The Gentleman from Everywhere

by James Henry Foss

CHAPTER XXIV.

FOREGLEAMS OF IMMORTALITY.

This year of our Lord, 1886, brought an infinitely greater sorrow than the mere financial losses which pressed so hardly upon us in connection with our Florida endeavors. On Christmas morning, while alone in my room, I distinctly heard my father's voice whisper: "James, James, good-bye," and an hour later the telegraph flashed the news that he passed away at the exact time when I heard him bidding me farewell.

My father was an honest man, the noblest work of God; he had gained none of what the world calls the great prizes of life, but he had what was better far, a conscience void of offense towards God and man. In the words of Thoreau—"If a man does not keep pace with his fellows, perhaps it is because he hears a different drum beat; he should step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away." This my father always did, though the music of his life-march came not from earth, but from the sky, and without a shadow of fear, sustained by a deathless faith, he passed within the gateway of eternal life.

The winter at last retreated sullenly and reluctantly to his arctic home, and when the first harbingers of spring appeared, singing the memorial songs of the Resurrection, the old country fever, inherited from many generations of farmer ancestors, seized me, and we bought a small plantation for $4,200, in N——, Mass., to which we moved April 28, 1887. Here, as usual, much money was expended on improvements and for horse, carriages, cow, pigs, hens, also for scanty harvests of vegetables, and our only returns therefor consisted of large crops of backaches, nasal hemorrhages, and rheumatism incurred in frantic attempts to coax from the reluctant soil, some slight compensation for excessive labor.

Here, as usual, I was busied with many cares, lecturing in various places on the subject of Florida and selling our private lands in that state. Like Mr. Pickwick, I was founder of many societies, notably the N—— club, which, with a fine orchestra and much dramatic talent soon became the social and literary attraction of the town; also the Republican club, which conducted a vigorous campaign for protective tariff and sound money, attracting large audiences by political debates. I was president of both these flourishing organizations, was chairman of the parish committee of the Unitarian Church, leading to its enlargement and extended usefulness, was a member of the congressional committee of the district which wrested a congressman from the Democrats, electing, after a desperate struggle, John W. Candler, to the National Legislature in place of Russell, "the sheepless Shepherd."

On the 16th of June of this year, Rebecca, the wife of my only surviving brother, left her body, and was welcomed to the evergreen shores of the summer-land, by her father, mother, our father, mother, my spirit-bride and her father, mother, and my two brothers who had long gone before. She was a good, honest woman, a veritable help-meet to my brother, and we all gratefully cherish the memory, which is the best attained by any life, that she left the world better than she found it.

One by one, we miss the voices which we loved so well to hear,
One by one their kindly faces in the darkness disappear.

On the evening of the 16th of August in this year, an experience came into our lives which changed the whole current of our religious thought, and forever banished from our minds all fear of the so-called death, and all doubt as to the eternal continuity of existence.

My brother, my wife, four children and myself were recreating for a week in the woods and waters of Onset Bay, and while walking in the gloaming through the grove, listening to the music of the band, we saw a notice posted on a tree stating that the B—— sisters would give a materializing seance in their cottage at this hour. We were all skeptics of the most pronounced type, having seen much of the contemptible trickery and fraud of so-called mediums; but we yielded to the temptation to enter the seance room through mere curiosity. Here we found in the "dim religious light," about a score of intelligent looking ladies and gentlemen intently watching white-robed figures which occasionally glided from a cabinet on a slightly elevated stage and embraced people from the audience who were called to meet them.

This ghostly procession interested us but slightly, until a form whose features seemed strangely familiar, advanced to the edge of the platform and beckoned my wife to come to her. On responding to the invitation, she was at once encircled by the arms of the visitor, kisses were exchanged, she was called distinctly "my dear sister," informed that the lady in white was Mary, my spirit-wife, who in loving tones expressed her thanks for the kindly care that Lillian had exercised over her three children, saying that she was always with her to help. Suddenly, the form called for me, and I went to her as one dazed.

"James," she said, "I am Mary, your wife." She embraced me with many kisses as in the long ago, and continued: "I am so glad to see you and Lillian, who has so lovingly taken my place; bless her for her goodness to our children; my time here is so short." Then turning; "Jot," she whispered to my brother, "come here;" she kissed him, said: "Rebecca, father and mother are here in the cabinet, but too weak to come out. We give you all our love and blessing; good-bye," and disappeared through the floor at our feet.

There was no possible shadow of doubt about this visitation from the unseen world. We had "felt the touch of the vanished hand, we had heard the sound of the voice that is still," and henceforth we knew that we walked hand in hand with angels. We realized unmistakably the truth of the words of the poet Longfellow:

"The forms of the departed enter at the open door,
The beloved, the true hearted come to visit us once more,
And with them the being beauteous, who unto my youth was given
More than all things else to love me, and is now a saint in Heaven.
Oh, though oft depressed and lonely, all my fears are laid aside,
If I but remember only such as these have lived and died."

The pages of the Bible, the testimony of all the sweet singers of all the ages, confirm indisputably our certain knowledge of spirit return, and we know the truth of what the saints and sages of all time have dreamed, and by faith have believed, all religions have taught, it is now demonstrated beyond all doubt and we can say most joyfully—

"Oh land, oh land
For all the broken-hearted,
The mildest herald by our fate allotted
Beckons, and with inverted torch doth stand
To lead us with a gentle hand
Into the land of the great departed,
Into the silent land."

We turned to our duties, inspired by the knowledge that we were guided and assisted by the loved ones gone before. After living on the flat-as-pan-cake plain of N—— for three years, again was I disenchanted; all the poetic illusions of farm life vanished, all the oxygen seemed to be exhausted from the air, the romance of raising potatoes at a cost of five dollars a peck disappeared, the old farm hung like a millstone round my neck, we sold it and hired a pretty cottage in the lucre-worshipping town of B——, on the 29th of March, 1890, where we led uneventful lives for one year, until my fickle fancy was captivated by a fine new house on the hilltop overlooking the sea, in the town of W——, Mass. This we bought and entered on the 14th of May, 1891.

Here at last we thought we had found the Mecca towards which, all our lives we had been drifting. Once more came the passion for beautifying our own, and we made our lawns to bud and blossom like the roses; worshipping at the shrine of the majestic ocean,

"Its waves were kneeling on the strand,
As kneels the human knee,
Their white locks bowing to the sand
The priesthood of the sea."

Here we passed four very pleasant and useful years; consciously near to us, though unseen, were all our loved ones of the spirit world. Almost every night our angel friends communicated with us unmistakably through the ouija, and planchette; they would draw caricature pictures of us all, and give us conundrums and jokes that we had never known before. One evening in particular, Mary wrote us to give her children the best possible musical instruction, stating that May would become a great singer and flute player, and that Ada would be a fine organist and pianist, as well as singer; that Ida would do well with violin and voice.

We were incredulous, as they had inherited no musical talent, neither had they manifested any inclination in these directions; but Mary was so persistent and strenuous in her appeals, that we heeded the advice, gave the girls good teachers along these lines, and soon, their spirit-mother's predictions were fulfilled to the very letter, and the so-called "Foss triplets" became a veritable inspiration to thousands of delighted listeners to their rendition of instrumental and vocal strains of music.

The dews of heaven descend upon all the flowers of the field, some open their petals, welcome the refreshment and are blessed thereby; while others close their buds, refusing the blessing, and as a result, wither and die. Even so come to all souls the spirits of the departed, and they inspire or fail in their mission of love according to whether we open or close to them the doors of our inner sanctuaries.

The departed, the departed,
They visit us in dreams,
They glide above our memories
Like sunlight over streams.

The melody of summer waves,
The thrilling notes of birds
Can never be so dear to me
As their softly-whispered words.