In 1869 he wrote again, “My sister Caroline died last night. We have a sad house. Why under such bereavements has God not given us some comforting reasonable hope in the future, where these severed ties of friendship and love may be again united? Man’s vanity and self-love have betrayed him into such a belief; but who knows that the fact substantiates it?” And in 1871 once more he wrote, “My sister Eleanora is dead, and there is now no one on earth whose veins bear blood like mine. My heart is desolate.” This obituary notice appeared at the time:
“The death of Eleanora Forrest, sister of Mr. Edwin Forrest the tragedian, has cast a gloom over the large circle of her acquaintances, which time alone can dispel; but the gloom which rests over the household in which her gentle sway and influence brought peace and happiness no change of time or season can ever remove. To one, at least, the light of home went out with her life. To one, now the last of his race, his splendid mansion will be as some stately hall deserted. Its light has gone out; the garlands which her hands twined are dead; ‘the eyes that shone, now dimmed and gone,’ will only appear again to him in memory. Memory, however,
“‘Is but a gift
Within a ruined temple left,
Recalling what its beauties were
And then painting what they are.’
“There was something so mild, so pure, so Christian-like, in this lady, that her passing away from us is but a translation from earth to Heaven, like a flower blooming here for awhile to find eternal blossom there.
“Kind, gentle, with a hand open to charity, she did not remain at home awaiting the call of the destitute and suffering, but when the storms and the tempests of winter came and the poor were suffering, bearing their poverty and wretchedness in silence, she came forth unsolicited to aid them. We could name many instances of this; but she, who while living did not wish her charities known, receives her reward from One who reads the human heart and sways the destinies of mankind. The writer of this speaks feelingly of one whom it was a pleasure and a happiness to know. If ever a pure spirit left its earthly tenement to follow father, mother, brothers, and sisters to the home ‘eternal in the skies,’ it was that of Eleanora Forrest. There are many left to mourn her loss, but only one of kindred remains to grieve. To him the knowledge of her many virtues, sisterly affection, and the bright hereafter, must bring that peace no friendly aid can effect. Let us remember, in our hours of affliction, that
“‘Life’s a debtor to the grave,
Dark lattice, letting in eternal day.’”