sive hand on the young girl's snoulder,—a touch that all remember who ever felt it. "See here, C.," she said, "you are young, very young indeed," (if ever youth was made to sound like a crime, it did then); "did you ever hear that, when two countries are at war, a third country or territory is always selected, which they call neutral ground? Now, I am perfectly willing to have my parlors stand for neutral ground; but you need not tell any one that I said so." The young girl passed on; but my mother called her back. "C.," she said, "I want to tell you, that when you've lived as long as I have, you'll find it's a capital thing to go through life deaf, and dumb, and blind!" I cannot remember whether the contending families came to our party, but I do know that those dear parlors proved neutral ground more than once to neighbors long parted, their differences melting away in a house where differences were never recognized. Indeed, nothing impressed one more than the warmth and glow her presence spread wherever she came; and in her own parlors she was surely queen. But wherever she moved, light followed her. How perfect were her relations to the near neighbors! How she had secrets with the family at Warner's tavern, and lived for years on the best of terms with those two excellent women, Mrs. Warner and Mrs. Vinton, and would often be seen stealing in at their back door, through the hole in the fence that parted our premises, to borrow a pie, or to give advice as to the naming of the children who were born there, or something equally important; then to the apothe HER VIVID PERSONALITY 449 cary's store between us, to have her evening chat with Mr. Isaac Clark, whom she justly regarded as "one of the salt of the earth"! Trifles, light as air they all seem to tell of; but the racy words she uttered to all these friends have been remembered ever since. And yet how can any one, who did not hear her, take in the infinite satire she conveyed, when she spoke of one of her children, as fearing she had gone over to "those loose enders," meaning the transcendentalists; and of another, that she had "got beyond ordinances," because she did not wish to go to church two or three times on Sunday? We shall have to leave many of her best sayings unrecorded, for we cannot transfer the tone and manner that made them forcible. IT CHAPTER XX. Ye sigh not, when the sun, his course fulfilled, Why weep ye, then, for him who, having won The bound of man's appointed years, at last, Life's blessings all enjoyed, life's labors done, While the soft memory of his virtues yet Lingers like twilight hues, when the bright sun is set? BRYANT. 'T was during the summer of 1841, that my father experienced his first shock of paralysis, followed at intervals with other attacks, more or less severe, until his death, on December 11, 1847. During these years, he suffered much from the consciousness of the change that had passed over him, from failing sight and memory, and all the wearisome attendants of paralysis. Nor was the care and alleviation of the disease as well understood as now, when modern science has taught us the methods of staying its progress and lessening its effects. Always patient and long-suffering, his Christian submission did not forsake him, and he bore the long years of his downward progress, rather, I HER HUSBAND'S LAST YEARS 451 should say, his upward progress, with that unrepining spirit which in health had been a cheerful and peaceful one. But the days were full of heaviness to him, though often lighted up by the warmth of his affections, and that spirit of courtesy (the last attainment of the refined Christian) which never forsook him, even when mind and memory were gone. And now, if I were to pass over in silence my dear mother's course during these trying years, that integrity which formed so striking a portion of her character would rise up to reproach me. Disparity of years is no disadvantage in the early period of marriage. In fact, to a high-toned young woman, the mixture of reverence she cannot but feel for her elder companion greatly enhances many of her enjoyments. Middle age still retains the noblest characteristics of youth; and if it has lost something of aspiration, it has the added grace of long habit, and the steadiness of long performance. But when years have passed on, and the wife finds herself in middle life, overwhelmed with its cares and duties, and still vigorous to meet them,- her husband now feeble, infirm, tottering on the verge of the grave, no longer able to be the guide and sustainer of her difficult path,- then is felt "that awful chasm of twenty-one years in human life," of which my mother's sister Sally had written, at the time of her betrothal, but which had never been manifest till now. She omitted no care that could add to his comfort; and the impatient word and sudden gesture, which children and friends might regret, did no justice to the devotion of weary days and nights, for which she asked no aid and claimed no sympathy. Self-control and patient endurance had never been her characteristic virtues, although she practised them far oftener than we knew; but at this period many trials came to her, which one must experience to understand. With the care of a failing invalid always on her mind, passing hours of every day reading over and over again the same newspapers with dimmed eyes,- eyes long dim from weeping for the lovely Anne Jean, and for other sorrows; her nights often broken and disturbed,she had yet the same duties to a large circle that she had always had. The habits of the house for half a century could not at once be changed, and the old hospitalities still went on, with a diminished purse, and added self-sacrifice on her part. The casual observer is wont to notice the occasions of the irritable word, the impatient gesture, and they always seem insufficient for the effect. One who looks deeper, knows that the cause lies deeper; that the irritability coming inevitably from so many sources of fatigue and anxiety must have a vent somewhere; and unfortunately for our poor human nature, the safety-valve will often be the one best loved, most tenderly cherished,- only alas! because on that perfect love and understanding we always fall back. And indeed, although her vigorous health seemed the same, yet that "cloud, no bigger than a man's hand," left upon her brain by the malignant erysipelas of two years before, had already begun its work |