My daughter had known Mr. Cable in his early literary ventures. He sometimes brought chapters of his manuscript to read to her. The South realized at oncethat a new literary artist had arisen out of its sea of ruin. That he wounded the feelings of some of his people is largely attributable to the fact that he spoke inopportunely; his work was cast upon the tolerance of public opinion when every nerve was bleeding and every heart hypersensitive to suggestion or criticism. It was too early an expression, and fell upon bristling points of indignant protest. But that he deeply loved his own city and people the most prejudiced can scarcely doubt, now that the perspective of three decades has softened the asperities of judgment. Only a soul that had made it his own could picture as he has done the silence, the weirdness, the majesty of the moss-draped swamps of lower Louisiana, the crimson and purple of the sunsets mirrored upon the glistening surface of her black, shallow bayous,—the sparse and flitting presence of man and beast and bird across this still-life making it but the more desolate. Cable was the first to see the rich types afforded to literature in the character, condition and history of the Creoles, and he has transformed them into immortals. Only love can create “pictures of life so exquisitely clear, delicately tender or tragically sorrowful” as he has made of the Latin-Americans. The South has already forgiven his historical frankness in its pride in the artist who has preserved for the future the romance, and color, and beauty of a race that, like so much else lovable and poetic and inspiring in our early history, by the end of another century will be blended indistinguishably with the less picturesque but all-prevailing type that is determining an American people.
I had been so impressed by his genius that I could not withhold from him my word of appreciation, and received in 1879 the following reply to my note: “I want to say to you that you are the first Southerner who has expressed gratitude to the author of ‘Old Creole Days’ for telling the truth. That has been my ambition, and to be recognized as having done it a little more faithfully than most Southern writers is a source of as hearty satisfaction as I have ever enjoyed. How full our South is of the richest material for the story writer!
“G. W. Cable.”
About this time Clara and the author of “Innocents Abroad” were guests together in the same home in Buffalo, New York, from which place she wrote me: “He is a wonderfully liberal yet clever talker. I think I shall be able to d-r-a-w-l like him by two o’clock to-morrow, when he leaves. He has written in my Emerson birthday book. When he found the selection for November 30th to be that high and severely noble type of an ideal gentleman, he laughed at its inappropriateness, and said: ‘With my antecedents and associations it is impossible that I can be a gentleman, as I often tell my wife—to her furious indignation;’—so he signs himself ‘S. L. Clemens, née Mark Twain,’ in allusion to his early career as a pilot, and the name by which the world first knew him. I like him immensely, and shall doubtless weary you some morning with a reproduction of his numerous unfoldings.”
I also met Mr. Clemens socially at Mr. Cable’s house.Many years before, I had seen Charlotte Cushman in the White Mountains. We were one day together in the same stage. An opportunity offering, with much delight Miss Cushman mounted to the top. She made her first appearance as Lady Macbeth in New Orleans. She looked the “Meg Merrilies” she had re-created for the world,—a vigorous woman in mind, body and character, and a gifted talker; nobody else was listened to when she was present. She bore in her face the earnestness of her spirit, the tragedy of her struggles, the intensity of her sympathy and the calm strength of her success.
Not long before her death I met Mrs. Eliza Leslie in Philadelphia. I was exceedingly glad of this opportunity, for she was one of the few premature women who had a message to give, and who did give it, notwithstanding in doing so she had to bear the disgrace of being a “blue-stocking.” She was a very quiet and dignified woman. I saw that she was quite bored by the loud talking of some small literary pretenders who were endeavoring to astonish her by their remarks on French drama. One offered to read to her an original poem, and the others assured her that she alone of American women was capable of rendering the true spirit of a French play. She talked with me about the South. She said she was glad to know that she had Southern readers and friends, and that if ever she visited the South it would be without prejudices. I thought of her sweet dishes, and I longed to ask her about the size of that “piece of butter as big as a hickory-nut” which, along with a gill of rosewater, her cook-book constantly recommended, to my asconstant perplexity and amusement. (Query—What sized hickory-nut?)
The next year in February, 1882, I dined at Mrs. Guthrie’s with Edwin Booth and his daughter Edwina. He was then at his best, and forty-nine years of age. I saw him at that time as Hamlet. He was a very modest man and dreaded after-dinner speeches, saying they gave him a stage-fright, and that he always tried to sit by a guest who would promise to take his place when he could not say anything. He was shown a rare edition of Shakespere, and a disputed point being introduced, he read several pages aloud with remarkable effect, though reading in private was contrary to his habit. The day was Sunday, and he mentioned how delightful it was to him to be in a quiet Christian home during the sacred hours. Booth acquired no mannerisms with age. His art so mastered him—or he mastered it—that his simplicity of style increased with years, which implies that his character grew with his fame.
Without being a habitue of the theater, I have enjoyed it from time to time all along my life-road. There is undoubtedly much to object to in the modern stage. Its personnel, methods of presentation and the character of many of the plays should call down just and strong censure. But it seems to me no more wrong to act a drama than to write one. Faith in humanity and in the ultimate triumph of good leads me to the conclusion that if the better people directed patient, believing effort to the purification of the stage, the time would come when histrionic genius would be recognized and cherished to its full value; and the best peoplewould control the theater, and would crowd from it those debasing dramas which, as never before in our day, are having the encouragement of the leading social classes. It is time something were done—and the right thing—to make it at least “bad form” that young men and women should witness together the broadly immoral plays that have of late so much shocked all right-minded people. If one generation tolerates the breaking down of moral barriers in public thought, the next generation may witness in equal degree the destruction of personal morality. The stage is but the expression of an instinctive human passion to impersonate. Masquerading is the favorite game of every nursery. It has been well said that “a great human activity sustained through many decades always has some deep and vital impulse behind it; misuse and abuse of every kind cannot hide that fact and ought not to hide it.” An instinct cannot be destroyed, but it may be directed—and nature is never immoral. Will the church ever be able to discriminate between that which is intrinsically wrong and that which is wrong by use and misdirection, and will it set itself to study without prejudice the whole question of public amusements as a human necessity, bringing the divine law to their regeneration rather than to their condemnation? The existence of any evil presupposes its remedy.
FRANCES WILLARD.
In June, 1881, I spoke by invitation before the Alumnæ Association of Whitworth College, at Brookhaven, Mississippi,—a venerable institution under the care of the Methodist Episcopal Church South. I did not give those young women strong doctrine, but I set before them the duty to
“Learn the mystery of progression truly:—Nor dare to blame God’s gifts for incompleteness.”
Bishop Keener, the well-known opponent of women’s public work, sat beside me on the platform. When the addresses were concluded, he pronounced them “very good.” “For women?” I asked. “No,” he returned, “foranybody!” I treated the gentlemen to some of the extemporaneous “sugar plums” which for a half century they have been accustomed to shower from the rostrum upon women—“just to let them see how it sounded.” Though it was against the rules, they applauded as if they were delighted.
I said: “Lest they should feel overlooked and slighted, I will say a word to the men—God bless them. Our hearts warm toward the manly angels—our rulers, guides, and protectors, to whom we confide all ourtroubles and on whom we lay all our burdens. Oh! what a noble being is an honest, upright, fearless, generous, manly man! How such men endear our firesides, and adorn and bless our homes. How sweet is their encouragement of our timid efforts in every good word and work, and how grateful we are to be loved by these noble comforters, and how utterly wretched and sad this world would be, deprived of their honored and gracious presence. Again, I say God bless the men.”
This occasion was of moment to me, because it led to one of the chief events of my life—my friendship and work with Frances E. Willard. She had seen in the New OrleansTimesthe address I made at Brookhaven, and was moved to ask me if I could get her an audience in my city, which she had already visited without results. I had been invited to join the little band enlisted by Mrs. Annie Wittenmeyer, the first president of the National Woman’s Christian Temperance Union; but I had declined, saying that this temperance work was the most unpopular and hardest reform ever attempted. However, I looked up the remnant of the first society, and went with their good president, Mrs. Frances A. Lyons, to call on every minister in town, requesting each to announce the date of Miss Willard’s address, and to urge upon their congregations that they should hear her speak. We were uncommonly successful, even that princely Christian, Rev. B. F. Palmer, D. D., departing from the usual Presbyterian conservatism. The result was a large audience in Carondelet Methodist Church, of which Rev. Felix R. Hill was the brave pastor;—for it required no little moral courage atthat time to introduce a woman to speak, and to do it in a church, and on a subject upon which the public conscience was not only asleep, but which affronted even many Christians’ sense of personal liberty.
I remember that I remonstrated when Miss Willard removed her bonnet and stood with uncovered head. But I could find no fault with the noble expression of serene sadness on her clear-cut features and with the gentle humility and sweetness which emanated from her entire personality. Heavenly sentiments dropped in fitly chosen sentences with perfect utterance, as she argued for the necessity of a clear brain and pure habits in order to establish the Master’s kingdom on earth. The hearts of the people went out to her in spontaneous sympathy and admiration; and the brethren were ready to bid her God-speed, for they felt that this public appearance was due to an impelling conviction that would not let her be silent. Thus the New Orleans Methodist Church, that indomitable pioneer of reform, proclaimed “All hail! to Frances Willard and the glorious cause.”
Some effort had been made to attain this success. With Miss Willard’s telegram in hand, I had despatched a message to my son, Edwin T. Merrick, jr., and to the W. C. T. U., but the train arriving ahead of time, a carriage brought the expected guest and her companion, Miss Anna Gordon, to my door, where I alone received and welcomed them. After weary travels over thousands of miles and stoppages in as many towns, they were glad to rest a week in my home. I had sent out hundreds of cards for a reception. My house was thronged.Distinguished members of the bench, the bar, the pulpit, the press and the literary world were present, and a large number of young women and men. Frances Willard came to most of these as a revelation—this unassuming, delicate, progressive woman, with her sweet, intellectual face, her ready gaiety and her extraordinarily enlarged sympathies, which seemed to put her spirit at once in touch with every one who spoke to her. She wore, I remember, a black brocaded silk and point lace fichu. She ever had the right word in the right place as she greeted each one who was presented.
She particularly desired to see Geo. W. Cable, who was present with his wife. “This is our literary lion to-night,” I said. “Oh, no!” he replied, “I come nearer being your house cat!” at which sally Miss Willard laughed. This visit was in March, 1882.
I did not attend all of Miss Willard’s meetings, and was greatly surprised when on returning from one of them she informed me that I was the president of the W. C. T. U. of New Orleans. I protested, and let her know I did not even have a membership in that body of women, she herself being for me the only object of interest in it. Finding that the source of power in my family resided ultimately in the head of the house, she wisely directed her persuasions in his direction. It was not long before I was advised by Mr. Merrick to come to terms and do whatever Miss Willard requested. This was the beginning of my work in the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union and of a friendship which lasted until God called this lovely and gifted being to come up into a larger life.
Mrs. Hannah Whitehall Smith aptly styled Frances Willard “one of God’s best gifts to the American womanhood of this century,” having done more to enlarge their sympathies, widen their outlook and develop their mental aspirations, than any other individual of our time. She inspired purpose and courage in every heart. She said: “Sisters, we have no more need to be afraid of the step ahead of us than of the one we have just taken.” Women have been ridiculed for their confidence in this glorious leader. It has been said that if Frances Willard had pushed a thin plank over a precipice, and had stepped out on it and said: “Come!” the White Ribbon host would have followed her to destruction. Yes, they certainly would have gone after her, for they had unwavering faith that her planks were safely lodged on solid foundations, plain to her clear sight, even when invisible to the rest of the world. I once told her that she had the fatal power attributed to the maelstrom which swallowed up ships caught in the circle of its attractions; that the women whom she wished to enlist in her work were equally powerless to resist her compelling force. She had a genius for friendships.
Nor were Miss Willard’s powers of attraction confined to her own sex. Her fascination for men of taste was evident to the end of her blessed life. Their letters of late date to her proved that “age could not wither nor custom stale her infinite variety.” Gifted men loved to sit at her feet; she was kindly disposed to the whole brotherhood. I have heard her say, “If there is a spectacle more odious and distasteful to me than aman who hates women it is a woman who hates men.” She also said: “If there is anything on earth I covet that pertains to men it is their self-respect.” She combined in her work a wonderful grasp on details and all the attributes of a great general, and in her temperament the intellectual and the emotional qualities. This woman was capable of sympathy toward every human being; she possessed the rare “fellowship of humanity,” and while she called out the best and noblest aspirations in others, she was herself the gentlest and humblest and most ready to take reproof. She seemed incapable of envy and jealousy, and it used to be said at National Headquarters: “If you want a great kindness from Miss Willard it is only necessary to persecute her a little.” With all her discriminating insight into human nature, her social relations were simply her human relations; she had no time for “society”—only for humanity. She proved to the world that a woman can be strong-minded, gentle-mannered and sweet-hearted at the same time, and that the noblest are the simplest souls.
No truthful pen picture can be given of Miss Willard which does not include some account of the woman she loved best in the world. Lady Henry Somerset, whom she had long admired in the distance, she loved at first sight when this titled lady came to the World’s and National W. C. T. U. Conventions, at Boston, in 1891. The rank and file of her old friends were startled and sore to discover that the queen of their affections, always before so easy of access, was much absent after business hour in the Convention, from her headquartersat the Revere House, and was with Lady Henry at the Parker House. This emulation of the first place in their leader’s regard for a time somewhat threatened the unity and peace of the White Ribbon Army in the United States. But Lady Somerset so swiftly made her own way into American hearts that the littleness of jealousy was discarded, and the women shared with Miss Willard high regard for this noble Englishwoman—the daughter of the Earl of Somers. TheReview of Reviewsstyled her “a romance adorning English life.” She had only now come to believe that if the world’s woes are to be lessened, women must grapple bravely with their causes and range themselves on the side of those who struggle for justice; and that the heart and instinct and intellect of woman must be felt in the councils of nations. Thus she became the foremost woman in English reforms.
I sent a word to Lady Henry asking if she objected to being mentioned in these pages, and received the following characteristic reply:
“Eastor Castle, Ledbury, Sept. 28, 1899.“Mrs. C. E. Merrick:“My dear friend, I thank you very much indeed for your letter. The words you write about Frances touched my heart. She is indeed the woman of the century who has done more than any other to give woman her place, and yet retain her womanliness. Anything you care to say about me and my poor little efforts belongs to you. Believe me yours in our best and truest bond,“Isabel Somerset.”
“Eastor Castle, Ledbury, Sept. 28, 1899.
“Mrs. C. E. Merrick:
“My dear friend, I thank you very much indeed for your letter. The words you write about Frances touched my heart. She is indeed the woman of the century who has done more than any other to give woman her place, and yet retain her womanliness. Anything you care to say about me and my poor little efforts belongs to you. Believe me yours in our best and truest bond,
“Isabel Somerset.”
While the love I cherish for Frances Willard was shared, in such degree, with Lady Henry, making a common bond between us, it was Mrs. Hannah Whitehall Smith who introduced me to her in Boston. Writing afterward to Mrs. Harriet B. Kells, in Chicago, at National W. C. T. U. Headquarters in the Temple, I said: “Give my love to our peerless Frances, God bless her! You say she is happy in the enjoyment of the delectable society of Lady Henry Somerset. I would say God bless Lady Henry too! only she doesn’t need any blessing, having already everything on earth any one can wish for, with our chieftain’s heart superadded.”
Mrs. Kells repeated this to Lady Henry, who seemed much amused, but did not reveal whether there were yet any unsatisfied longings in her life. Many American hearts to-day say tenderly, “God bless Lady Henry!” for she is a sweet spirit, a brave soul, a true woman. It is no exaggeration to say that these two heroic women are chief historic figures in the records of their sex, and while they were needful to each other their united labor was more important for the world’s reforms.
So many arc-lights have been thrown on Miss Willard’s character that it may not be possible to add more to the world’s knowledge of her. Still I should like to make known a little of her self-revealings in letters to me, on points that illustrate her simple greatness. When the Red Cross was making its first essays in America, a postal card came which showed her friendliness to all worthy organizations: “The Red Cross isroyal. No grander plan for ‘We, Us & Co.’ of North and South. If not in W. C. T. U. I should give myselfto it. The noblest spirits of all civilized lands are enlisted. Princes in the old world are its sponsors.”
Again, she wrote: “How do you like dear Miss Cobbe’s book, ‘Duties of Women’? I had a letter from her the other day and the creature said, to my astonishment and delight, that she was just as familiar with my name as I was with hers! And she the biggest woman of the age!”
No censure, abuse or disappointment seemed ever to destroy the sweet hopefulness of her spirit. At one time she wrote: “Somebody’s strictures in theNew Orleans Picayunegave me many thoughts. I may come under criticism not only in these regards, but in others concerning which there may not have been expression. I sincerely desire to be a true and a growing Christian woman. Some friends can hold the mirror to our faults.”
All the world knows how her soul was moved that the church of God should uphold our Christian cause, and that the M. E. Conference should seat its women delegates. At that time her word came to me: “If the M. E. pastors don’t endorse our blessed gospel, so much the worse for them—in history, that’s all! ‘This train is going through; clear the track!’ I want you in a delegation to the General Conference in May. Will Mrs. Bishop Parker allow her name added? It is a blessed chance to put a blessed name to a most blessed use. Oh that he may see this for the sake of God and Home and Humanity!”
Frances Willard’s fearless mind threw a searchlight into any new thought that seemed worthy of exploration.She investigated Swedenborgianism, Faith-healing, Psychic and Christian Science—if perchance she might find the soul of truth which is ever at the origin of all error. She was not afraid of the evolution of man, for she early realized that the works and word of God must harmonize; that when science and religion should better understand themselves and each other there could be no real conflict,—and she joyed in this larger vision. After a visit to my house, in 1896, she wrote thus to Judge Merrick: “Christ and His gospel are loyally loved, believed in and cherished by me, and have been all along the years; nor do I feel them to be inconsistent with avowing one’s position as an evolutionist: ‘When the mists have cleared away,’ how beautiful it will be to talk of the laws of the universe in our Father’s house, and to find again there those whom we have loved and lost—awhile. In this faith I am ever yours.
“Frances E. Willard.”
It is scarcely worth while to say that she often was the subject of the doctrinaire. At one time a noted advocate of the faith cure was her guest, and was using all diligence to lead Miss Willard to embrace her “higher life.” She said to this lady: “Come with me to-day to see a friend, a lovely woman, who seems to me to walk the higher life of faith in great beauty and peace and power for others. I think you will be kindred spirits.” The visit was made, and the two strangers fell into each other’s arms, as it were, in the intensity of their spiritual sympathy. On their returnto Rest Cottage, Miss Willard quietly said to her guest: “That friend is one of the most noted Christian Science healers.” Now this was the chiefest of heterodoxies to the faith-healer. “How I did enjoy her shocked astonishment,” Miss Willard gleefully said to me, “and I told her I was more than ever sure how trulyone, in the depths of their natures and their essential faiths, are those who are sincerely seeking to know God.”
Frances Willard’s spiritual life was too overflowing and comprehensive to find expression in creeds. Her own new beatitude, “Blessed are the inclusive, for they shall be included,” is a fair statement of her doctrine as it related to her human ties, and to all the household of faith. Her whole law and gospel was “To love the Lord thy God with all thy heart—and thy neighbor as thyself:” and she found God in His works as well as in His Word, and His image in every beautiful soul that passed her way—and always her spirit ascended unto the Father. She herself was regenerate by love, and she expected love alone—enough of it—to transform the world. She wrote me: “Be it known unto thee that I believe—andalwaysdid—that the fact oflifepredicts the fact of immortality. Lonesome would it be indeed for us yonder in Paradise were not the trees and flowers and birds we loved alive, once more with us to make heaven homelike to our tender hearts. How rich is life in friendships, opportunity, loyalty, tenderness! To me these things translate themselves in terms of Christ. Perhaps others speak oftener of Him, and have more definite conceptions of Him as an entity; but in the wishful sentiment of loyalty and a sincereintention of a life that shall confess Him by the spirit of its deeds I believe I amgenuine.”
Just after the Boston World’s and National Conventions of 1891, Lilian Whiting—that keen analyzer of motive and character—wrote: “Frances Willard is a born leader; but with this genius for direction and leadership, she unites another quality utterly diverse from leadership—that of the most impressionable, the most plastic, the most sympathetic and responsive person that can possibly be imagined. Her temperament is as delicately susceptible as that of an Aeolian harp; one can hardly think in her presence without feeling that she intuitively perceives the thought. She has the clairvoyance of high spirituality.
“No woman of America has ever done so remarkable a work as that being done by Frances Willard. There is no question of the fact that she was called of the Lord to consecrate herself to this work. She is so simple, so modest, so eager to put every one else in the best possible light, so utterly forgetful of self, that it requires some attention to realize her vast comprehensiveness of effort and achievement. If ever a woman were in touch with the heavenly forces it is she. Frances Willard is the most remarkable figure of her age.”
Some one else in a private letter writes: “Her strength was because she could love as no one else has loved since the Son of Man walked the earth.”
SORROW AND SYMPATHY.
Unwilling to be separated from me, Clara proposed in 1882 that she and her two children should spend the summer in New England. Her Uncle William had placed his furnished house at our disposal; so Mr. Merrick and I had the novel experience of housekeeping in the land of the Pilgrims. We had the social pleasure of entertaining most interesting people, among them Miss Lucretia Noble, the author of “A Reverend Idol.”
After this visit Clara wrote a critique of this much-talked-of book, published in theNew Orleans Times-Democrat, in which these words occur: “Miss Noble reminds one forcibly of that charming woman—Genevieve Ward. The identity of the ‘Idol’ is supposed to be established in the character of the worshiped and worshipful Phillips Brooks.” Clara had at times been a newspaper contributor, and often said a timely word for “the Cause that needed assistance.” She had addressed an open letter, just before leaving the city, to Mr. Paul Tulane, the philanthropist whose monument is Tulane University, urging vainly that this great institution should be co-educational in its scope. It was said of her that while her intellect and style wereexquisitely womanly they possessed firm rationality and searching analytical qualities.
Rev. W. F. Warren, D. D., president of Boston University, came also with his most attractive family to Wilbraham. The friendship and love of his wife, Harriet Cornelia Merrick, proved a source of great comfort in that season of sorrow, and a true satisfaction as long as she lived. Her vigorous, wholesome, sympathetic nature was one on which everybody was willing to ease off their own burdens. Her intellectual abilities ranked high, for she had acquired the culture of seven years spent in Europe. She was widely known for twenty-four years, as the editor of theHeathen Woman’s Friend—the organ of the Woman’s Foreign Missionary Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church. She was an artist in music and a master of the French, German and Italian languages. A friend in Germany said: “Her German is perfect. She is never taken for an American; for does she not possess all the virtues of a German housewife? Does she not dearly love to fill her chest with fine linen, and take the best care of her household? And then she cultivates her flowers, makes fine embroideries, and last is a good knitter. She cannot be an American lady!” Yet she was a model mother after the American ideal; besides being a trustee of the New England Conservatory of Music, and a leading officer of numerous other boards. She had a breezy fashion of conversation, a fascinating smile, a cheery word, a fun-sparkling eye and bright hair waving prettily from a broad brow. When I confided to her the fact of my daughter’s threatened life by a latent disease,she gave such heartful sympathy that I have never ceased to be grateful, and shed many tears when she too was called away.
I needed a close friend this sad summer, for though my daughter was not in usual health when we left home, none knew of the presence of a fatal malady. After a physician from Springfield had told us that she might survive a year in a warmer climate, it was difficult to keep strong enough to show her a cheerful face; but the medical orders were that Clara should not be informed of her own danger if we expected to take her home alive. I telegraphed for Mr. Guthrie. When he arrived and saw her looking as usual, sitting by an open window, bright, and beautifully dressed, he sent an immediate message to New Orleans allaying anxiety. But it was soon evident that she had entered upon the beginning of the end. She drove out every day and did not suffer: and we found her serenely conscious of her own condition. She said: “It is all right, if I die. I have been as happy as opportunities, and kindness, and attentions, and love can make a human being. It is beautiful to die here in Wilbraham where every one is so kind.” Every day she was bright and cheerful, and looked her own sweet self. One day her father assisted her into the carriage, and I knew it was for her a last drive. Though almost prostrated with grief, I was able to welcome her cheerfully when she returned. The next morning she got up as usual, and calling for her children, took a tender leave of all of us. “Don’t grieve, mother dear, don’t!” she said; “I am safe in God’s keeping.”
“Oh, my child, what can I do without you!” I cried. “Do as other bereaved mothers have done and bear it bravely! and you will have both my little children to rear; they are yours.” When at the last she fixed her beautiful eyes on me and said: “My mother!” her earthly word was silenced, her life-work done.
I find that I wrote thus to a dear friend at that time: “Here I am—sitting in the chamber of my dead. The Marthas and the Marys are here doing according to their natures. Mary sits in the quiet with me, Martha writes of our loss to the absent, or prepares dinner. God help us! the business of life must go on even in the presence of death. My Clara lies on the lounge, wrapped in white cashmere, so still—so cold;—and this is the last day she can so lie before she is buried from my sight. The wind blows cool, as often in a New England August, but it drives pangs into my sore heart, and the day seems different from any other day of my life. Why does God leave us at such times set apart to suffer, as on some eminence? The people pity us. Her father says the time is short and we shall soon go to her. Yes—and then the air and the sunshine will take on a new nature for some one else—for our sakes. But it is different to lay old frames in the dust from putting under the daisies’ bed the young in their glorious prime. God knows best. It may be that she is taken from evil to come. She lived happily, and has laid down all of earth bravely to go into the other life.
“The students stop in passing, and seeing our mourning door ask, ‘Who is dead?’ My dead is nothing to them. They never saw Clara—nor me. It is only anidle question. We are only two atoms among earth’s millions. O Lord, forget not these particles in Thy universe,—for we are being tossed to and fro,—and bring us to a resting place somewhere in Thy eternal kingdom!
“I know the world must still go on, though it is stationary for me, and I am honestly trying to have patience with its cheerful progress; but even the playfulness of my two motherless little ones jars upon me. It is useless for me to try to realize human sympathy from the lonely height where I sit and weep over the untimely death of my two beautiful daughters. They were God-given, and my very own by ties of blood, but more by that happy responsiveness of soul which constitutes ‘born friends.’ After being as the woman whose children rise up and call her blessed, I am now like Rachel of old, refusing to be comforted because they are not. I lie down in humble submission because I cannot help myself. I say over and over, ‘Thy will be done!’—but all the same I would have them back if I could. None of us try to raise a controversy with the inevitable. We are grateful for kind words and sympathy. They cannot change anything, but they give just a drop of comfort to a desolate, disrupted life on the human side of that gateway, through which the majority have gone down into the silence where ‘the dead praise not the Lord.’”
Many testimonies to the character and worth of our child were written and published. They shall speak for her and for the greatness of our loss. TheTimes-Democratsaid: “Wherever she moved she was by thenecessities of her sweet nature a ‘bright, particular star’ among earth’s shining ones. Her conversation was a delight to all within sound of her voice. Her wit was gentle, pure, generous and sincere. She ruled all hearts, and loved to rule, for she ruled by love.”
Catharine Cole wrote: “Many men and women famous in the great world of art and literature will pay the sweet tribute of tears to the memory of this lovely woman; and here in our own home, where she was so beloved and admired, her gentle, cheery presence will be missed and mourned for many sad days. She shone like a jewel set amid dross.”
From Mrs. Mollie Moore Davis—widely known for her exquisitely delicate love poems and quaint tales of real life—came this tender word: “I truly appreciated her great gifts and greater loveliness. She is a star gone from my sky.”
Mrs. Mary Ashley Townsend sent me these words: “Her constant and determined intellectual development, her devotion to progress, her literary tastes, her social charms, her reliability as a friend, her loveliness as a wife and mother, formed a combination of qualities that made her the realization of the poet’s dream,
“‘Fair as a star when only oneIs shining in the sky.’”
Mrs. Townsend is herself a rarely gifted poet, long and deeply homed in the heart of New Orleans. With the exception of Longfellow and Cable, no writer has so vividly mirrored the very atmosphere of lower Louisiana. In “Down the Bayou” its “heroed past,” itsshrined memories find an eloquent voice; there in everlasting tints are painted its dank luxuriance and verdant solitudes; its red-tiled roofs and stucco walls, the “mud-built towers of castled cray-fish,” its sluggish, sinuous bayoux and secrets of lily-laden lagoons, its odors of orange bloom and mossy swamps mingled with flute-toned song and flitting color amid the solemn, dark-hued live-oaks. Mary Ashley Townsend had three lovely daughters. One has passed over the river, but she still has Adele, who resembles her gifted mother, and Daisy, to comfort her life.
James R. Randall, the gifted author of “My Maryland,” said in his own newspaper: “She was too radiantly dowered for this world she glorified. She was all that poets have sung and men have wished daughter and wife to be. Well may the bereaved father and husband wonder with poor Lear ‘why so many mean things live while she has ceased to be.’” Other expressions were as follows: “It is something worth living for, to have been the mother of such a being.” “Outside of your mother-love the loss of the sweet friendship and congeniality of your lives will create an awful void. But that beautiful soul is yours still—growing and developing in Paradise.” “Amid all her charms what impressed me most was her admiration for her mother. She addressed you often and fondly as ‘dear,’ as if you were the child and she the mother.” “Centuries of experience have not developed a philosophy deeper or more comforting for the human race than that of David: ‘He shall not return to me but I shall go to him.’ I thank God for the great gift of death!”
A minister of God wrote me, from Worcester, Mass., a word that may be as great a light to some sitting in darkness as it was to me: “I must confess that, for my own part, I take such sorrows with less heaviness of heart than once, for the reason that every such loss seems to strengthen, rather than weaken, my faith in immortality. In good and beautiful lives I see so vividly a revelation of God—the Infinite Holiness and Beauty shining through the human soul and the raiment of clay—that I cannot believe it possible for death to extinguish their real life ‘hidden with Christ in God.’ I cannot believe that they can be ‘holden of the grave.’ I feel assured that theirs is a conscious life of progress and joy, and cannot mourn for them as dead, but only as far away. More and more am I convinced that this vivid feeling of the Divine Presence in beautiful human lives is peculiarly the Christian’s ground of hope in immortality. It was what the apostle meant by ‘Christ in you, the hope of glory,’ and it gives us gradually the clear vision of an immortal world. Only thus, as we gain that ‘knowledge of God’ which is ‘eternal life’here and now, can we rise above the mist and smoke of this temporal world and lift our eyes ‘unto the hills whence cometh our help.’ Only thus as we live in the eternal world,here and now, can we feel secure that nothing fair and good in human life can perish.”
Mrs. Hannah Whitehall Smith wrote me thus from Philadelphia the sad December of this year:
“My dear Friend:“Miss Willard wants to open the lines between yoursoul and mine. She feels sure we can do each other good, and asks me to tell you about my Ray who went home three years ago, because you, too, have lost a daughter and will understand. My Ray died after five days’ sickness. As soon as she was taken ill, I began, as my custom is, to say, ‘Thy will be done.’ I said it over and over constantly, and permitted no other thought to enter my mind. I hid myself and my child in the fortress of God’s blessed will,—and there I met my sorrow and loss. When she went out of my earthly life the peace of God which passes all understanding came down upon me from above, and enwrapped me in an impregnable hiding-place, where I have been hidden ever since. My windows look out only on the unseen and divine side of things; and I see my child in the presence of God, at rest forever, free from all earth’s trials. Whatever may be your experience I know that grief is bitter anguish under any other conditions than these, and the mystery of it is crushing.“Our blessed Frances gave me your letter to read, and I could echo every word you said about her. She is queen among women and is doing a glorious work, not the least of which is the emancipation of women—coming out on every side. They have far more than they know for which to thank Frances Willard.”
“My dear Friend:
“Miss Willard wants to open the lines between yoursoul and mine. She feels sure we can do each other good, and asks me to tell you about my Ray who went home three years ago, because you, too, have lost a daughter and will understand. My Ray died after five days’ sickness. As soon as she was taken ill, I began, as my custom is, to say, ‘Thy will be done.’ I said it over and over constantly, and permitted no other thought to enter my mind. I hid myself and my child in the fortress of God’s blessed will,—and there I met my sorrow and loss. When she went out of my earthly life the peace of God which passes all understanding came down upon me from above, and enwrapped me in an impregnable hiding-place, where I have been hidden ever since. My windows look out only on the unseen and divine side of things; and I see my child in the presence of God, at rest forever, free from all earth’s trials. Whatever may be your experience I know that grief is bitter anguish under any other conditions than these, and the mystery of it is crushing.
“Our blessed Frances gave me your letter to read, and I could echo every word you said about her. She is queen among women and is doing a glorious work, not the least of which is the emancipation of women—coming out on every side. They have far more than they know for which to thank Frances Willard.”
To that letter I replied: “If the Heavenly Father takes note of the sparrow’s fall, it may be that He put the thought in Miss Willard’s mind to ask you to help me; but, dear lady, you are many a day’s journey ahead of me in religious experience when, in the presence ofthe death of your beloved, you can say, ‘Thy will be done.’ I wish I could, like you, will whatever God wills.
“I thank you for the account of your Ray, and I thank God that He created such a Christian mother. Simeon said to Mary: ‘Yea, a sword shall pierce through thine own soul also.’ Every one who has lost a child has been pierced through and through. In this crisis of my life I am amazed and stupefied by my own capacity for suffering, and actually look upon myself with an awed pity, as I would upon a stranger. How can I yield everything? I had already buried one lovely daughter in the bloom of life; and I had only one left. I submit because I must. My heart cries out for my child; God forgive me, but I would call her back to me if I could.”
When the time drew near for the annual convention of the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union, my husband and sons urged that I should go to Detroit, hoping the change of scene and new responsibilities might arouse me from depression. Miss Willard had already written: “My heart turns toward thee in thy desolation. Remember thou hast doting sisters. I believe thy beautiful Clara knows how we rally to thy side, and is glad.”
While I was in Detroit, Hannah Whitehall Smith called upon me several times, and talked about my condition of mind, and so inspired me with gratitude that I endeavored to obey every suggestion she made, regardless of the pride and self-sufficiency which is so common with unsatisfied souls. She seemed to have direct access to the Heavenly Father, and laid my case beforeHim with such simplicity and faith that my heart was deeply touched, and I gained a new knowledge of spiritual relations. When I learned in these latter days, that she had been called to sorrow over her husband “gone before,” I wrote to her in loving memory of her former goodness, and received a reply, from Eastnor Castle, where she and Lady Henry Somerset had been engaged in preparing a memorial of Miss Willard, which was issued to the people of Great Britain.
The letter reads: “Your loving sympathy in my last great loss has been most welcome. My dear husband had been a great sufferer for eighteen months, and longed so eagerly to go that no one who loved him could be anything but thankful when his release came. I have been enabled to rejoice in his joy of having entered into the presence of the King. It cannot be long for me at the longest before I shall join him, and until then I am hidden in the Divine fortress of God’s love and care. I love to think that you too are hidden there, dear friend and sister, and that together we may meet in the Divine Presence where there is fulness of joy even in the midst of earthly sorrow.
“Lady Henry joins me in love to you. She is, as we are, very sorry over the loss of our beloved Frances Willard; but God still lives and reigns, and in Him we can rest without anxiety. I have found Him a very present help in many a time of trouble, and I rejoice to know I was permitted to help you realize this in your hour of sore need.”
BECKY SPEAKS UP IN MEETING IN THE INTERESTS OF MORALITY.
The incidents which once enlivened the lives of every family that was served by the negro slave are fading from the minds of even many who were centers of those episodes. But they are of legendary interest to the younger generations. There are some things to be regretted in the negro being poured into the mold of the white man’s education. The only true national music in the United States is that known as “the negro melody.” Will not so-called musical “cultivation” tend to destroy the charmingly distinctive character of the negro’s music? Art cannot supply or enhance the quality of his genius. It will be a definite loss if the music of the future shall lack the individualism of his songs, for with them will go the wonderful power of improvisation—the relic of his unfettered imagination, the voices of his native jungles struggling to translate themselves into speech. His happyinsoucianceis already fleeing before the pressure of his growing responsibilities. Very much that constitutes the picturesque and lovable in negro character will disappear with the negro point of view,—for if he survives in this civilization his point of view must merge into theAnglo-Saxon’s. Only those who were “to the manor born” can deftly interpret the idiosyncrasies of the plantation negro; so, while a few of us who owned them are yet alive, it may be a service to the future, as well as our duty and pleasure, to link their race peculiarities to the yet unborn, by revealing and embalming them through the garrulous pen. Becky Coleman’s gifts as araconteusedeserve a record. It delights me to remember her as I sat one day at the door of the porch facing the wide river and the public road. Near by, through a path in the grounds, a procession of colored people passed and repassed morning and evening, with buckets on their well-cushioned heads, to the cisterns of water in the rear of the house. Becky came along and greeted me with polite cordiality. I invited her to stop and rest awhile, and filled her tin cup with iced lemonade from a pitcher standing near.
The woman seated herself on the steps, set down her pail beside her and sipped the cool beverage.
“Thanky, ma’am,” said she. “I feels dat clean down in my foots. It’s mighty hot fer dis time er year. Ole Aunt Mary is spendin’ to-day at my house, en she hope me some, hoin’ in my gyardin’, en now um gwine to bile er pot o’ greens and stchew some greasy butter beans (fer de ole ’oman don’t never have nothin’ but meat en brade at her house), en den she mus’ finish gittin’ de grass en weeds outen my cabiges, for um bound to have a fall gyardin’, en ef yo wants turnips, en lettice, en redishes, yo knows whar to fin’ em.”
Becky lifted the lower flounce of my wrapper and inspected the embroidery, looking at me sharply fromhead to foot. “Dat’s a mighty purty dress yo got on, Miss Carrie,” said she, “yo mus’ lem me have it when yo’re done wid it. Won’t yo promise me?”
“Now, Becky,” I replied, “don’t ask me to make a promise I might forget, and you would be sure to remember; but you go on and tell me about your protracted meeting at the Royal Oak Church yesterday.”
Becky squared her portly person into a comfortable position, her hand on her hip, and with complacency and satisfaction beaming from her ebony colored face she began:
“Ya’as em I wuz dar; I was bleeged to be dar, fer um one uv de stchowerd sisters. You knows we dresses in white en black. I had on dat black silk dress yo sont me las’ Chrimus. Dat is, I had on de tail uv it, wid er white sack instead of er bass, en I jes’ let yo know nun of dese niggers roun’ here can beat me er dressin’, when I gits on de close yo gie me. I had er starchy big white handkercher tied turbin fashin on my head, en Miss Lula’s big breas’-pin right yeah” (putting her hand to her throat), “en I tell yo, mun, I jes’ outlooked ennything in dat house. Yander comes Aunt Loo, an’ I bet she’ll tell yo de same. ’Twas er feas’ day—sackament day—en all de stchowerd sisters was er settin’ roun’ on de front benches, like dey does dem times, en dar wus Sis’ Lizer Wright, who wus one of us, all dressed up in pure white, en settin’ side uv her was Peter Green, en he wus fixed up too, mitely, even down to new shoes.
“Dey hilt pra’ar, en den Bro’ Primus Johnson ris en showed er piece up paper ’en told us all ’twas er license fer to jine Peter Green and Lizer Wright in deholy bonds o’ mattermony; ‘But,’ sez he, ‘fo’ I go any furder I want de bretherin to come for’ard en speak dey mines on de subjick.’
“Well, at dat, I seed er good many nods ’en winks er passin’ ’bout, but I never knowd ’zacly whut wus gwine on ’till one of de elders ris ’en said he dijected to havin’ any ceremony said over dem folks, fer Sis’ Lizer’s fust husband, ole Unk’ Jake, wus yit er livin’, ’ceppen he died sence I lef’ home dis mawin’,’ sez he.
“His ’pinion wus dat ef de deacorns wan’t ’lowed but one wife ’cordin’ to Scriptur, de stchowerd sisters mustn’t have mor’n one man at de same time.
“Dat fotch Bro. Primus ter his feet, en he tun roun’ to de sisters, he did, en ’lowed dat dey too mought git up en ’brace de multitude, en gie dur unnerstandin’ in dis case. ’Pon dat, Sis’ Anderson ris, en sez she, ‘Dis ’oman orten be casted outen de church, en I ain’t afeard to say so pine blank.’ I tell yer she was in fer raisen uv a chune, en singin’ her right out den en dar, wid de Elder leadin’ of her ter de do’, for dat’s de way dey tu’ns em outen de church over here. ‘Fer,’ sez she, ‘she’s bent on committen’ ’dultery—ef she ain’t done it befo’—en its gwine clean agin whuts in dat ar volum on dat ar table,’ en she p’inted her forefinger to de Bible er layin’ dar, en ses she, ‘We cyant ’ford to let sich doin’s as dese to be gwine on in dis heah ’sciety.’
“Dey all sided ’long Sis’ Andersen mostly, ceppen me. I wus sorry fer de ’oman a settin’ dar wid her arms hugged up on her breas’ like a pore crimi’al. I wuz mighty sorry fer her. So when Bro’ Primus’quired ef ennybody felt able ter counterfeit Sis’ Andersen’s evidence, en looked all roun’, en nobody sed nuthin, when he axed ’em agin why, on dat second ’peal, I jes’ riz up en tole ’em I knowed dat ’oman fo’ de wah. To be shore she had tuck up wid old Unk’ Jake long ’fo’ dat. He wus er ingeneer in a big saw-mill on de Tucker place, en he had er son by his fust wife, killed in de wah. He wus mighty ole when I fust seed him—he ollers wus a heap too ole fer Sis’ Lizer—but fer de las’ six or seben year de ole man’s done failed so he ain’t no service to nobody—mor’n er chile, siz I. Bein’ as he is, sez I, widout any owner fer to feed en clove en fine him it comes powerful hard on Sis’ Lizer to do all, fer I tell yer, he’s des like er chile, only wus, fer a chile kin he’p himself some, but Unk’ Jake cayn’t do er Gawd’s bit fer hisself, nor nobody else.”
“Is he too feeble to walk about?” I asked.
“Well, ma’am, in ’bout er hour, he mought git as fer frum here as yo gyardin gate yander—hoppin’ long slow on his stick.”
Becky rose and very perfectly imitated the bowed figure and halting gait of the poor old negro. Throwing down the stick she had used, she resumed her seat and her subject, saying; “Sis’ Lizer done er good part by dat ole man. She has him to feed wid er spoon, fer his han’ is dat shakey dat he spills everyt’ing ’fo he gets it ter his mouf. When she goes ter de fiel’ she puts er baskit er co’n by him so he kin muse hisself feedin’ de chicken en ducks.
“Ole folks, yo know, eats mighty often,” said Becky, “en den he mus’ be fed thru de night. Ef she don’tgit up en gin him dat cake or some mush en milk, why she cayn’t sleep fer his cryin’—jes’ like er chile.”
“You were telling me, Becky, what occurred at church; suppose you go on with that story,” said I.
“Gawd bless yer soul, honey, dat wan’t no story. I wish I may die dis minit ef I didn’t tell yo de Gawd’s trufe. Oh, yas; I had ris en wus er speakin’ up fer de ’oman, how long I knowed her en so on, en den I said——” she spoke louder, rising and gesticulating: “Brethren, you see dat grass out yander en dat yaller spotted dog er wallerin’ roun’ on it? Well den, yo sees it, en yo sees dat steer er standin’ er little ways off; now dat ox would be eatin’ dat grass ef he warn’t driv away by de dog. Ole Unk’ Jake ain’t no dog. He ain’t dat mean en low down. He done gie Sis’ Lizer er paper signifyin’ his cornsent fer her to take ’nother pardner.
“Een I jes’ went on—‘Bretherin,’ says I, ‘nobody nee’nter talk ’bout no ’dultery neither, fer yo all knows dere want no lawful marryin’ nohow in slave times en Reb times. De scan’lous can’t be no wus en ’tis. Yo mus’ jes’ sider dat Sis’ Lizer wants ter marry, now fer defust time, en live like er Christon in her ole days. Nobody musn’t hender her in de doin’ of er right t’ing, but let us pray fer de incomin’ uv de Sperit.’
“We mus’ feel fer one another, sez I, ’en none de res’ kin do no better’n Sis’ Lizer. De Word says ef yer right arm defend yo, cut it off, en ef yer right eye ain’t right, pull it out. ‘Bretherin,’ says I, ‘dey ain’t nothin’ ’tall gin dese folks bein’ jined together in dat ar book dar, nor nowhares else.’
“Brudder Primus ’lowed, he did, dat Sis Colemanhad thowed mo’ light on do case dan ennybody else, en perceeded ter ax Peter Green ef he wus willin’ en able to help Sis’ Lizer take keer of ole Unk Jake, en he signified he wus; en den everybody wus satisfied en de ceremony wus said over ’em right den en dar, fo’ de preacher tuk his tex’ en preached his sarmont.
“But dis won’t do me,” said Becky. “I mus’ go long en put on my dinner ’fo’ de ole man come ’long en holler fer his vittles. Good-by, Miss Carrie,” said she, rising, “don’t yo forgit yo promised me dat dress yo got on. I wants to put it away ’ginst I die, to be berry’d in. Dat ’min’s me dat Aunt Patsey’s sholey bad off. She cayn’t las’ much longer.”
“You’ve had that woman dying for a week, Becky.”
“No, ma’am,Iain’t had her dyin’! It’s de Lord! If ’twasmediff’unt people would die fum dem datdoesdie—I tell yer!”
MRS. JULIA WARD HOWE AND THE BLESSED COLORED PEOPLE.
As has been intimated, I became president of the New Orleans W. C. T. U. not from deep conviction of duty on the temperance question, but because I could not resist the inspirations of Frances Willard’s convictions. Once in the work I gave my heart and my conscience to it with such measure of success that in January, 1883, a State convention was called to meet in New Orleans in the hall of the Y. M. C. A. Miss Willard was again present, and was my guest. Rev. W. C. Carter, D. D., pastor of Felicity Street M. E. Church South, was the knightly brother who stood beside us in this hour when we were without reputation, nobly doing his sworn duty as a soldier of the Cross, to speak the truth and defend the weak. Miss Willard spoke twice in his church. At a table where a number of dignitaries of the church were dining, referring to this event, a friend remarked that Dr. Carter had said the only time his church was full was on this occasion of Miss Willard’s address. “No,” the doctor replied, “I did not say that. I said thefirsttime it was full. It was full again—but she filled it!”
There was a peculiar fitness in the time of MissWillard’s early visits to the South. Women who had been fully occupied with the requirements of society and the responsibilities of a dependency of slaves, were now tossed to and fro amidst the exigencies and bewilderments of strange and for the most part painful circumstances, and were eager that new adjustments should relieve the strained situation, and that they might find out what to do. Frances Willard gave to many of them a holy purpose, directing it into broader fields of spiritual and philanthropic culture than they had ever known. For the local and denominational she substituted the vision of humanity. It seemed to me that when Miss Willard and Miss Gordon bravely started out to find a new country they discovered Louisiana, and like Columbus, they set up a religious standard and prayed over it—and organized the W. C. T. U. I was one result of that voyage of discovery. It immersed me in much trouble, care and business—sometimes it seemed as if I had more than my head and hands could hold—unused was I to plans and work and burdens. I prayed to be delivered from too much care unless it might set forward the cause. I was willing “to spend and be spent,” but sometimes I felt as if I had mistaken my calling. I only knew that I was on the right road, and tried to look to God to lead me. Doubts might come to-morrow, but to-day I trusted. In ten years I saw the work established in most of the chief towns of the State, and many men and women afield who had learned the doctrine of total abstinence for the individual and the gospel of prohibition for the commonwealth.
During these years I gathered numerous delightfulassociations in my State work and in my annual attendance upon the conventions of the National W. C. T. U. Among the National workers who aided me greatly in my early work was Mrs. Judith Ellen Foster who, with her husband, was for a week my guest, and spoke in crowded churches. Although I did not wholly sympathize with her when later she withdrew from the National W. C. T. U., our friendly personal relations were never broken. Her brilliant abilities as a temperance worker and as a pioneer woman-member of the bar commanded my respect, and I have not ceased to be grateful for the sustaining power of her inspirations and acts. For the first time in my life, at one of her meetings in New Orleans, I sat in a pulpit—where Bishops Newman and Simpson had officiated—and very peculiar were my feelings in such a place.
Besides Mrs. Foster, Mrs. Mary T. Lathrop, Mrs. Clara C. Hoffman and Mrs. Hannah Whitehall Smith from National ranks did much to create sentiment for our cause in Louisiana. No speaker in America has excelled Mrs. Lathrop in the vigor and the statesmanlike majesty of her arguments for the dethronement of the liquor traffic. A distinguished judge, who was not in favor of our propaganda, said there were few men in Congress who had equalled her in logic and eloquence. We mourn yet that in her death the world has lost so much that time can never replace.
One of the greatest victories won for our cause was the passage in 1888 of a Scientific Temperance Instruction bill, by the State Legislature, for the education of the youth in the public schools, on the nature of alcoholand its effect upon the human system. Mrs. Mary Hunt of Massachusetts, the originator of this movement for the safeguard of health against the seductions and destructions of strong drink and narcotics, spent a month at our legislature as the guest of Mrs. Mary Reade Goodale. Daily I went with these two indefatigable workers, watched and manœuvered the progress of this bill, until one of the best statutes passed on this subject by any State was secured. Such a work for the world’s glory is enough for any mortal, but we trust it has also placed Mrs. Hunt among the immortals of earthly fame.
I visited the Capital at this time and was active in the lobby, interviewing members. I sent my card to a Senator Gage, and was more than surprised when in response a tall, dignified black man presented himself. It was difficult for a moment to determine whether to make him stand during the interview, as is usual with his color, but I said: “Senator Gage: The people have put you in this respectable and responsible position, and as other senators have occupied this chair will you please be seated?” He sat down, and he afterward voted for our bill.
After this social intercourse with Mrs. Hunt and Mrs. Goodale great impetus was given to the work in Louisiana by the establishment of a W. C. T. U. booth at the World’s Exposition in New Orleans in the year 1885. It was artistically decorated and made as attractive as ingenuity could devise. Here the world’s great lights in the temperance cause were to be heard daily—in pulpits and other public places in the city. Inaddition to Miss Willard, Mrs. Lathrop, Mrs. Matilda B. Carse, Mrs. Caroline Buel, Mary Allen West, Mrs. Josephine Nichols, Mrs. Mary A. Leavitt, Mrs. Sallie F. Chapin of the National Guard, there were present from State work, Mrs. Lide Merriwether of Tennessee, Mrs. I. C. de Veiling of Massachusetts, Mrs. J. B. Hobbs and Mrs. Lucian Hagans of Illinois, Mrs. M. M. Snell of Mississippi, and many others. Our Louisiana Prohibition militia were in force all the time, and we had the pleasure and assistance of such brotherly giants of the temperance reform as Geo. W. Bain, I. N. Stearn, president of National Temperance Society, Jno. P. St. Johns, Hon. R. H. McDonald of California, Rev. C. H. Mead, A. A. Hopkins, and hosts of other loyal brethren who burnished our faith and fired our zeal.
Miss Willard in theUnion Signalof this date said: “Mrs. Merrick speaks of the W. C. T. U. Booth as a ‘tabernacle.’ I consult Webster and find that a tabernacle is ‘a place in which some holy or precious thing is deposited.’ Aye, the definition fits. Our hearts are there, our holy cause, our blessed bonds. Again, it is a ‘reliquary,’ says the redoubtable Noah, ‘a place for the preservation of relics.’ Yea, verily. The women of Israel never turned over their relics more keenly than have W. C. T. U. women rifled their jewelry boxes for the ‘Souvenir Fund,’ which has gone into the Tabernacle. It is ‘a niche’ too ‘for the image of a saint.’ Accurate to a nicety. Heaven keeps a niche to hold our treasures, and so does the World’s Exposition. Our saints are there in person and in spirit—the right hand of our power.”
Mrs. Julia Ward Howe had been called by the Exposition management to preside over the Woman’s Department. There was much criticism of the authorities that this honor had not been given to a Southern woman; notwithstanding that this world-renowned Bostonian was not a stranger to our people—they fully appreciated the power of her “Battle Hymn of the Republic”—it seemed unnecessary to seek so far for a head of the Exhibit. If Southern women could create it, some one of them was surely able to direct it. Mrs. Howe came and performed this duty with marked ability, and displayed a force of character which commanded respect though it did not always win for her acquiescence in her decisions or affectionate regard from all her colleagues. I myself had much expense to incur, and received nothing, and individually I had naught special to excite my gratitude, though from the first I was willing to welcome this distinguished lady, and extend to her my co-operation and hospitality. My subsequent relations to her though transient have been pleasant, and doubtless her memory of her Exposition coadjutors matches our recollection of her own regal self. Miss Isabel Greely was her secretary—a very useful and estimable woman.
Some interesting exercises took place during one afternoon of the Exposition. Mrs. Julia Ward Howe addressed the colored people in a gallery devoted to their exhibit. There was a satisfactory audience, chiefly of the better classes of the race. Mrs. Howe had asked me to accompany her, and when I assented some one said: “Well, you are probably the only Southern womanhere who would risk public censure by speaking to a negro assembly.” Mrs. Howe told them how their Northern friends had labored to put the colored people on a higher plane of civilization, and how Garrison had been dragged about the streets of Boston for their sake, and urged that they show themselves worthy of the great anti-slavery leaders who had fought their battles. Her address was extremely well received. I was then invited to speak. I told them: “The first kindly face I ever looked into was one of this race who called forth the sympathy of the world in their days of bondage. Among the people you once called masters you have still as warm, appreciative friends as any in the world. Some of us were nurtured at your breasts, and most of us when weaned took the first willing spoonful of food from your gentle, persuasive hands; and when our natural protectors cast us off for a fault, for reproof, for punishment, you always took us up and comforted us. Can we ever forget it?
“Have you not borne the burdens of our lives through many a long year? When troubles came did you not take always a full share? Well do I remember, as a little child, when I saw my beloved mother die at the old plantation home. The faithful hands from the fields assembled around the door, and at her request Uncle Caleb Harris knelt by her bedside and prayed for her recovery—if it was God’s will. How the men and women and children wept! And after she was laid in the earth my infant brother, six months old, was given entirely to the care of Aunt Rachel, who loved him as her own life even into his young manhood, andto the day of her death. And who can measure your faithfulness during the late war when all our men had gone to the front to fight for their country? Your protection of the women and children of the South in those years of privation and desolation; your cultivation of our fields that fed us and our army; your care of our soldier boys on the field of battle, in camp and hospital, and the tender loyalty with which you—often alone—brought home their dead bodies so that they might be laid to sleep with their fathers, has bound to you the hearts of those who once owned you, in undying remembrance and love.
“I do not ask you to withhold any regard you may have for those who labored to make you free. Be as grateful as you can to the descendants of the people who first brought you from Africa—and then sold you ‘down South’ when your labor was no longer profitable to themselves. But remember, now you are free, whenever you count up your friends never to count out the women of the South. They too rejoice in your emancipation and have no grudges about it; and would help you to march with the world in education and true progress. As we have together mourned our dead on earth let us rejoice together in all the great resurrections now and hereafter.” At the close, many colored people with tearful eyes extended a friendly hand, and Mrs. Howe too did the same.
Hon. R. H. McDonald, the California philanthropist, had been my guest during Exposition days and had won our hearts by a face that reflected the nobility of his deeds. In 1890 he sent me $150 to be used for prizesoffered in the public schools of New Orleans for the best essays written on temperance. The school board and Mr. Easton, the able superintendent, accepted the offer, and the presentation of the prizes was made a great public occasion in an assemblage at Grunewald Hall.
There was a small contingent of Southern women whose platform services were invaluable to me, and whose loving sympathy helped me over many otherwise rough places. The first of these was Mrs. Sallie F. Chapin of South Carolina. Both in appearance and speech she was intense, tragic, and pathetic.—Her fiery eloquence captured the imagination and dragooned convictions in battalions. She did splendid pioneer platform services as superintendent of Southern Work, which place she filled until it was abolished by the National Convention of 1889, at the request of the Southern States, because the existence of that office misrepresented them in their organic relations to the National W. C. T. U. and had a trend toward violation of a platform principle against sectionalism. Mrs. Chapin lived and died an “unreconstructed Rebel.” The bogey of secession of the Southern States from the National seemed to haunt her brain; but I have never been able to discover any other woman who believed that such a phantom existed; it must have been but a queer instance of reflex action from her over-stimulated Southern sentiment. Mrs. Chapin had extraordinary ability and was a marvel of endurance when her temperament is taken into the reckoning. Her heroic service deserves a lasting place in our annals.
Another Southern woman of large brain and larger heart who helped me in my days of inexperience was Mrs. Mary McGee Snell (now Hall) of Mississippi. Like the war-horse of Scripture she scented battle afar off and gloried in combat. She was never so happy as in the heat of struggle. Her impetuous nature took her into all sorts of unusual situations, and she did not seem to be out of place—as did many other delegates—when, during a National W. C. T. U. convention, she was seen in the streets of Chicago parading at the head of a Salvation Army procession. She is essentially “a soldier of the Cross,” and has carried her gifts of eloquence and the most vibrant, persuasive of voices into the Evangelistic department of our National organization. Her love of rescuing souls has kept her exclusively in evangelistic work; in her power as a gospel worker she is a Sam Jones and D. L. Moody boiled down.
The most original of our National staff-workers who came to my rescue was another full-blooded Southerner—Miss Frances E. Griffin of Alabama. She is gifted with an inimitable humor. An audience room is quickly filled when it is known that she is to be the speaker of an occasion. Though a woman of presence and dignity and a manner that befits the best, her appearance as soon as she speaks a word is a promise of fun, and her audience has begun to laugh before the time. Wit of tongue is rare with women, but Miss Griffin’s equals in quality or rank the best of our American humorists. At the same time that she enlivens the seriousness of the public work which womenhave in hand, she is an intelligent reformer and also a true woman of the home—having for many years been the responsible bread-winner of her family, and has reared orphan children.
Miss Belle Kearney was too young during my term of office to be classed with the workers already mentioned, for she had just begun to consecrate her life to the service of humanity. At my request she brought her fresh enthusiasm and great gifts to organize the Young Woman’s Temperance Union of Louisiana. Repeated and most effective work in this State has made Louisianians feel that they have an endearing right in this Dixie-born-and-reared young woman; nor have they less pride than her native Mississippi in her present national fame as a first-class platform speaker and progressive reformer.