Neither my father or mother were Christians at the time of marriage. They commenced life in the town; but as children were born to them, although they had purchased a home in the village, they sold it and went to the country.
The principal object had in view in this matter, was to keep their children in a pure and health giving moral, as well as physical, atmosphere. I am not certain which took the lead in this change, father or mother; but it is presumable that as father had been reared in the town and mother in the country, it was done directly or indirectly through her influence.
Fortunately father and mother agreed on all principal matters relating to the government of their children. They both resolved to do the best possible, to give them a practical education, an education that would be of use; but mother being the better informed assumed the larger share in the direction of this education. She, to some extent, examined and encouraged the children even when in school, and kept the love of learning burning briskly all the time.
About seven years after marriage she became an active Christian, joining the African M. E. Church in Gouldtown, October 12, 1846, under Rev. now Bishop A. W. Wayman; and not long after my father followed her in a profession of faith.
My whole recollection of my mother is of a Christian. In my early childhood, I remember her as being much afflicted. During one of these long periods of sickness, I remember her requesting my father to sing the hymn:
"Shrinking from the cold hand of death
I soon shall gather up my feet,
Shall soon resign this fleeting breath
And die,—my father's God to meet."
I suppose she felt that her end was approaching. She had taken the book and found the hymn and requested my father to sing it. As soon as he saw the character of the hymn he bowed himself upon the bedside and wept. Though but a child scarcely above infancy, yet the scene is firmly photographed on my memory.
I also remember during one of these long periods of sickness, of receiving an impression that I had seen her walking out in the garden. I was so sure that she had been out, that the next day I asked her if she was going out again. She surprisingly asked "Going out again? why when have I been out?" "Why," said I "you were out in the garden yesterday." "No, I was not," she replied. I insisted that she had been out; but she thought I had dreamed it; and that disgusted me, when I was so sure I had seen her and talked with her in the garden. I carry to this day a distinct recollection of her appearance in the garden on that day.
The facts were, as I afterward learned, that she was sitting by the south window in her room overlooking the garden, watching me while I was playing in the garden. I have no explanation to offer.
The work of my mother may be divided in at least three parts, viz: In her family, in the neighborhood, and in herself, in enduring afflictions and triumphing over them.