Chapter V: Part 5

In the opinion of all he was the good genius of the college. The fellowship he held there was of a higher order than that pertaining to the arts and sciences; it was in the department of sound living and straightforwardness. Not only was he the friend of every student, but he was especially so of those who needed some guidance or correction inspired by sympathetic understanding and directed by practical good sense. For the faculty he served an office in the disciplinary line not easily described,--call it adviser, mediator, mitigator, or demonstrator of applied common sense. He had an idea that parents sent their boys to college to be made to stay there and perform their duties and work out their best, rather than to be sent away when any little thing went wrong with them. Still he admitted exceptions.

One of the recognized degrees of punishment in those days was that of “rustication,”--country residence being supposed to be a balance or compensation for some of the tendencies of the pursuit of the fine or liberal arts within a college town. This was applied to cases not quite deserving of technical “suspension”; but still was in fact removal from actual attendance on college exercises, whether required or prohibited,--a forced residence at the home of some scholarly and judicious gentleman, where the attractions would be wholesome influences rather than dangerous temptations, and where the pupil might receive instruction in the three branches of learning pertaining to a classical course, and thus be enabled to do what seemed less likely within college walls,--to keep up with his class.

Such were the peculiar qualities of Mr. Kellogg that these temporary sojourns with him were much in fashion at that time, and, it is truth to say, rather sought for by those a little backward or wayward. Borne on the college books as a grade of punishment, it certainly was not of the vindictive, but of the reformatory, or rather, the sanitary character. In either aspect, to the delinquent “student” this punishment was by no means clothed with terrors. To take up such familiar relations with a man of stalwart manhood, who never lost his sympathy and love for youth, and had the faculty of putting every one at his ease and at his best, to say nothing of the provision for needful exercise by going out often with an able seaman in a stout Hampton boat, braving the terrors of the seas, and the beauties of the islands of Casco Bay,--this should bring a boy whose forces were not yet knit together in just balance, to his best of body and heart and mind, and to some clearness of purpose and steadfast resolution.

When after three years the writer of these lines returned to the college as professor, Mr. Kellogg appeared in a new phase. The young wife had known him under this higher aspect during her girlhood association with mature and cultivated people. So we met now with a broader intellectual horizon. His opinions on theological, public, and political questions were rather conservative, but they were illuminated by his warm heart. His presence was cheering in the home as in the college room. He was a good adviser on practical questions of life--for other people!

When the War of the Rebellion threatened the existence of the Union and some of us went out for its defence, we looked to see him take the field or the seas for the honor of the flag under which he had sailed. But he saw his duty otherwise. He was not even drawn by the considerations which appealed to some of our brightest college men, to take service as paymaster in the navy. With so many men gone forward, he thought he had a duty to the homes.

After the war, when circumstances brought the relater of this into more responsible positions, our acquaintance became yet closer. He let himself be seen at his best, and also in his deeper needs. He had done a great and honored work among the sea-faring men in Boston, and he had written many right-minded, bracing books for boys which have gone the world over. All, however, from a singular course of mishaps, brought him more fame than fortune. He had held on to his old place and church relations in Harpswell; and thither he returned. His old people welcomed him back and gave him their hearty support. But with all that could be reasonably done, his income could not overtake his outgo. He was in the position of Paul in the storm, with four anchors out of the stern, wishing for the day.

But he had a good little farm on Harpswell Neck, a long way off the main road but with a fine outlook on the bay. With some strange freak,--an abnormal desire for seclusion perhaps,--he had shut off his front view by planting a thick hedge of black-spruce trees, effectually concealing his home from the bay view whether from without or from within. This black belt, however, served to mark the mouth of the channel for those of us obliged to make port farther up the bay, or good anchorage ground before his door for those who were bound to see him even if they had to carry intrenchments.

Well understanding the meaning of the old Antæus fable, he thought to recover strength by contact with the earth. He betook himself to his farm. No man ever worked harder at this or more completely conformed to its demands. City friends, of the learned professions, were not always considerate of his conditions and the pressure of his “environment.” One Saturday evening just before sunset, and a shower rapidly coming up, he was in his barn pitching off a load of hay up to the “great beams,” with two loads more to get in before the shower, when the “girl” came running out of the house calling, “Mr. Kellogg, Mr. Kellogg, there’s two ministers come, and I think they mean to stay to supper!” Strong stories are told about his remarks on this occasion; but when questioned as to the truth of them, he would neither affirm nor deny.

With his honesty and sincerity he did not think it necessary to change his working suit when he came to Brunswick for exchange of farm products for commodities. His classical friends could scarcely recognize him trudging through the streets accompanying--not driving--his contemplative oxen. More easily recognizable was he when, homeward bound and fairly out of the village, he would spur them to a brisk trot, and enter port as suited him well, on the jump, with “very rag of canvas flying.” At times, when under pressure, he would drive to town with a peculiarly endowed colt he had raised, whose inclination to freedom and independent “rustication” seemed to have well qualified for a degree in the liberal arts. On one of these voyages the demonstrations in these directions were of such centrifugal order as to dislocate the normal relations of horse, harness, wagon, and driver, and even the continuity of some constituent parts of the respective latter three, leaving wreck and confusion behind, and nothing to get home whole but the colt. Mr. Kellogg’s friends earnestly advised him to sell the colt; but to no avail. He seemed to like the colt better than ever; whether because of the colt’s facility of “high action,” or from the force of classical studies, applauding the victor in the game, or perhaps from that tenderness of heart that would not forsake a sinner.

With all his love for the beautiful Birch Island just across the narrow channel of the bay, which he had begun to frequent when a college boy, he had an inclination--or what the French call a “penchant,” both a leaning and a drawing--toward the wild and odd. This had led him to carry his boat voyages around to the east side of Harpswell, amidst some very bad ledges and boisterous seas, across to Ragged Island. This has only a little boat-harbor, and is so difficult of access, so storm-lashed and grim, that it was believed to have been, if not still to be, a resort for those who had reason to avoid the customs officers and agents of the courts, and not less implacable creditors. A curious impulse to know more about such a place led Mr. Kellogg to make acquaintance with this weird fastness in the seas, and the very eccentric character who at that time made his dwelling there. It is said that he even bought a half interest in the island. Many queer stories have come down from that passage in his experience,--chiefly of his quickness at repartee when some self-sufficient wight thought to pose him with a sea-dog witticism; and of his skill in restoring strong, rude friendships so quickly broken by some fancied disregard of the extreme sensibilities of the longshoreman’s personal code. His influence upon that class of men was wonderful, owing to their absolute faith in his integrity and absence of self-seeking. As to his Ragged Island proprietorship, whether he sold out or was sold out, the result would be about the same to him. It was possibly such business ventures as this which deepened the embarrassment in balancing his accounts.

In the course of this varied struggle things came to such a pass that he made known his condition to some of his most intimate friends. His farm was heavily mortgaged,--in fact for about all it was worth,--and the mortgage note was overdue and payment rigorously demanded. His home was in danger, and he seemed quite broken up about it. In a very private way this payment was provided for, and the mortgage taken off. It was a day of deep revelations when this burden was lifted, and he returned to a home which was in the dispensations of both law and gospel his own. Nor was it any great surprise to hear it said that it was mortgaged again not long afterwards. That would be the natural outcome of habits he indulged in, of which a characteristic story may be an example. His self-forgetfulness was of so obvious a character that his neighbors saw fit to provide a fine new overcoat to cover one mark of this deficiency. Putting it on one cold day soon afterwards to drive to Brunswick, he met a poor fellow, gaunt and thin as to flesh or other covering, poking his way down the Neck to something he called home. Plain greetings were exchanged, when Mr. Kellogg exclaimed rather than questioned, “Tom, haven’t you any better clothes than that!”--”No, Parson Kellogg,” came the apology, “I hain’t got no others at all!” Off came the new overcoat, with the Kellogg outcome, “Take this, then; you need it more than I do!” throwing it over him and driving out of reach of the astonished man’s protest, left to the necessity of keeping the garment for the present, and the possibly not disagreeable reflection that it would be of no use to try to give it back at any time. The absolute verity of this story in every detail has not been vouched for; but the fact of its general acceptance among the people shows that it was true to nature,--that is to say, “Just like Elijah!” Anyway, the story goes to prove his recognized character.

All this time he was strictly keeping up his faithful ministry among his faithful Harpswell people; doing good to everybody he met, preaching stanch old-school sermons with irresistible logic, enlivened by brilliant flashes of wit and flights of poetry and heart-reaching illustration; a familiar and welcome visitor in every house, holding the confidence and love of every home, sharing joys and griefs, intrusted with innermost experiences; smiled at in some sense or other by all who saw him; respected and revered by all whom he knew, whether of his fold or of some other, or perchance without any fold, astray, and, but for him, lost.

His public ministerial work knew no limit but that of the hours of the day. After his own church service it was his practice to meet every opportunity to speak to the people on neighboring shores. Not only was his boat seen threading the channels among the eastern Harpswell Islands that made part of his far-outlying, conglomerate parish, but pushing its way across the western bays to Flying Point, Wolf’s Neck, and Freeport,--the track of this life-message more kindling to the thought than the thrilling vision of the funeral boat-train faring to these same places named in Whittier’s weird poem of “The Dead Ship of Harpswell.”

The people among whom Mr. Kellogg came to minister had marked and interesting characteristics. Natural advantages for seafaring business in all its variety had in early times brought to these shores settlers of a robust type. Among them were many who, at that period when minds and bodies were so astir in the old world and new over questions of life, religion, and the social order, sought a change of place that they might find scope for their abounding energies and unchanging purpose. These were strong characters--men and women--strong in body, mind, and heart,--and, it must be said also, in political and religious faith. This implies originality, independence, diversity,--the outcome of which is not a tame common likeness in the elements of a community, but differences which when properly harmonized give strength to the social structure. These leading spirits organized their likenesses and differences into a little republic, based upon integrity, and by mutual service tending to the common good realizing what was best in the ability of each. They prospered. Many a noble old homestead stands to-day on these island fronts and headlands, testifying to the uses they made of this prosperity. These characteristics appeared in their descendants down to the third and fourth generation.

It was the holding together of this society, the harmonizing of these elements, and bringing out their power for good, that made the inspiring and noble work for Elijah Kellogg. With a warm heart for all; the quick recognition of every worthy trait of temperament or habit; taking in the sorrows of others with sincere sympathy; tactful in dealing with weakness or defect; tolerant of differing belief or profession; fearless of adverse expression or hostile force,--he went straightforward in his work. He was appreciated. Most of those he dealt with were in one way or another seafaring men; builders and owners, masters and sailors of ships; men of wide experience, who had seen the world, who had endured hardships, who had well carried great responsibilities; the women, too, accustomed to enlarging thoughts and sympathies.

These were a people worthy of such a man as he was of them. His sound instruction and faithful exhortation impressed such minds. Strong doctrine, largely on the lines of the old Pilgrim faith, propounded, pondered, and at least respected, meets and makes such characters. The untiring effort to apply these principles in the practice of daily living, instilling these elements into the springs of action and fibre of character, inculcating the test of right and sense of honor for the rule of social intercourse and endeavor,--out of all this comes a mighty result in the course of years. For three generations in that steadfast old town he stood at the gates of life. Birth, baptism, marriage, and the passing over we call death,--none of these was held quite acceptable to God, or blessed to the full for any, unless Elijah Kellogg were the usher. To the last days of his life, he was summoned from near and far by descendants of these families to perpetuate by this token the covenant of the inherited blessing. His influence is still powerful in the sterling character of that community, of which it is not too much to say that it is typical of the best American citizenship.

One interesting custom kept up to the last was that time of all good gifts and greetings,--the annual “donation party,” or reception, for Mr. Kellogg, at that home of ample welcome, dear “Aunt Betsy” Alexander’s, his oldest and nearest neighbor. What gatherings were there! What types of strength and beauty! What harmonious contrasts and balancing of youth and age, of soberness and mirth, of brooding memories and forward-looking, untested promise! And all owing so much of their worth to this one man.

In his latter years Mr. Kellogg was more an object of interest than ever. The inroads of advancing age did not reach his mind and spirit. He stood up in his old church and gave strong sermons,--some of them quite likely the same as had been given to other generations, but equally applicable and wholesome now. People came long distances to see and hear him. Summer visitors at neighboring resorts kept the circle of admirers undiminished and filled the church on Sundays.

He was often sought for to go elsewhere for one more greeting. At the great meeting of the graduates at the centennial of the college, he was entreated to be one of the announced speakers. His modesty and real diffidence would not allow him to assent. But, as might be expected, he was sought out in some of his old haunts within the grounds, and brought in by acclamation. His was the best speech among them all, which bore hearts away to the unseen bonds of fellowship and the continuity of college life and power.

In the very closing days of his activity-- in the mingling of the twilight and the dawn--he was persuaded to address a meeting of friends from neighboring towns held in the spacious auditorium in Merrymeeting Park, by the riverside in Brunswick. Over against the solid physical force of the vast assembly he stood with the aspect of an already disembodied spirit; but in clear tones, as of a voice from heaven, he delivered his message, in that marvellous, all-entreating discourse, “The Prodigal Son.” Those of us who stood near, almost dreading lest the winged words should bear him away, saw by the gleam of his eye what joy it was to that great heart of faith, and hope, and love, that his last commission might be to point out the way by which the wilful, unworthy wanderer, with belated penitence, might find the Father’s House.

It does not seem quite natural to close these reminiscences without expressing thankfulness that the last decade of years brought the long-cherished friendship within even closer bounds. With a summer home on the site of one of the great old shipyards came the good fortune of becoming one of Mr. Kellogg’s nearest neighbors. After life’s toil and trial, its strifes and storms and perils, we sat down within hailing distance on shores sloping toward each other, looking over quiet waters. It was a time of boats again; and their message was still of glad tidings. It seemed but an easy row across the mile of bay, with him on the other shore. Thus was more than renewed the old habit of hospitalities and symposiums. The dreams of youth had been interpreted; its faiths tested; its hopes and fears overpassed; only its heart unchanged. We knew what we were talking about now; and there was much to say. On Sundays we walked together the well-worn paths to his familiar church with boyish embrace, caring not if any thought it strange. Then, too, meeting at the bankside of dear friends departed, with his words the last of earth.

Now the black spruces stand in mourning; but our hearts go on with him. His boat is still on the sloping shore, pointing seaward; so does his cherished spirit help to bear us over.

Through nearly threescore years what blessed work was his! And his reward is not wholly on high, although it will be so in the consummation. But here and now and in the years to come is a great part of it, in living power in the hearts and souls of men and women walking worthily in this world, letting their light also shine to illumine the path for others still. Who can estimate the value, the power, the reach, of a work like this? Faithful friends are earnest now to set up a monument to mark the place of his forth-giving and to keep the memory of him fresh; but the whole world is not too wide to look for the place of his power, and the memory of him belongs to the eternities.

A TRIBUTE

ABIEL HOLMES WRIGHT

[On Tuesday, March 19, 1901, funeral services for Mr. Kellogg were held at the Harpswell church. At these services Professor Henry L. Chapman officiated, and spoke to the Harpswell people of the work and character of their beloved pastor. A choir of Bowdoin College students, members of the Alpha Delta Phi fraternity, sang appropriate hymns. On the next day services were held in the Second Parish church of Portland at which Rev. Abiel H. Wright, pastor of the St. Lawrence Street church and an intimate friend of Mr. Kellogg, delivered the following tribute, and Rev. Dr. George Lewis of South Berwick offered prayer. The burial was in the Western Cemetery, Portland, where are buried Mr. Kellogg’s wife and father and mother.]

In one of the pastoral psalms God’s thought and feeling concerning the death of his consecrated servants find this expression, “Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His Saints.” When the aged saint comes home from the toil and trouble of his earth-time services, there is joy in the heart of the Eternal Father. Angels rejoice when one sinner repenteth and the life of faith is begun on earth, but when the sinner becomes a saint and the long weary trial-way is trodden through to its end, when, as the Lord sees, His servant’s work is done, and he is received on high into the saints’ everlasting rest, then indeed the death of His saint is precious in His sight.

Fifty-seven years ago Elijah Kellogg began his life ministry as a preacher of the Gospel in the humble village of Harpswell Centre, where a few days past it was ended. What minister of Maine has ever been more widely known and loved by its people than was this saintly and revered preacher? As a young man of thirty years but recently from Andover Theological Seminary, he began his ministry among the Harpswell people; as an aged saint of God, nearly eighty-eight years old, known and loved far and wide in our land, he closed that ministry in his death, among the people he had seen grow up from childhood to declining age. He had baptized the children of those who were his first parishioners. He had buried the parents and in many instances the grandparents of those who loved, revered, and supported him during the last years of his laborious ministry.

If we ask why he remained among them, when called to other and more inviting fields of labor; why, when this honored Second Parish invited him to its pastorate in the time of its strength and prime, he declined to leave the little country church of forty or fifty members, the answer is, because he loved the Harpswell people. They were his first love, and they were his last love. Highly privileged people! God-blessed church! To have had this holy man of God living among them, passing by them continually, speaking God’s truth to them, serving them in their homes, their fields, their boats, their sanctuary, in the Christ-spirit of devotion, and living out his rich, fruitful life of faith among them to its end, content and satisfied to have their love and gratitude, and with his dying breath speaking his last loving benediction upon them every one. It has been a beautiful life of service,--a noble ministry for God and humanity.

We have often wondered what Elijah Kellogg would have been had he chosen to take his father’s pulpit, and the position and the prominence which it would have given him in our city and throughout our state. It might possibly have made of him a grander preacher than he was--and few are the preachers that ever came to Portland pulpits who drew larger or more satisfied congregations than did he; it might have made of him a more influential clergyman in our state than he was. But who will say he could have developed a grander character or won a fairer fame than now belong to him?

Elijah Kellogg was a man of deep and fervid piety--a man of prayer. There are guest chambers in our city where his voice has been heard in prayer for hours at a time, the memory of which is a benediction. There is a chamber on Munjoy Hill, in which I have often slept, which Elijah Kellogg frequently occupied as the guest of one of his former Harpswell families. In that chamber he wrote parts of many of his surpassing juvenile stories, and there he prayed often and long.

Being a man of prayer, it was his wish and will to abide where God would have him. It was God’s will that of the fifty-eight years of his ministry, the Harpswell people should have his service nearly all of the time for forty-three years, and part of the time each of the remaining fifteen years. During the ten years he was minister of the Seaman’s Bethel in Boston, as chaplain of the Seaman’s Friend society, he spent his summer in his Harpswell home, preaching and ministering to the people. Counting out the five years of his Topsham pastorate, we may say that his connection with the church of Harpswell Centre was practically unbroken for fifty-three years, and during his pastorate in Topsham he continued to dwell in his Harpswell home.

His work in Boston brought out one prominent characteristic of his ministry: his interest in and love of young men. Elijah Kellogg was every man’s friend, but he was preëminently the friend and helper of young men. As he delighted to write books for boys, which helped them to become right-minded and true-hearted young men, so he aimed in preaching and by personal effort to reach and save young men. He did so conspicuously in Boston. At the time when Dr. Stone was pastor of Park Street Congregational church, Mr. Kellogg was preaching in the Mariners’ church of that city. At that time Dr. Charles G. Finney was at work as a revivalist with Dr. Stone. Rev. Mr. Kellogg had been, and was then and subsequently, in the habit of meeting a class of young men in Dr. Stone’s chapel. From among those young men he trained Christian workers and led them down into the slums of the North End to help him in his work of holding meetings on the wharves.

One of those young men I knew years afterward, who devoted much of his spare time aiding Elijah Kellogg in his good work among the tempted classes of the North End. Two years later that young man came to Portland to live. He became a worker, then a member, of the St. Lawrence Street church. When Mr. Kellogg was back again in Harpswell, this young man was a prominent merchant and politician, and a well-known Christian worker in this city.

At the dedication of the new St. Lawrence Congregational church in 1897, Mr. Kellogg made two memorable addresses, in one of which he alluded to the lamented Henry H. Burgess, who had died in 1893, in these words: “When I was preaching in Boston, Henry H. Burgess was the bookkeeper for a paint and oil firm in that city, and a member of the Park Street Sunday-school. I was preaching at that church, and saw that the people were sending out old men to gather the young men into the Sunday-school. I told them they would never do any good in that way, and asked them why they did not send out young men to do this work. They said they did not have any young men to do it, and I said I would get some of them for the purpose. I preached one sermon, and the first Sunday after that I walked fifteen young men into that Sunday-school, with Henry Burgess at their head, and the next Sunday in came twenty more, and so on, until finally the building was crowded to its utmost capacity, and we had young men to work for us.

“When Henry Burgess came to Portland from Boston, I gave him a letter of introduction to Dr. Carruthers. He is no longer here,” continued the aged speaker, while tears of emotion coursed down his bronzed cheeks, “but though absent in the body, he is rejoicing here with us in the spirit.”

They loved each other, this aged minister and that strong young man, and they were helpful to each other. They have changed eyes and clasped hands, now, I believe, in the eternal home of the saints.

It was during Mr. Kellogg’s life in Boston, in his home on Pinckney Street, that he wrote his marvellous books for young people. Is there here man or woman, young man or maiden, who has not read them and received from them moral tone and stamina? Perhaps it is true to say, and no discredit to Mr. Kellogg to say, that he was more widely known as author than as preacher, and that he has probably done more for the moral health of American youth by his breezy, fascinating books than by his work as preacher and pastor. Yea, he has been a mighty preacher to young Americans by the eloquence of his industrious pen.

It would, I believe, be difficult to find an author who wrote with a more definite and practical aim to Christianize young people than did Elijah Kellogg, or one who had better success in the attainment of his high and noble purpose. Mr. Kellogg possessed a genius for that kind of literary work. That he had, in early years, the latent art of an accomplished rhetorician was proved in his student days, when he wrote and declaimed “Spartacus to the Gladiators,” while in Andover Theological Seminary. It is well, doubtless, that Mr. Kellogg’s literary genius was directed to the humbler, yet more practical and serviceable, art of writing books for the moral and religious culture of the young.

As a preacher Mr. Kellogg was great, both in the art of making and in the forceful presentation of the sermon. Rhetorical finish and enlivening humor were alike natural and easy to him. I never have heard a preacher who seemed more thoroughly to enjoy the effort of preaching, and few preachers excelled him in the ability to make his audience enjoy the sermon. How quickly could he change the amused interest of the congregation in the play of his humor into serious and solemn emotion by the power and pathos of his forceful appeals, applying the teaching of his sermon to the conscience and the heart.

He was a man of quick and responsive sympathies. His whole life was characterized by the spirit of Christian benevolence. He not only gave himself to his people to be ever and always their servant in things spiritual, but as truly in things temporal. He was their counsellor and helper in all their heavenly and earthly concerns. It was the habit of his life to keep a purse for the Lord, into which went one-tenth of all moneys received by him. Thus he furnished himself, systematically, with the means to extend aid to those whose sufferings appealed to his sympathies. It is said that he gave beyond his means, and often to his own embarrassment. His services as a preacher were in constant demand, from churches far and near, and he responded when he could. Not a few churches have been blessed by his labors, at different intervals, during his Harpswell pastorate. Here in Portland he was greatly beloved. For nearly one year he was the continual supply of the St. Lawrence Street church, and in the thought of its older members he is regarded as one of its pastors. Portland claimed him as her own. He preached at Cumberland Mills, at Wellesley, Rockport, and New Bedford, Massachusetts, and in other places he has served the church of God. The Congregational church in New Bedford extended to him a call, as did this Second Parish. But he refused all such calls, being unwilling to make any final severance from his beloved Harpswell people.

In 1889, after the close of his Topsham pastorate, he resumed full pastoral care of the Harpswell church, which had been served by others during his work elsewhere, and there he remained until God called him home. It was a wonder to us all how this venerable man, with the infirmities of extreme old age creeping upon him, could still keep on preaching in his eighty-eighth year, two sermons each Sunday, and ministering as a pastor to his flock.

His last visit to Portland was during “the Old Home week” in August, 1900. He opened the festivities of that notable week by preaching Sunday morning in this Second Parish church, upon invitation of its pastor, and preaching again in the evening of that day at Yarmouth; returning Monday morning to the residence of his niece in the old homestead of his honored father, the first pastor of this Second Parish church, who died in that historic house on Cumberland Street in 1842, aged eighty years.

Elijah Kellogg married, after the age of forty, Hannah Pomeroy, the daughter of the Rev. Thaddeus Pomeroy, pastor at Gorham, Maine, from 1832 to 1839. Two children survive this union, both residing in Melrose Highlands, Massachusetts, Frank Gilman Kellogg and Mary Catherine, the wife of Mr. Harry Batchelder. I was called to officiate at the funeral service of their mother in the Cumberland home referred to, and rode to the grave with her sorrowing husband. Returning from the cemetery, the aged, grief-stricken man, said, “Now I will return to my home to be alone with my God.” His words have been living in my memory ever since. They implied that he was sure of finding the God of all comfort in that secluded and desolated home on Harpswell’s shore. Who doubts but the God we love dwelt there with his aged servant, strengthening and supporting him in his loneliness and sorrow?

His children desired greatly to have their father with them in their pleasant homes, but he chose to dwell among the people whom God gave him to serve unto the end. “I will die in the harness,” he would say, in answer to their appeals. I have from the lips of his son the words of the last prayer he was heard to offer some days before his death. “I thank God for a Christian mother, who consecrated me to Christ and the Christian ministry,”--the prayer was followed by his repeating of the twenty-third Psalm.... Just before Elijah Kellogg passed away from earth, he delivered this touching message for his Harpswell flock, “I want to send my love to all these people.” Having loved his own, like his dear Lord, he loved them unto the end. Yesterday the message was delivered to them by Professor Chapman in his funeral discourse. The very last words of this venerable man of God, this faithful shepherd of God’s people, were, “I am so thankful.”

Let us not attempt to interpret the words; they teach us that his Christian heart was overflowing with gratitude to God. He was dying in a good old age, his children around him, his people near him. He was gathered to his fathers after a long, faithful, heroic, and noble life. He leaves with us a most precious and a most blessed memory. Our hearts, too, are full of gratitude to God for the life of Elijah Kellogg on earth.

DECLAMATIONS

SPARTACUS TO THE GLADIATORS

It had been a day of triumph in Capua. Lentulus, returning with victorious eagles, had amused the populace with the sports of the amphitheatre to an extent hitherto unknown even in that luxurious city. The shouts of revelry had died away; the roar of the lion had ceased; the last loiterer had retired from the banquet; and the lights in the palace of the victor were extinguished. The moon, piercing the tissue of fleecy clouds, silvered the dewdrop on the corselet of the Roman sentinel, and tipped the dark waters of Volturnus with wavy, tremulous light. It was a night of holy calm, when the zephyr sways the young spring leaves, and whispers among the hollow reeds its dreamy music. No sound was heard but the last sob of some weary wave, telling its story to the smooth pebbles of the beach, and then all was still as the breast when the spirit has departed.

In the deep recesses of the amphitheatre a band of gladiators were crowded together,--their muscles still knotted with the agony of conflict, the foam upon their lips, and the scowl of battle yet lingering upon their brows,--when Spartacus, rising in the midst of that grim assemblage, thus addressed them:--

“Ye call me chief, and ye do well to call him chief who, for twelve long years, has met upon the arena every shape of man or beast that the broad Empire of Rome could furnish, and has never yet lowered his arm. And if there be one among you who can say that, ever, in public fight or private brawl, my actions did belie my tongue, let him step forth and say it. If there be three in all your throng dare face me on the bloody sand, let them come on!

“Yet I was not always thus, a hired butcher, a savage chief of still more savage men. My father was a reverent man, who feared great Jupiter, and brought to the rural deities his offerings of fruits and flowers. He dwelt among the vineclad rocks and olive groves at the foot of Helicon. My early life ran quiet as the brook by which I sported. I was taught to prune the vine, to tend the flock; and, at noon, I gathered my sheep beneath the shade, and played upon the shepherd’s flute. I had a friend, the son of our neighbor; we led our flocks to the same pasture, and shared together our rustic meal. “One evening, after the sheep were folded, and we were all seated beneath the myrtle that shaded our cottage, my grandsire, an old man, was telling of Marathon and Leuctra, and how, in ancient times, a little band of Spartans, in a defile of the mountains, withstood a whole army. I did not then know what war meant; but my cheeks burned, I knew not why; and I clasped the knees of that venerable man, till my mother, parting the hair from off my brow, kissed my throbbing temples, and bade me go to rest and think no more of those old tales and savage wars. And, methinks, if I could look on something other than warrior’s harness and the blinding glare of burnished steel, and hear some other sound than death groans and armor clangs, could I but lay these throbbing temples upon the soft green turf beside my native brook, and let my hand hang over the bank into its blessed current, and feel the broad sweep of its waters, while the leaves danced over me, methinks that I could heave this cursed crust from off my heart and be again a child. Yes, a child, a child! But what have I to do with thoughts like these? I do forget my story.

“That very night the Romans landed on our shore, and the clash of steel was heard within our quiet vale. I saw the breast that had nourished me trampled by the iron hoof of the war-horse; the bleeding body of my father flung amid the blazing rafters of our dwelling. To-day I killed a man in the arena, and when I broke his helmet-clasps, behold! he was my friend! He knew me,--smiled faintly,--gasped,--and died; the same sweet smile that I had marked upon his face when, in adventurous boyhood, we scaled some lofty cliff to pluck the first ripe grapes, and bear them home in childish triumph. I told the prætor he was my friend, noble and brave, and I begged his body, that I might burn it upon the funeral-pile, and mourn over his ashes. Ay, on my knees, amid the dust and blood of the arena, I begged that boon, while all the Roman maids and matrons, and those holy virgins they call vestal, and the rabble, shouted in mockery, deeming it rare sport, forsooth, to see Rome’s fiercest gladiator turn pale, and tremble like a very child before that piece of bleeding clay; but the prætor drew back as if I were pollution, and sternly said: ’Let the carrion rot! There are no noble men but Romans!’ And he, deprived of funeral rites, must wander, a hapless ghost, beside the waters of that sluggish river, and look--and look--and look in vain to the bright Elysian Fields where dwell his ancestors and noble kindred. And so must you, and so must I, die like dogs!

“O Rome! Rome! thou hast been a tender nurse to me! Ay, thou hast given to that poor, gentle, timid shepherd-lad, who never knew a harsher sound than a flute-note, muscles of iron and a heart of flint; taught him to drive the sword through rugged brass and plaited mail, and warm it in the marrow of his foe! to gaze into the glaring eyeballs of the fierce Numidian lion, even as a smooth-cheeked boy upon a laughing girl. And he shall pay thee back till thy yellow Tiber is red as frothing wine, and in its deepest ooze thy lifeblood lies curdled!

“Ye stand here now like giants, as ye are! The strength of brass as in your toughened sinews; but to-morrow some Roman Adonis, breathing sweet odors from his curly locks, shall come, and with his lily fingers pat your brawny shoulders, and bet his sesterces upon your blood! Hark! Hear ye yon lion roaring in his den? ’Tis three days since he tasted meat; but to-morrow he shall break his fast upon your flesh; and ye shall be a dainty meal for him.

“If ye are brutes, then stand here like fat oxen waiting for the butcher’s knife; if ye are men, follow me! strike down yon sentinel, and gain the mountain-passes, and there do bloody work as did your sires at old Thermopylæ! Is Sparta dead? Is the old Grecian spirit frozen in your veins, that ye do crouch and cower like base-born slaves beneath your master’s lash? O comrades! warriors! Thracians! if we must fight, let us fight for ourselves; if we must slaughter, let us slaughter our oppressors; if we must die, let us die under the open sky, by the bright waters, in noble, honorable battle.”

REGULUS TO THE CARTHAGINIANS

The beams of the rising sun had gilded the lofty domes of Carthage, and given, with its rich and mellow light, a tinge of beauty even to the frowning ramparts of the outer harbor. Sheltered by the verdant shores, an hundred triremes were riding proudly at their anchors, their brazen beaks glittering in the sun, their streamers dancing in the morning breeze, while many a shattered plank and timber gave evidence of desperate conflict with the fleets of Rome.

No murmur of business or of revelry arose from the city. The artisan had forsaken his shop, the judge his tribunal, the priest the sanctuary, and even the stern stoic had come forth from his retirement to mingle with the crowd that, anxious and agitated, were rushing toward the senate house, startled by the report that Regulus had returned to Carthage.

Onward, still onward, trampling each other under foot, they rushed, furious with anger and eager for revenge. Fathers were there whose sons were groaning in Roman fetters; maidens whose lovers, weak and wounded, were dying in the distant dungeons of Rome; and gray-haired men and matrons whom Roman steel had left childless.

But when the stern features of Regulus were seen, and his colossal form towering above the ambassadors who had returned with him from Rome; when the news passed from lip to lip that the dreaded warrior, so far from advising the Roman senate to consent to an exchange of prisoners, had urged them to pursue, with exterminating vengeance, Carthage and the Carthaginians,--the multitude swayed to and fro like a forest beneath a tempest, and the rage and hate of that tumultuous throng vented itself in groans, and curses, and yells of vengeance. But calm, cold, and immovable as the marble walls around him, stood Regulus the Roman; and he stretched out his hand over that frenzied crowd, with gesture as proudly commanding as though he still stood at the head of the gleaming cohorts of Rome.

The tumult ceased; the curse, half muttered, died upon the lip; and so intense was the silence that the clanking of the brazen manacles upon the wrists of the captive fell sharp and full upon every ear in that vast assembly, as he thus addressed them:--

“Ye doubtless thought--for ye judge of Roman virtue by your own--that I would break my plighted oath, rather than, returning, brook your vengeance. I might give reasons for this, in Punic comprehension, most foolish act of mine. I might speak of those eternal principles which make death for one’s country a pleasure, not a pain. But, by great Jupiter! methinks I should debase myself to talk of such high things to you; to you, expert in womanly inventions; to you, well skilled to drive a treacherous trade with simple Africans for ivory and gold! If the bright blood that fills my veins, transmitted free from godlike ancestry, were like that slimy ooze which stagnates in your arteries, I had remained at home and broken my plighted oath to save my life.

“I am a Roman citizen; therefore have I returned, that ye might work your will upon this mass of flesh and bones which I esteem no higher than the rags that cover them. Here, in your capital, do I defy you. Have I not conquered your armies, fired your towns, and dragged your generals at my chariot wheels, since first my youthful arms could wield a spear? And do you think to see me crouch and cower before a tamed and shattered senate? The tearing of flesh and the rending of sinews are but pastime compared with the mental agony that heaves my frame.

“The moon has scarce yet waned since the proudest of Rome’s proud matrons, the mother upon whose breast I slept, and whose fair brow so oft had bent over me before the noise of battle had stirred my blood, or the fierce toil of war nerved my sinews, did with the fondest memory of bygone hours entreat me to remain. I have seen her, who, when my country called me to the field, did buckle on my harness with trembling hands, while the tears fell thick and fast down the hard corselet scales,--I have seen her tear her gray locks and beat her aged breast, as on her knees she begged me not to return to Carthage; and all the assembled senate of Rome, grave and reverend men, proffered the same request. The puny torments which ye have in store to welcome me withal shall be, to what I have endured, even as the murmur of a summer’s brook to the fierce roar of angry surges on a rocky beach.

“Last night, as I lay fettered in my dungeon, I heard a strange ominous sound; it seemed like the distant march of some vast army, their harness clanging as they marched, when suddenly there stood by me Xanthippus, the Spartan general, by whose aid you conquered me, and, with a voice low as when the solemn wind moans through the leafless forest, he thus addressed me: ’Roman, I come to bid thee curse, with thy dying breath, this fated city; know that in an evil moment, the Carthaginian generals, furious with rage that I had conquered thee, their conqueror, did basely murder me. And then they thought to stain my brightest honor. But, for this foul deed, the wrath of Jove shall rest upon them here and hereafter.’ And then he vanished.

“And now, go bring your sharpest torments. The woes I see impending over this guilty realm shall be enough to sweeten death, though every nerve and artery were a shooting pang. I die! but my death shall prove a proud triumph; and, for every drop of blood ye from my veins do draw, your own shall flow in rivers. Woe to thee, Carthage! Woe to the proud city of the waters! I see thy nobles wailing at the feet of Roman senators! thy citizens in terror! thy ships in flames! I hear the victorious shouts of Rome! I see her eagles glittering on her ramparts. Proud city, thou art doomed! The curse of Jove is on thee--a clinging, wasting curse. It shall not leave thy gates till hungry flames shall lick the fretted gold from off thy proud palaces, and every brook runs crimson to the sea.”

HANNIBAL AT THE ALTAR

The last rays of the setting sun lingered on the towers of Carthage, and tinged with a warm flush the snowy crests of the waves that flung their gray foam to its very ramparts. Laughing maidens, bearing their pitchers from the fountains, assembled at the gates; tired camels that all day long had borne from distant and tributary realms vestments of purple, fragrant gums, and dust of gold, released from their burdens, were feeding beneath the walls; while from the deck of many a galley the slave’s rude song floated on the evening air.

In a quiet vale, secluded, yet not distant from the city, beneath the shadow of a palm, reclines a lovely woman; the low-voiced summer wind, stirring the citron groves, has lulled her to rest. The ripe grapes from a pendent vine almost touch her swelling breast. The spray of a neighboring fountain falls in minute drops, like tears of pearl, on her cheek, while a beautiful boy, tired with play, has nestled to her side, half hidden by her flowing locks.

Hurried footsteps are heard in the distance, a heavy hand puts aside the branches, and Hamilcar, the chieftain of the Carthaginian armies, stands beneath the shadow of the palm; as he bends forward to look upon his slumbering wife, a ripe grape, shaken by the plume of his helmet from the cluster, falls upon the face of the sleeper, and she awakes. Bright tears of pride and joy glitter in her dark eyes, as, seated at his feet among the flowers, her white arm flung in careless happiness across his sinewy knees and throbbing in his gauntleted grasp, she gazes on the towering form and noble brow on which the stern traces of recent conflict still linger. Tempests have bronzed his cheek, desperate and bloody conflicts left their scars upon him; yet is he not less dear to her than when in joy of youth they crowned the altars of the gods with flowers, sporting among the sheaves at harvest home. Thus she speaks:--

“My lord, is it disaster or business of the State that brings you here? Your eye is troubled, and these iron fingers too rudely press my flesh, as though your thoughts were dark and fraught with doubt or danger.”

“I have left the camp to make good a purpose long since known to thee, to devote with sacred rites this boy at the altar of Mars, and pledge him to eternal enmity with Rome.”

“Is this the weighty business which brings thee at this twilight and unaccustomed hour, thine armor soiled with dust, thy brow with sweat, in such fierce haste to pluck this fair child from his mother’s breast, and train him up to slaughter? Strange that this great empire, so full of men and arms and fleets of war, should need the arm of childhood to protect it. Stern man, thou lovest me not.”

“Why question thus my love? For as this breastplate does my heart defend, so have I cherished and protected thee, while in thy fragile beauty thou hast clung around the warrior’s stubborn strength, even as that wreathing vine doth yonder citron clasp, adorning its protector; but little dost thou know, fair wife, of the affairs of nations and of camps. Beneath these shades where the cool zephyr from Trinacrian hills breathes through spicy groves thou hast reposed; no tear has stained thy cheek except the fountain’s pearly drops that glistened there when I thy sleep disturbed.