Chapter XIV: Work and Play (2)

Last Sunday was as perfect here as with you. My husband preached at Pawlet, about six miles from here, and I went with him. He preached a very earnest sermon on prayer. My Bible-reading is thronged, and I can't but hope the Holy Spirit is helping my infirmities and blessing souls. My heart yearns over these women, many of whom have faces stamped with care. There is a class here that nobody has any idea how to get at. To meet their case, apostolic work needs to be done. Do you know that Irishmen are buying up the New England farms at a great rate?

_To Mrs. Donaghe, Dorset, Sept. 10, 1876._

The extraordinary heat has worked unfavorably on both my husband and myself; he has been under medical treatment most of the time, forlorn and depressed. I have just pushed through as I could; my Bible-reading, which has been wonderfully attended, being the only work I have done. The weather is cool now and I feel stronger.

A party of young people, who were coming to call on A., were upset just above us; two had broken legs, others bruises and cuts, and one had both knee-pans seriously injured. We got her here and put her to bed, and then I started off to get the rest; but the surgeon, on arriving, decided they should be removed at once, and got them all safely back to Manchester.

_To Mrs. Condict, New York, Oct. 16, 1876._

Since my last letter I have been to Montreal, fled from and settled down here. My book is out in England, and my husband sat up till midnight, reading an English copy of it, although he had heard me read it aloud when written, and read it twice in proof-sheets. He thinks it will be a useful book. I feel sure you will agree with me in its main points. God grant it may send many a bewildered mother to her knees! Miss S. called here a few days ago; she has written a book called "The Fullness of the Blessing,"--one object of which is to prove that sanctification is not, can not be instantaneous.... I do hope the book will do good. It seems timely to me, for I shudder when I hear that A. and B. "professed sanctification" on such and such a day. My visit to Montreal gave me indignant pain when I saw crowds kneeling to the Virgin, and not to Christ, in those costly churches and cathedrals.

As to Miss ---- I do not know enough of her to form an opinion of her state; I incline, however, to think that demoniac possession is sometimes permitted. Fenelon, you know, thinks we should not be too eager for spiritual delight. He is entirely right when he says that the "night of faith" may witness a faith dearer to God than that of sensible delight. I love Job when he says, "Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him," more than I do David when he is in green pastures and beside still waters; it does not require much faith to be happy there.

_Nov. 12th._--I am glad Greylock reached you in safety, and sorry I could not correct its numerous misprints. Your question about Kitty I don't quite understand; I did not mean to say that her parents had no more trouble with her, but they had no more fights growing out of self-will on both sides. I know that there is no end to trouble with obstinate or otherwise naughty children, only if the mother lives close to Christ the fault will be on their side, not hers. You speak, by-the-bye, of my using the word Christ rather than the word Jesus. I do so because it means more to my mind, and because the apostles use it much more frequently. I do hope my book will be a comfort and help to many well-meaning but inexperienced mothers. And I wish I practised more perfectly what I preach. But I have my infirmities and find it hard to be always on my guard.... A. and I are taking drawing-lessons of a very superior French teacher, who offers us the privilege of spending our whole time in her studio, with "conseil."

_The Home at Greylock_ was published the latter part of October. It embodied, as she said, the results of thirty years of experience and reflection. Its views of marriage and of the office of a Christian mother found frequent expression in her other writings and in her correspondence. She placed religion and love alike at the foundation of a true home; the one to connect it with heaven above, the other to make it a heaven upon earth. She enjoined it upon her young friends, as they desired enduring domestic felicity, to marry first of all for love. To one of them, who was tempted, as she feared, to marry out of gratitude rather than from love, she wrote:

We women are exacting creatures; and you can not please us unless we have the whole of you. Oh, if you knew the sacredness, the beauty, the sweetness of married life, as I do, you would as soon think of entering heaven without a wedding garment, as of venturing on its outskirts even, save by the force of a passionate, overwhelming power that is stronger than death itself!

How warmly she sympathised with mothers, especially with young mothers, in their peculiar experiences and how great she thought their privilege to be, her writings testify. The same trait is brought out still more fully in her letters. "Only a mother," she wrote, "knows the varied discipline of hopes and fears and joys and sorrows through which a mother passes to glory--for this is the mother's pathway, and she rarely walks on a higher road or one that may so lead to perfection." Some of her letters addressed to bereaved mothers have already been given. But if her heart was always touched with grief by the death of an infant, it seemed to leap for joy whenever she heard that in the home of a friend a child was coming or had just arrived. Here are samples of her letters on such occasions.

_To Mrs. ----, Jan 10, 1874._

You little know into what a new world you are going to be introduced! I wouldn't be a bit frightened, if I were you; it is ever so much more likely that you'll get through safely, than that you will not; and then what joy! You will be a very loving, devoted mother, and I hope this little one will only be the beginning of a houseful. I spoke for ten, but only had six; and our dear Lord had to take two of them back.... I have just run over your letter again, and want to reiterate my charge to you to feel no fear about your future. If you live and have a child, your joy will be wonderful, but if you do not live (here) it will be because you are going to dwell with Christ, which is better than having a thousand children. So I see nothing but bright sides for you.

_To the Same, April 18 10, 1874._

By this time you ought to be able to receive letters; at any rate I am going to write one and you can do as you please about reading it. Well, isn't a baby an institution? I am sure you had no idea what a delightful thing it is to be a mother, and that you have had a most bewildering experience of both suffering and joy. I shall want to hear all about the young gentleman when you get strong enough to write an enthusiastic letter about him; nor have I any objection to hear how his mother is behaving under these new circumstances.

What does your husband think of the upsetting of all home customs and the introduction of this young hero therein? Thank him for sending me the news in good season. I should not have liked it from a stranger. And by-the-bye, don't let your children say parp-er and marm-er, as nine children out of ten do. I daresay you never meant they should, having a little mite of sense of your own. Now this is all a new mother ought to read at once, so with lots of congratulations and thanksgivings, good-bye.

The following is an extract from a letter to another friend, dated Feb. 20, 1875:

Your last letter was so eloquent in its happiness that in writing an article for a magazine on the subject of education, I could not help beginning "The King is coming," and depicting his heralds... I am indeed rejoicing in your joy, and hope the little queen will long sit on the right royal throne of your heart. Keep me posted as to Miss Baby's progress. I know a family where the first son was called "Boy" for years, the servants addressing him as "Master Boy."

Here are the opening sentences of the article referred to:

The King is at hand. Heralds have been announcing his advent in language incomprehensible to man, but which woman understands as she does her alphabet. A dainty basket, filled with mysteries half hidden, half displayed; soft little garments, folded away in ranks and files; here delicate lace and cambric; there down and feathers and luxury. The King has come. Limp and pink, a nothing and nobody, yet welcomed and treasured as everything and everybody, his wondrous reign begins. His kingdom is the world. His world is peopled by two human beings. Yesterday, they were a boy and a girl. To-day, they are man and woman, and are called father and mother.

Their new King is imperious. He has his own views as to the way he shall live and move and have his being. He has his own royal table, at which he presides in royal pomp. His waiting-maid is refined and educated--his superior in everyway. He takes his meals from her when he sees fit; if he can not sleep, he will not allow her to do so. His treasurer is a man whom thousands look up to, and reverence, but, in this little world, he is valued only for the supplies he furnishes, the equipages he purchases, the castle in which young royalty dwells. The picture is not unpleasing, however; the slaves have the best of it, after all.

The reign is not very long. Two years later, there is a descent from the throne, to make room for the Queen. She is a great study to him. He puts his fingers into her eyes to learn if they are little blue lakelets. He grows chivalrous and patronizing. So the world of home goes on. The King and Queen give place to new Kings and Queens, but, though dethroned, they are still royal; their wants are forestalled, they are fed, clothed, instructed, but above all, beloved. When did their education begin? At six months? A year? Two years? No; it began when _they_ began; the moment they entered the little world they called theirs. Every touch of the mother's hand, every tone of her voice, educates her child. It never remembers a time when she was not its devoted lover, servant, vassal, slave. Many an ear enjoys, is soothed by music, while ignorant of its laws. So the youngest child in the household is lulled by uncomprehended harmonies from its very birth. Affections group round and bless it, like so many angels; it could not analyse or comprehend an angel, but it could feel the soft shelter of his wings. [13]

The following was addressed to a friend, whose home was already blessed with six fine boys:

DORSET, _Sept. 16, 1868._

Dear Mr. B.:--I am just as glad as I can be! I _said_ it was a girl, and I _knew_ it was a girl, and that is the reason it _is_ a girl. Give my best love to Mrs. B., and tell her I hope this little damsel will be to her like a Sabbath of rest, after the six week and work days she has had all along. It is hard to tell which one loves best, one's girls or one's boys, but it is pleasant to have both kinds... I hope your place has as appropriate a name as ours has had given to it--"Saints' Rest"!!--and that you will fill it full of saints and angels; only let them be girls, you have had boys enough.

* * * * *

III.

The Year 1877. Death of her Cousin, the Rev. Charles H. Payson. Illness and Death of Prof. Smith. "Let us take our Lot in Life just as it comes." Adorning one's Home. How much Time shall be given to it? God's Delight in His beautiful Creations. Death of Dr. Buck. Visiting the sick and bereaved. An Ill-turn. Goes to Dorset. The Strangeness of Life. Kauinfels. The Bible-reading. Letters.

During the early months of 1877 Mrs. Prentiss' sympathies were much excited by sickness and death among her friends.

"I spend a deal of time," she wrote, "at funerals and going to see people in affliction, and never knew anything like it." And wherever she went, it was as a daughter of consolation. The whole year, indeed, was marked by a very tender and loving spirit, as also by unwonted thoughtfulness. But it was marked no less by the happiest, most untiring activity of both hands and brain. During the month of January she wrote the larger portion of a new serial for The Christian at Work. It would seem as if she foresaw the end approaching and was pressing toward it with eager steps and a glad heart.

_To her eldest Son, New York, Jan. 28, 1877._

The great event of last week was cousin Charles' unexpected death. [14] Your father and I attended the funeral, in his church, which was crowded to overflowing with a weeping audience. Most of the ministers we know were there. Cousin G. came on Friday night and said nothing would comfort him like hearing your father preach and he promised to do so. I went with him to Inwood, and we have just got back. Your father preached a beautiful sermon and paid a glowing tribute to cousin Charles in it, and I am very glad I went. After the funeral yesterday I came home and put up some chicken-jelly I had made for Prof. Smith, and carried it down to him; there I met Dr. Gould, of Rome, who had seen him, and said he considered his case a very critical one. _Feb. 4th_.--Your father was invited to repeat his lecture on Recollections of Hurstmonceux and Rydal Mount, and did so, yesterday morning, in our lecture-room, which was filled with a fine audience, mostly strangers. What have you on your natural bracket? And have you put up your leaves on your windows? Mine are looking splendidly. H. is burning one of them with a magnifying-glass your father gave me at Christmas. The sun does lie delightfully in this room. I must now go to the Smiths. All send love.

Prof. Smith passed away peacefully in the early morning on the 7th of February. One of his last conscious utterances was addressed to Mrs. Prentiss: "I have ceased to cumber myself with the things of time and sense, and have had some precious thoughts about death." Henry Boynton Smith was one of those men who enrich life by their presence, and seem to render the whole world poorer by their absence. He was strongly attached to Mrs. Prentiss; for more than forty years the relation between him and her husband resembled that of brothers; Mrs. Smith was one of her oldest and most beloved friends, and for a quarter of a century the two families had dwelt together in unity. And, then, with one of the saddest and one of the happiest events of her domestic history--the burial of her little Bessie, at which he ministered with Christlike sympathy, and at the baptism of her Swiss boy who bore his name--he was tenderly associated. It is not strange, therefore, that his death, as well as the wearisome years of invalidism which preceded it, touched her deeply. What manner of man he was; how gifted, wise and large-hearted; how devoted to the cause of his Lord and Saviour; what a leader and master-workman in sacred science and in the Church of Christ; how worthy of love and admiration--all this may be seen and read elsewhere. [15]

_To Mrs. Condict, Feb. 14, 1877._

Before I go down to the meeting at Mrs. D.'s I must have a little chat with you, in reply to your last two letters. I felt like shrieking aloud when you contrasted your life with mine. But it is impossible to state fully why. Yet I may say one thing; I have had to learn what I teach in loneliness, suffering, conflict, and dismay, which I do not believe you have physical strength to bear. The true story of my life will never be written. But whatever you do, don't envy it. And I do not mean by that, that I am a disappointed, unhappy woman; _far from it_. But I enjoy and suffer intensely, and one insulting word about Greylock, for instance, goes on stinging and cutting me, amid forgetfulness of hundreds of kind ones. [16] Let us take our lot in life just as it comes, courageously, patiently, and faithfully, never wondering at anything the Master does. I am concerned just as you are about my interest in things of time and sense. But I have not the faintest doubt that if we could have all we want in Christ, inferior objects would fade and fall. But we live in a strange world, amid many claims on time and thought; we can not dwell in a convent, and must dwell among human beings, and fall more or less under their influence. We shall get out of all this by and by. _Feb. 27th._--This winter I am drawing in charcoal under an accomplished teacher; she has so large a class that I had to withdraw from it and take private lessons. She has invited A. to assist her in teaching little ones twice a week, which materially curtails her bill. A. was introduced to one youth, aged five, as _Monsieur_ So and So; he had his easel, his big portfolio, and charcoal, in great style, but only took one lesson, he hated it so. I don't see what his mother was made of. I sympathise with your fear of spending too much time adorning your home, etc., etc. It is a nice question how far to go and how far to stay. But I honestly believe that a bare, blank, prosaic house makes religion appear dreadfully homely. We enjoy seeing our children enjoy their work and their play; is our Father unwilling to let us enjoy ours? In a German book [17] I translated, a little boy is very happy in making a scrap-book for a little friend, and God is represented as being glad to see him so happy. And I don't believe He begrudged your making me that pretty picture, or did not wish me to make yours. (By-the-bye, when you have time, tell me how to do it.) It seems to me we are meant to use _all_ the faculties God gives us; to abuse them is another thing. I feel that I am having a vacation, and wonder how long it is going to last. I do not know how I should have stood the _tremendous_ change in my life, through my husband's change of profession, if I had not had this resource of painting. O, how I do miss his preaching! How I miss my pastoral work! Dr. Buck is on his dying bed, and longing to go. [18]

_To her eldest Son, New York, March 11, 1877._

We had an excellent sermon from Dr. Vincent this morning, which he repeated by request. Last evening we had Chi Alpha, and as I saw this body of men enter the dining-room, I wondered whether I had borne any minister to take up your father's and my work when we lay it down.

_18th._--I thought within myself, as I listened to a sermon on the union of Christ and the believer, whether I should have the bliss of hearing you preach. Let me see; how old should I have to be, at soonest? Sixty-two; the age at which my ancestors died, unless they died young. I got a beautiful letter, a few days ago, from a minister in Philadelphia, the Rev. Mr. Miller, who has 1,300 members in his church, and says if he could afford it he would give a copy of Greylock to every young mother in it.

I went to Mrs. P.'s funeral on Friday. She wanted to die suddenly, and had her wish. She ate her breakfast on Tuesday; then went into the office and arranged papers there; her husband went out at ten, and shortly after, she began to feel sick and the girls made her go to bed. One of them went out to do some errands, and the other sat in the room; she soon heard a sound that made her think her mother wanted something, and on going to her found her dead. Dr. P. got home at twelve, long after all was over. He told me it was the most extraordinary death he ever heard of, but his theory was that a small clot of blood arrested the circulation, as she had no disease. I had a talk with C. about his wife's sudden death. I had already written him and sent him a note. I cut from the Evening Post the slip I enclose about Mr. Moody's question-drawer. I wish I could hope for as sudden a death as Mrs. P.'s.

_To Mrs. Condict, April 16, 1877._

I am glad you liked the picture. Did you know that you too can get leaves and flowers in advance of spring, by keeping twigs in warm water? I had forsythia bloom, and other things leafed beautifully. It is said that apple and pear blossoms will come out in the same way, if placed in the sun in glass cans. I have been thinking, lately, that if I enjoy my imperfect work, how God, who has made so many beautiful, as well as useful, things, must enjoy His faultless creations. My work is still to go from house to house where sickness and death are so busy. Mrs. F. G. has just lost her two only children within a day of each other. Neither her mother nor sister could go near her during their illness or after their death, because of the flock of little ones in their house, and it was not safe to have a funeral. Dr. Hastings made a prayer; he said the scene was heart-rending.

_May 3d._--Dr. Storrs preached for us last Sunday, and said one striking thing I must tell you on the passage, "They were stoned, were sawn asunder, they were tempted," etc. He said many thought the word _tempted_ out of place amid so many horrors, but that it held its true position, since few things could cause such anguish to a Christian heart as even a suggestion of infidelity to its Lord. To this à Kempis adds the _hell_ of not knowing whether one had yielded or not.

_May 17th._--"Misery loves company"; and so I am writing to you. Perhaps it will be some consolation to you that I too have been knocked up for two weeks, one of which I spent in bed. Nothing serious the matter, only put down and kept down; not agreeable, but necessary. How _astounded_ we shall be when we wake up in heaven and find our hateful old bodies couldn't get in!... M. is making, and H. has made, a picture scrap-book for a hospital in Syria. Your mother might enjoy that. We all _crave_ occupation. "Imprisonment with hard labor" never seems to me so frightful as imprisonment and nothing to do, does. Did you ever hear the story of the man who spent years in a dark dungeon, idle, and then found some pins in his coat, which he spent years in losing, and crawling about and finding?

Well, I have got rid of a wee morsel of this weary day in writing this, and you will get rid of another morsel in reading it. So we'll patch each other up, and limp along together, and by and by go where there it no limping and no patching.

The new serial, her Bible-readings, and painting, with visits to sick- rooms and to the house of mourning, during the early half of this year, left little time for correspondence. Her letters were few and brief; but they are marked, as was her life, by unusual quietness and depth of feeling. Her delight was still to speak in them a helpful and cheering word to souls struggling with their own imperfections, or with trials of the way. A single extract will illustrate the gentle wisdom of her counsels:

I think there is such a thing as peace of conscience even in this life. I do not mean careless peace, or heedless peace; I mean calm consciousness of an understanding, so to speak, between the soul and its Lord. A wife, for instance, may say and do things to her husband that show she is human; yet, at the same time, the two may live together loyally, and be happy. And unless a Christian is aware of having on hand an idol, dearer than God, I see no reason why he should not live in peace, even while aware that he is not yet finished (perfect). We love God more than we are aware; when He slays us we trust in Him, when He strikes us we kiss His hand.

Her own mood at this time was singularly grave and pensive. She felt more and more keenly the moral puzzle and contradictions of existence. "From beginning to end, in every aspect," she wrote to a friend, "life grows more mysterious to me, not to say queer--for that is not what I mean. Such strange things are all the time happening, and even good people doing and saying things that nearly drive one wild.... We live in a mixed state, in a kind of see-saw: we go up and then we go down; go down and then fly up." Still this strange, ever-changing mystery of life, although it sometimes perplexed her in the extreme, did not make her unhappy. "I have great sources of enjoyment," she adds, "and do enjoy a good deal; infinitely more than I deserve."

Early in June she and the younger children went to Dorset. On reaching there, she wrote to her husband:

Here we are, sitting by the fire in our dear little parlor. We made a very comfortable journey to Manchester, but the ride from there here was rather cheerless and cold, as they forgot to send wraps. The neighbors had sent in various good things, and the strawberries looked very nice. It rains, but M. and I have surveyed the garden, and she says it is looking better than usual.

I only wish you were here. Your love is intensely precious to me, as I know mine is to you. How thankful we ought to be that we have loved each other through thick and thin! This is God's gift. I can not write legibly with this pencil, nor see very well, as it is a dark day, and yet too early for a lamp.

The latter part of June she made a short visit with her husband to Montreal. A pleasant incident of this journey was an excursion to Quebec, where two charming days were spent in seeing the Falls of Montmorenci, the Plains of Abraham, and other objects of interest in and about that remarkable city. During the ride in the cars from Montreal to St. Albans, she called the attention of her husband to a paragraph from an English newspaper containing an account of the death of a miner by an explosion, on whose breast was found a lock of hair inscribed with the name of "Jessie." She remarked that the incident would serve as an excellent hint for a story. This was the origin of _Gentleman Jim_, the pathetic little tale published shortly after her death.

Soon after her return from Montreal she began painting in water-colors, which afforded her much delight during the rest of her life. The following note to Mrs. Ellen S. Fisher, of Brooklyn, dated July 2d, will show how her lessons were taken:

Will you kindly inform me as to your method of teaching your system of water-colors by mail, and as to terms. I have not had time to do anything in that line, as I had to go to Canada (by-the-bye, you can get delightful Chinese white paint there in tubes). My daughter says she thinks she heard you say that you would paint a little flower-piece reasonably, or perhaps you have one to spare now. I should like a few wild flowers against a blue sky. I got half a dozen Parian vases at Montreal--each a group of three--and filled with daisies and a few grasses, they are exquisite. Some of them are in imitation of the hollow toadstools one finds in the woods.

_To Mrs. Condict, Kauinfels, July 23, 1877._

Kauinfels is a word we invented, after spending no little time, by referring to a spot in a favorite brook as "the place where the old cow fell in"; it looked so German and pleased us so much that we concluded to give our place that name. We are fond of odd names. We have a dog Pharaoh and a horse Shoo Fly. Then we had Shadrach, Meseck, and Abednego for cats. We had a dog named Penelope Ann--a splendid creature, but we had to part with her. My Bible-reading began two weeks ago, and neither rain nor shine keeps people away. For a small village the attendance is very large. I do not know how much good they do, but it is a comfort to try.

I can't get over Miss ---'s tragical end. She must have suffered dreadfully. I do not doubt her present felicity, nor that she counts her life on earth as anything more than a moment's space. I do not feel sure that she did me any good. I saw so much that was morbid when she visited me here, that I never enjoyed her as I did when I knew her less. But there is nothing morbid about her now.

_To Mrs. James Donaghe, Dorset, Aug. 20, 1877._

Yesterday was the first fine day we have had in a long time, and, as I sat enjoying it on the front porch, how I wished I could transport you here and share these mountains with you! To-day is equally fine, and how gladly would I bottle it up and send it to you! A score of times I have asked myself why I do not bring you here, and then been reminded that you can not leave your husband.

I do not write many letters this summer. We have three or four guests nearly all the time. This uses up what little brain I have left, and by half-past eight or nine I have to go to bed. I am unusually well, but work hard in the garden all the forenoon and get tired. Yesterday the Rev. Mr. Reed, of Flushing, preached a most impressive sermon on the denial of self. In the afternoon he preached to a neighborhood meeting at his own house, to which we three girls go, namely, M., her friend Hatty K., and myself. I give Thursdays pretty much up to my Bible-reading--studying for it in the morning and holding it at three in the afternoon. Utter unfitness for this or any other work for the Master makes me very dependent on Him. The service is largely attended, and how I get courage to speak to so many, I know not.

A. is gone to Portland and Prout's Neck. Mr. P. is unusually well this summer, and has actually worked a little in my garden. He is going to Saratoga this week to visit Mrs. Bronson.... M. is a kind of supplement to her father; I love in her what I love in him, and she loves in me what he loves; we never had a jar in our lives, and are more like twin-sisters than mother and daughter. Hatty K. is like a second M. to me. At this moment they are each painting a plate. They work all the morning in the garden, and in the afternoon sit in my room sewing "for the poor" like two Dorcases, or drive, or row on the pond. They also study their Greek Testament together like a pair of twins. Just here Mr. P. came driving up to take me out to make calls. We made three together, and then I made three alone. Now we are going to have tea, and should be glad if you could take it with us.

_To Mrs. Condict, Kauinfels, Sept. 13, 1877._

Since you left, I have been very busy in various ways; among other things, helping Hatty collect her last trophies, pack her various plants, and the like. Then there is a woman, close by, who is very sick and very poor, and the parson and his wife (meaning himself and myself) must needs pack a big basket of bread, butter, tea, apples, etc., for her watchers and family, with extract of beef for her. That was real fun, as you may suppose. I mean to devote Thursdays to such doings, including the Bible-readings. I took for my Bible-reading this afternoon, the subject of confession of sin, and should really like to know what perfectionists would say to the passages of Scripture relating to it. However, I know they would explain them away or throw them under the table, as they do all the Bible says about the discipline of life. Our bad Pharaoh lifted up his voice in every hymn at Mrs. Reed's last Sunday, and little Albert fairly shrieked with laughter. If next Sunday is pleasant we are to go to Pawlet to preach. Good-night. [19]

_To Mrs. Fisher, Kauinfels, Sept. 15, 1877._

Excuse my keeping your pictures so long. It is owing to my having so much company. We feel it a duty to share our delightful home here with friends.

Will you send me some more pictures, and in your letter please tell me how to make the light-green in the large arbutus leaf; I tried all sorts of experiments, but failed to get such a toned-down tint. My copy is pretty, as I have improved a good deal on the whole; but my work looks parvenu. I had to use a powerful magnifying-glass to puzzle out your delicate touches, and your work bore the test, it is so well done. My work, viewed in the same way, is horrid. A. has been to Portland and found there some exquisite placques; some of them of a _very_ delicate cream color; others of a least suspicion of pink. She began to paint thorn apples on one; but a day or two later, found some of the foliage we had thrown away, turned to most delicious browns; so she painted the leaves in those shades, only--and the effect is richly and gravely autumnal. I hope your eyes are better.

* * * * *

IV.

Return to Town. Recollections of this Period. "Ordinary" Christians and spiritual Conflict. A tired Sunday Evening. "We may make an Idol of our Joy." Publication of _Pemaquid_. Kezia Millet.

She returned to town early in October and began at once to prepare for the winter's work. Her industry was a marvel. The following references to this period are from reminiscences, written by her husband after her death:

She lost not a day, scarcely an hour. The next eight months were among the busiest of her life; and in some respects, I think, they were also among the happiest. She resumed her painting with new zeal and delight. It was a never-failing resource, when other engagements were over. Hour after hour, day after day, and week after week she would sit near the western window of her sunshiny chamber, absorbed in this fascinating occupation. Rarely did I fail to find her there, on going in to kiss her good-bye, as I started for my afternoon lecture. How often the scene comes back again! Were I myself a painter I could reproduce it to the life. Her posture and expression of perfect contentment, her quick and eager movements, all are as vividly present to my mind, as if I saw and parted from her there yesterday! One morning each week was devoted to her Bible-reading; the others, when pleasant, were generally spent in going down town with M. in quest of painting materials, shopping, making calls, etc., etc.

She was much exercised in the early part of the winter by a burglary, which robbed her of a beautiful French mantel clock given her on our silver wedding-day by a dear friend; and by the loss of my watch, stolen from me in the cars on my way home from the Seminary--a beautiful watch with a chain made of her hair and that which once "crowned little heads laid low." She had ordered it of Piguet, when we were in Geneva in 1858, and given it to me in memory of our marriage. But _her_ grief over the loss of the watch was small compared with mine, then and even since. What precious memories can become associated with such an object! One of the books which she read during the winter was "Les Miserables" by Victor Hugo. She read it in the original in a copy given her by Miss Woolsey. She was quite captivated by this work, and some of its most striking scenes and incidents she repeated to me, during successive mornings, before we got up. Her power of remembering and reproducing, in all its details, and with all the varying lights and shades, any story which she had read was something almost incredible. It always seemed to me like magic. Her father possessed the same power and perhaps she inherited it from him. [20]

The following letter will show that while her mind was still exercised about the doctrines taught by writers on the "Higher Life" and "Holiness through Faith," it was in the way of a deepening conviction that these doctrines are not in harmony with the teaching of Scripture or with Christian experience. Referring to some of these writers, she says:

_To a Christian Friend, Oct. 21, 1877._

I have not only no unkind feeling towards them, but have no doubt they have lived near to Christ. But this I believe to have been their state of mind for years, though perhaps not consciously: Most Christians are "ordinary." Nearly all are a set of miserable doubters. Most of them believe the Christian life a warfare. Most of them imagine it is also a state of discipline, and make much of chastening, even going so far as to thank God for His strokes of Fatherly love! Strange love, to be sure! They also fancy they can work out their own salvation.

Now we are not "ordinary" Christians. We understand God's Word perfectly; and when He says, "Work out your own salvation," He means nothing by it except this, that _He_ will work it in you to will and to do, and you are to do nothing, but _let_ Him thus work. And furthermore, we know His mind beyond dispute; we can not err in judgment. Therefore, if you doubt our doctrine, it is the same as doubting God, and you should fall on your knees and pray to read Scripture as we do.

As to the Christian life being a conflict, why, you "ordinary" Christians are all wrong. Satan never tempts us, though he tempted our Lord; it comes natural to us to go into Canaan with one bound; the old-fashioned saints were ridiculous in "fighting the good fight of faith." Look at the characters in the Bible, "resisting unto blood, striving against sin"; what blunderers they were to do that!... In our enlightened day nobody is "chastened"; it used to be done to every son the Father received and it was a token of His love. He knows better now. He chastens no one; or if He does, we will cover it up and ignore it; religion is all rapture, and this is not a scene of probation. Still if you insist that you have been smitten, it only shows how very "ordinary" you are, and how angry God is with you.

Now you may ask why I have taken time to write this, since you are not led away by these errors. Well, they are pleasant and very plausible writers, and it has puzzled me to learn just where they were wrong. So I have been thinking aloud, or thinking on paper, and perhaps you may find one or more persons entangled in this attractive web, and be able to help them out. How a good man and a good woman ever fell into such mischievous mistakes, I can not imagine....

As to you and me, I see nothing strange in the weaning from self God is giving us. It is natural to believe that He weans us from the breast of comfort in which we had delighted, because He has strong meat in store for us. I know I was awfully selfish about my relation to Christ, and went about for years on tip-toe, as it were, for fear of disturbing and driving Him away; but I do not know that I should _dare_ to live so again. And how better can He show us our weakness than by making it plain that we, who thought we were so strong in prayer, are almost "dumb before Him"! My dear friend, I believe more and more in the _deep_ things of God.

"STRENGTH is born
In the deep silence of long-suffering hearts,
Not amid joy."

Imagine soldiers getting ready for warfare, being told by their commander that they had no need to drill, and had nothing to do but drink nectar! As to being brought low, I will own that I have not been entirely left of God to my own devices and desires; if I had been, I should have gone overboard. He had such a grip of me that He _couldn't_ let go. I saw a man apply a magnet to steel pens the other day, and that's the way I clung to God; there was no power in me to hold on, the magnetism was in Him, and so I hung on. Wasn't it so with you?

And now to change the subject again; if you have any faded ferns, vines, leaves on hand, you can paint and make them beautiful again. For a light wall, paint them with Caledonian brown, and they will have a very rich effect. I expect a patent-right for this invention.

The vivid sense of human weakness and of the sharp discipline of life, which she expresses in this letter, was deepened by hearing what a sea of trouble some of her friends had been suddenly engulphed in. Early in October she wrote to one of them:

For some time before I left Dorset, your image met me everywhere I went, and I felt sure something was happening to you, though not knowing whether you were enjoying or suffering. And since then there has been nothing I could do for you but to pray that your faith may bear this test and that you may deeply realise that--

God is the refuge of His saints,
When storms of sharp distress invade.

The longer I live the more conscious I am of human frailty, and of the constant, overwhelming need we _all_ have of God's grace.... I can not but hope things will turn out better than they seem. But if not, there is God; nothing of this sort can take Him from you. You have longed and prayed for holiness; this fearful event may bring the blessing. May God tenderly bless and keep you, dear child.

But vivid as was her sense of human weakness and of the imperfections cleaving to the best of men, while yet in the flesh, she still held fast to the conviction, uttered so often in "Urbane and His Friends" and in her other writings, that it is the privilege of every disciple of Jesus to attain, by faith, to high degrees of Christian holiness, and that, too, without consuming a whole lifetime in the process. In a letter to a young friend she says:

Your letter shows me that I have expressed my views very inadequately in Urbane, or that you have misunderstood what I have said there.... "There _is_ a shorter way"; a better way; God never meant us to spend a lifetime amid lumbering machinery by means of which we haul ourselves laboriously upward; the work is His, not ours, and when I said I believed in "holiness through faith," I was not thinking of the book by that title, but of utterances made by the Church ages before its author saw the light of day. We _can not_ make ourselves holy. We are born sinners. A certain school believe that they are "kept" by the grace of God from all sin. I do not say that they are not. But I do say that I think it requires superhuman wisdom to _know_ positively that one not only keeps all God's law, but leaves no single duty undone. Think a minute. Law proceeds from an infinite mind; can finite mind grasp it so as to know, through its own consciousness, that it comes up to this standard? On the other hand, I do believe that a way has been provided for us to be set free from an "evil conscience"; that we may live in such integrity and uprightness as to be at peace with God; not being afraid to let His pure eye range through and through us, finding humanity and weakness, but also finding something on which His eye can rest with delight--namely, His own Son. Every day I live I see that faith is my only hope, as perhaps I never saw it before.... Read over again the experience of Antiochus; he got in early life what dear Dr. ---- only found on his deathbed, and so may you.

_To Miss E. A. Warner, New York, Oct. 28, 1877._

I am too tired on Sunday evenings to find much profit in reading, and have been sitting idle some minutes, asking myself how I should spend the hour till bed-time, if I could pick and choose among human occupations. I decided that if I had just the right kind of a neighbor, I should like to have her come in, or if there was the right kind of a little prayer-meeting round the corner, I would go to that. Then I concluded to write to you, in answer to your letter of July 24. I write few letters during the summer, because it seems a plain duty to keep out of doors as much as I possibly can; then we have company all the time, and they require about all the social element there is in me. We feel that we owe it to Him who gives us our delightful home to share it with others, especially those who get no mountain breezes save through us; of some I must pay travelling expenses, or they can not come at all. Their enjoyment is sufficient pay. My Bible-reading takes all the time of two days not spent in outdoor exercise, as I have given up almost everything of help in preparation for it but that which is given me in answer to prayer and study of the Word. I am kept, to use a homely expression, with my nose pretty close to the grindstone; in other words, am kept low and little. But God blesses the work exactly as if I were a better woman. Sometimes I think how poor He must be to use such instruments as He does.

How is the niece you spoke of as so ill and so happy? For my part I am _confounded_ when I see people hurt and distressed when invited home. How a loving Father must feel when His children shrink back crying, "I have so much to live for!" or, in other words, so little to die for. It frightens me sometimes to recall such cases.

And now I am going to tote my old head to bed. It is 59 years old and has to go early.

_To Mrs. Fisher, Oct. 31, 1877._

With young children, and artistic work to do, the wonder is not that you have to neglect other things, but that you ever find time to attend to any one outside of house and home. I do not want you to make a care and trouble of me; I feel it a privilege to _try_ even to copy anything from your hand, and am willing to bide my time. It is shocking to think of your summer's work being burned up; no money can compensate for such a loss--I hate to think of it. I have had your landscape framed, and it is the finest thing in the house.

_Nov. 9th._--I have your apple-blossoms ready to mail with this. I found the subject very difficult, and at one time thought I should have to give it up; but your directions are so clear and to the point that I have succeeded in getting a picture we all think pretty, though wanting in the tender grace of yours.

The picture, which is a gentle blaze of beauty, has just reached me. We have had burglars in the house, and one of my songs of praise is that they did not take the little gem I got from you last summer. Glad you are a _woman_ and not all artist.

_To Mrs. Condict, Nov. 24, 1877_

As to the running fern, I paint it the color of black walnut, and round placques it looks like carving. Emerald green I hate, but it is a popular color, and A. was obliged to put it into the flower pictures she painted on portfolios. I am glad you are still interested in your painting. I have just finished the second reading of Miss Smiley's book, and marked passages which I am sure you will like. I will mail my copy to you. As to joy--"the fruits of the Spirit" come naturally to those in the Spirit, and joy is one. But we may make an idol of our joy, and so have to part with it. There may come a period when God says, virtually, to the soul, "You clung to Me when I smiled upon and caressed you; let Me see how you will behave when I smile and speak comfortably no more." Fenelon says, "To be constantly in a state of enjoyment that takes away the feeling of the cross, and to live in a fervor of devotion that keeps Paradise constantly open--this is not dying upon the cross and becoming nothing." [21]

When I look at the subject at a distance, as it were, remembering that this life is mere preparation for the next, it seems _likely_ that we shall have religious as well as other discipline; if we ascend the mount of Transfiguration it is not that we may _dwell_ there, though it is natural to wish we could. And the fact is, no matter what professions of rapture people make, if they believe in Christ and love Him as they ought to do, what they have enjoyed will be nothing when compared with going to live _with_ Him forever, surrounded by sanctified beings all united in adoring Him. When I think of this my courage grows apace, and I say to myself, I may never live in heaven again here below; but I certainly shall, above; and can't I be patient till then? I wonder if you know that I am going to begin a Bible-reading on the first Wednesday in December? I have a very kind letter from Mr. Peter Carter, who says Kezia would make the fortune of any book.

Kezia is one of the characters in _Pemaquid; or, a Story of Old Times in New England_, then recently published. She had written it with "indescribable ease and pleasure," to use her own words, mostly during the previous January. The pictures of New England life--especially its religious life--in old times are vivid and faithful; and the character of Kezia Millet for originality, quiet humor, and truth to nature, surpasses any other in her writings, with the exception, perhaps, of Aunt Avery in "Fred and Maria and Me."

The following is an extract from a letter of Mr. Hallock, the publisher of "The Christian at Work," dated Aug. 25, 1877, in which he begged her to gratify its readers by telling them more about Ruth and Juliet. She accordingly added some pages to the last chapter, although not quite enough to satisfy the curiosity about Juliet: