Papers from Overlook-House

PHILADELPHIA J. B. LIPPINCOTT & CO. 1866.
Entered according to the Act of Congress, in the year 1866, by J. B. LIPPINCOTT & CO., In the Clerk's Office of the District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.


Overlook House, October 10, 1864 .
My Dear Friend:—At last, as if borne to you by some scape-grace of a messenger, these papers, copied from the time-discoloured manuscripts, so carefully preserved in the old book-case, which with its dark lustre, its bright brass ornaments, is still the prominent object in our library, are destined to reach the hands into which they should long ago have been placed.
I well remember the evening on which you first heard of them, and listened to my attempt to read them to you; perplexed as I was with the faded lines, traced by fingers which can write no more.
You will not forget our drives, previously, during the day, and late in the afternoon, in consequence of my week-day service in the old church. Perhaps the ancient edifice would need the excuse of days of architectural ignorance, but no Cathedral on earth can surpass it, in its claim to occupy a place amid scenes of surpassing beauty and sublimity. There it stands alone, on the slope of an immense hill, with the whole range of the mountains from the water-gap to the wind-gap full in view—glorious walls to sustain the great blue dome of heaven! The great solitude of the road that winds along the grave-yard, has often caused me to think of distant friends, and has riveted them to my soul with still more indissoluble bonds. And the Great Friend has been the great relief from oppressive loneliness, as I thus stood in one of the beautiful gates of the Eternal Temple. As to that quiet grave-yard itself, the rhetoric of the dead is there well spoken, and they whose ashes are here deposited, do not find second graves in our short memories.
You will tell me that all connected with my church is not always solemn. Your perverse memory will never forget the leader of the choir; nay, the useful man who was often choir itself. He sang at least with energy. Unfortunately—oh well do I remember my fearful victory over my features, when I first became cognizant of the fact; a victory at a time when a smile had endangered my claims to due ministerial sobriety; unfortunately he had the habit of marking time emphatically, by raising himself on his toes, and simultaneously elevating his hand, his chin, his eyes, and his hair. Yet that was but a slight trial to us both. The man was better than either of us; and the first impression having subsided, we found that he did well in calling forth the voices of the congregation. You will recollect our return home, as we refused all offers of hospitality, although the snow was falling, and we were warned not to risk the drifts, promised by the rising wind. We would not be detained, as we had set our hearts on passing the evening together in the old mansion of my fathers. On we drove, the sound of the bells sweeping in wild merriment over the great fields of snow, or rising to a louder chime as we passed through the forest, under a thousand triumphal arches, of boughs laden with white honors. Only once, and where the road was in a ravine, was I afraid that you would be exposed some hours to the storm, until we should hear the voices of hunters, and the bay of their dogs, sent to seek us, after our custom, when any one is lost in the snow. Happily we extricated ourselves, and soon saw the lights gleaming from the windows of the house upon the hill.