I regret that it is not in my power to join the citizens of Amesbury and Salisbury in the memorial services on the occasion of the death of our lamented President. But in heart and sympathy I am with you. I share the great sorrow which overshadows the land; I fully appreciate the irretrievable loss. But it seems to me that the occasion is one for thankfulness as well as grief.
Through all the stages of the solemn tragedy which has just closed with the death of our noblest and best, I have felt that the Divine Providence was overruling the mighty affliction,—that the patient sufferer at Washington was drawing with cords of sympathy all sections and parties nearer to each other. And now, when South and North, Democrat and Republican, Radical and Conservative, lift their voices in one unbroken accord of lamentation; when I see how, in spite of the greed of gain, the lust of office, the strifes and narrowness of party politics, the great heart of the nation proves sound and loyal, I feel a new hope for the republic, I have a firmer faith in its stability. It is said that no man liveth and no man dieth to himself; and the pure and noble life of Garfield, and his slow, long martyrdom, so bravely borne in view of all, are, I believe, bearing for us as a people "the peaceable fruits of righteousness." We are stronger, wiser, better, for them.
With him it is well. His mission fulfilled, he goes to his grave by the Lakeside honored and lamented as man never was before. The whole world mourns him. There is no speech nor language where the voice of his praise is not heard. About his grave gather, with heads uncovered, the vast brotherhood of man.
And with us it is well, also. We are nearer a united people than ever before. We are at peace with all; our future is full of promise; our industrial and financial condition is hopeful. God grant that, while our material interests prosper, the moral and spiritual influence of the occasion may be permanently felt; that the solemn sacrament of Sorrow, whereof we have been made partakers, may be blest to the promotion of the righteousness which exalteth a nation.
LYDIA MARIA CHILD.
In 1882 a collection of the Letters of Lydia Maria Child was
published, for which I wrote the following sketch, as an
introduction:—
In presenting to the public this memorial volume, its compilers deemed that a brief biographical introduction was necessary; and as a labor of love I have not been able to refuse their request to prepare it.
Lydia Maria Francis was born in Medford, Massachusetts, February 11, 1802. Her father, Convers Francis, was a worthy and substantial citizen of that town. Her brother, Convers Francis, afterwards theological professor in Harvard College, was some years older than herself, and assisted her in her early home studies, though, with the perversity of an elder brother, he sometimes mystified her in answering her questions. Once, when she wished to know what was meant by Milton's "raven down of darkness," which was made to smile when smoothed, he explained that it was only the fur of a black cat, which sparkled when stroked! Later in life this brother wrote of her, "She has been a dear, good sister to me would that I had been half as good a brother to her." Her earliest teacher was an aged spinster, known in the village as "Marm Betty," painfully shy, and with many oddities of person and manner, the never- forgotten calamity of whose life was that Governor Brooks once saw her drinking out of the nose of her tea-kettle. Her school was in her bedroom, always untidy, and she was a constant chewer of tobacco but the children were fond of her, and Maria and her father always carried her a good Sunday dinner. Thomas W. Higginson, in Eminent Women of the Age, mentions in this connection that, according to an established custom, on the night before Thanksgiving "all the humble friends of the Francis household—Marm Betty, the washerwoman, wood-sawyer, and journeymen, some twenty or thirty in all—were summoned to a preliminary entertainment. They there partook of an immense chicken pie, pumpkin pie made in milk- pans, and heaps of doughnuts. They feasted in the large, old-fashioned kitchen, and went away loaded with crackers and bread and pies, not forgetting 'turnovers' for the children. Such plain application of the doctrine that it is more blessed to give than receive may have done more to mould the character of Lydia Maria Child of maturer years than all the faithful labors of good Dr. Osgood, to whom she and her brother used to repeat the Assembly's catechism once a month."
Her education was limited to the public schools, with the exception of one year at a private seminary in her native town. From a note by her brother, Dr. Francis, we learn that when twelve years of age she went to Norridgewock, Maine, where her married sister resided. At Dr. Brown's, in Skowhegan, she first read Waverley. She was greatly excited, and exclaimed, as she laid down the book, "Why cannot I write a novel?" She remained in Norridgewock and vicinity for several years, and on her return to Massachusetts took up her abode with her brother at Watertown. He encouraged her literary tastes, and it was in his study that she commenced her first story, Hobomok, which she published in the twenty- first year of her age. The success it met with induced her to give to the public, soon after, The Rebels: a Tale of the Revolution, which was at once received into popular favor, and ran rapidly through several editions. Then followed in close succession The Mother's Book, running through eight American editions, twelve English, and one German, The Girl's Book, the History of Women, and the Frugal Housewife, of which thirty-five editions were published. Her Juvenile Miscellany was commenced in 1826.