CHAPTER VI.
HIS LIFE'S MISSION FOUND—EXTENSIVE GENEALOGY OBTAINED—BLESSED IN HIS WIVES AND CHILDREN—DEATH OF WIFE AND OTHERS—THIRD MARRIAGE—LEG AMPUTATED A SECOND TIME—HIS BENEDICTION.
FROM the time the Salt Lake Temple was completed in 1893 Thomas felt it to be his chief mission in life to obtain genealogical information and labor in the Temple for his dead kindred, and he devoted every dollar that he could spare as well as his time scrupulously to this cause.
He heard of a man in England who was engaged in the business of tracing up genealogies, and employed him to trace up his—which he was able to do all the better for the start Thomas made while on his trip. He succeeded so well that after awhile it taxed Thomas' limited resources to obtain means to pay for the names he was getting for him, and a request had to be sent to suspend the genealogical research until more funds could be accumulated. The English genealogist, however, had got the spirit of the work, found unusual opportunities for getting the information and became so enthusiastic that he didn't want to quit, and furnished quite a lot of names without charge.
Thomas was so grateful to the Lord for inspiring him to undergo the operation and to recover therefrom, and experienced such a feeling of relief in being rid of the diseased limb, with its running ulcers, after having been encumbered therewith for thirty years, that he felt that he couldn't do enough to show his appreciation for what the Lord had done for him. He could put up with the inconvenience of wearing an artificial limb so long as he could feel assured that personally he was clean and wholesome and not offensive.
It must not be supposed that he was entirely free from pain, even after his severed leg had been exhumed. It might be comparatively painless when at rest, but the exertion of walking after he got his artificial leg always caused more or less pain. The pain, however, had been so much more intense before his leg was amputated, that, instead of feeling disposed to complain, he rejoiced over the improvement.
Nor did he feel that his labors in the Temple ought to excuse him from serving in the ward. He could only serve in the Temple three, or at most four, days in the week, and even on those days got home early enough to do some work in his garden or some visiting among the poor who were his special charges, it being his duty to receive and distribute the fast offerings among them and see that none were allowed to suffer. Then during the three or four days a week when he was not required to be at the Temple he devoted himself almost exclusively to home and ward duties.
Sunday was usually one of his busiest days. Attendance at meetings and visiting and exhorting the High Priests (over whom he helped to preside) or others who, because of sickness or sorrow or grievance required his fatherly attention and care, kept him constantly employed.
It was natural for him to be doing something. He was always an early riser, and if his own needs didn't furnish him with a sufficient incentive for constant exertion, his concern for others never failed to. He neither had the time nor disposition to be idle. Work to him was a tonic. He gloried in doing things, and in seeing the results of his labor. He many times felt the better for his exertion. At other times when fatigue might have furnished him ample excuse for refraining from further exertion, the work served as a counter irritant, in making him partially forgetful of his constant pain, and so he praised the Lord for his ability to work.