"December 3. Thanks be to God! I have written my Whittier rhyme. It has cost me much labor, for I have felt that I could not treat a memory so reverend with cheap and easy verses. I have tried to take his measure, and to present a picture of him which shall deserve to live."[150]
Mr. and Mrs. Cobden-Sanderson, the English suffragists, were in Boston this winter. They dined with her, and proved "very agreeable. Mrs. Sanderson's visit ought to help suffrage mightily, she is in such dead earnest for it. After dinner I proposed that each one should name his favorite Browning poem. I named 'Pippa,' Mrs. Sanderson 'Paracelsus,' Mr. S., 'The Grammarian's Funeral,' etc., etc. The talk was so good that we could not stop it to hear the Victor, which I regretted."
Another delightful dinner of this winter was one given in her honor by her niece, Mrs. Richard Aldrich (Margaret Chanler), in New York. Among the guests were Kneisel, the violinist, and Schelling, the pianist. Mrs. Aldrich demanded "Flibbertigibbet," and our mother played and recited it in such a manner that the two musicians were inspired to play, as the people in the story were to dance. Kneisel flew home for his violin, Schelling sat down at the piano, and the two played Bach for her and to her delight.
"The occasion was memorable!" she says.
Returning from New York, she was able to attend the Whittier Centennial at Haverhill.
"December 17. ... Sanborn came to take me.... I have been praying to be well for this occasion, my last public engagement for some weeks. I am thankful to have been able, at my advanced age, to read this poem at the Whittier Celebration and to be assured by one present that I had never been in better voice, and by others that I was generally heard without difficulty by the large audience."
"December 31. Oh, blessed year 1907! It has been granted me to write four poems for public occasions, all of which have proved acceptable; also three fatiguing magazine articles, which have for the time bettered my finances. I have lived in peace and goodwill with all men, and in great contentment with my own family, to which this year added a promising little great-grandson, taking away, alas! my dear son-in-law, David Prescott Hall. I found a very competent and friendly young musician who has taken down nearly all my songs.... A word was given me to speak, namely, 'Thanks for the blessed, wonderful year just past.'"