 cal was her character, and how grand a thing it is in 
 this sorrowing world to believe in Jesus Christ, the 
 Resurrection and the Life ; to take all as He says it, 
 and because He says it, and thus to live in hope," 
 
The Evening Time, 169 
 
 Many tributes were called out by her death. A 
 friend of the Seminary wrote : — 
 
 " In the removal of Mrs. Thompson's personal pres- 
 ence, our first thought is of the loss we sustain. But our 
 second thought is better. There is no loss. Her life is 
 built into this Seminary. It is a foundation stone that has 
 risen up as the walls of superstructure have grown higher 
 and higher. All the way up from the beginning we have 
 been building on it and building with it; and never while 
 the Institute lasts can that life crumble out of the space in 
 which we have laid it. 
 
 " Could our wishes have prevailed, we would have de- 
 layed her going till she had seen with mortal eye the com- 
 pletion of the new Hall, and mingled her voice with ours 
 in the shoutings of ' Grace, grace unto it ! ' But our com- 
 fort is the thought that, as it is, she shall behold it from a 
 far better vantage-ground than ours. 
 
 " If there were any place for tears in connection with 
 such a departure, we would let them fall over the loneli- 
 ness now flung upon the life so long intertwined with hers. 
 But our venerated father and friend has a more precious 
 sympathy than any we can give him. He knows that a 
 little farther along the now parted streams will unite again 
 to flow eternally on together. Meantime we pledge him 
 the cheap consolation of our sympathy, and invoke for him 
 the priceless sympathy of Him who wept at the grave of 
 Bethany. 
 
 "The household that once was so gladsome and bright 
 is sadly darkened now. One light after another has gone 
 out of it, and the shadows of death and change have 
 gathered densely around it. But the dawn of a new and 
 brighter day is breaking. The reunion of these scattered 
 members has already begun, and will go steadily on under 
 
1 70 The Evening Time. 
 
 the Master's wise ordering, till at length, no loved one 
 missing, they shall be encircled in the arms of an ever- 
 lasting life. 
 
 " There are precious memories clustering around this 
 school of the prophets. More than one of the saints 
 whose names the Church cannot and will not willingly let 
 die, have hallowed it by their labors and their love, and 
 now on the roll of these, with sadness, and yet with glad- 
 ness, we write lovingly and tenderly the name of Eliza 
 Butler Thompson." 
 
 '' She \vas a woman," said another, '' of noteworthy 
 qualities that commanded respect and kindled affec- 
 tion. To a native, sunny kindliness, to a cheerful, 
 courageous hopefulness, to a stanch conscientious- 
 ness, she added no small executive energy and force 
 of thinking. A delightful sense of wholesomeness 
 characterized her, an ingenuous straightforwardness, 
 and a tenacity of conviction that held its ground 
 until there w^as occasion for abandoning it. Her 
 fervor of thought was largely influenced by the great 
 Edwards, who was once a pastor in her native town. 
 The framework of her theology was garlanded by 
 loving deeds, and perfumed by the exquisite blos- 
 soms of self-sacrifice. Such truthful constancy, such 
 guileless sincerity, such single-hearted devotion to 
 truth and humanity, such loving, thoughtful interest 
 and sacrifice for kindred and friends, reassure us 
 that there is still something of the divine in human 
 life, that grand realities are still to be found amidst 
 
The Evejiing Time. 171 
 
 all its hollow insincerities. Those who knew Mrs. 
 Thompson will cherish her memory as among the 
 precious treasures of the heart." 
 
 In Michael Angelo's painting of The Three Fates," 
 the face of the one who presides over the beginning 
 of human life is scowling, terrified, and hesitant. The 
 second, who weaves the web, has a look of grand 
 patience, as of one moving steadily under a heavy 
 load, an expression of force concentrated on endur- 
 ance and watchfulness ; a kind of solemn awe, as if 
 there was something to hope and much to fear. 
 Atropos, holding out the shears and seeming to 
 restrain herself only by the greatest tension, from 
 cutting the thread before the prescribed instant, turns 
 her face in the direction opposite to that in which the 
 others look, and sees what inspires her with trium- 
 phant eagerness. '' At last," her face says, " it is time 
 for joy, a bounding into exultant freedom, unhin- 
 dered progress, and everlasting life," 
 
 " Blessed are they who are called to the marriage 
 supper." 
 
 In the paper which my mother left, designating 
 mementos for different members of the family, she 
 added, as if to give one more smile to those who 
 would read it after she had gone, *' In the words of 
 old ' Valiant* for Truth,' I leave my sword to those 
 who come after, and my courage and skill to him 
 that can get it." 
 
172 The Evening Time, 
 
 She closed by saying : " God has given to us all the 
 prospect of a blessed reunion in the heavenly inher- 
 itance, where two of the number are waiting in sure 
 and certain hope. May the dear grandchildren, the 
 crowning mercy of our lives, be all included in the 
 sure bundle of eternal life. The Lord grant it in his 
 time. To Him all the future is committed." 
 
 Under her name, on the family monument at 
 Cedar Hill, are the words, 
 
 " Present with the Lord." 
 
 " For all thy saints who from their labors rest, 
 Who thee, by faith, before the world confessed, 
 Thy name, O Jesus, be forever blessed. 
 
 " Thou wast their Rock, their Fortress, and their Might, 
 Thou, Lord, their Leader in the well-fought fight, 
 Thou, in the darkness drear, the Light of light. 
 
 " The golden evening brightens in the west, 
 Soon, soon to faithful warriors comes the rest, 
 Sweet is the calm of Paradise the blest." 
 
 " Give us grace so to follow their good example, 
 that with them we may be partakers of thy heav- 
 enly kingdom." 
 
 University Press : John Wilson & Son, Canibridsfe. 
 

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