In looking over the foregoing pages,
I feel that sad indeed have been my wanderings in
the shady paths of life. The aged friends of my
childhood have been buried over again. The last
sad parting from many dear friends has been noted
down; the deaths of sister, brother and mother, have
been noticed in sad rotation; grand-children have sprung
up, beside the way, flourished for a little season,
then faded like the pale, withering leaves of autumn,
and passed away from earth forever.
O, Memory, thy garland has indeed
been entwined, with many a withered flower, whose
leaves though faded, emit a sweet fragrance to the
heart, and lead it to a purer, holier trust in heaven.
But there is a deeper shadow, a gloomier
shade, a sadder spot upon earth, than we have yet
visited. It is the recently made grave of my
husband the father of my children, who passed
suddenly away, leaving his afflicted family, bereft
of his counsel, his watch care, and his support.
As I stand in this sad spot, and gaze
upon that lone grave, with tearful eyes and a bursting
heart, memory comes like a tide, throwing over my
soul the remembrances of the many many years
we have journeyed on together, since our first acquaintance
in academic halls (for our intimacy first commenced
in school), and all the sad loneliness of the present
presses like a weight upon me, crushing me to the
earth, and obscuring all the sunshine of earthly bliss.
How sad and desolate is the home from
which some loved one has been borne suddenly away,
with the firm assurance that “the places that
once knew them shall know them no more forever.”
The vacant seat at table, the return
of their usual hour of arrival, all places and all
things remind us of the departed one, and bring up
harrowing remembrances of the past, that add deeper
pangs to our sorrow, and fill our hearts with more
unendurable anguish, and suffuse our cheeks with more
scalding tears, as the stern reality presses upon
us, that it always must be thus.
Companion of my youth, can it be possible
thy manly form is hid beneath this grassy mound at
my feet? that I never again shall hear the sound of
that voice, whose endearing tone won me to thy side,
to unite my destiny with thine, and float with thee
over life’s tempestous ocean?
Rough, indeed, has been the passage,
and many the adverse storms we have encountered, during
our thirty-two years companionship, and now, way-worn
and weary, the grave the greedy grave claims
thee for its occupant. How sweet is the assurance
“that the graves shall give up their dead, and
this mortal shall put on immortality.” Yes,
this dear dust shall rise again, and be clothed in
undying youth.
O, how stealthily the stern messenger
came, laying low the form of the strong man, ere we
were aware of his danger. One week one
short week, and yet to him a week of agonizing suffering,
and all was over. Yet, in that week, what a volume
might be written, of deep, intense thought and feeling,
of fervent prayer and supplication, and tearful, childlike
submission to the divine will. Might be written
did I say? Is it not written even
in the book of God’s remembrance? Neither
sigh or tear were unnoticed, or prayer unheard, by
that God who careth for us, and numbereth the very
hairs of our heads. How often the prayer ascended
from the lips of the dying man, “O my Father,
help me in this my extremity,” and it was indeed
his hour of extreme necessity, for he was wrestling
with his last enemy.
A smile sat upon his countenance,
even while struggling for that frail life that was
so soon to end, and it is now very evident to those
that were in attendance upon him, that he was more
fully aware of his situation than they. Every
arrangement and every observation plainly shows now
that he had little, if any hope of recovery.
But still the attending physician
spoke very encouragingly to him, and to others, and
so we hoped and believed he would yet be well.
He was grateful for every attention.
Ere the disease (which was pneumonia) assumed its
most fearful aspect; a daughter, who was watching
by the bed, hearing him whisper, thought he was addressing
her; but bending over the pillow, she heard him say,
“Oh, my Father, if it be possible,
let this cup pass from me.”
Then raising his clasped hands, said,
fervently, “Nevertheless, not my will, but thine
be done.” Towards morning, reason became
dethroned, and the bewildered imagination wandered
in the land of shadows. There was an extremely
anxious expression of countenance, and he would look
earnestly upon his attendants, as though he thought
we could relieve him. He was incessantly springing
from his bed in his struggles for breath, and trying
every new position that the extremity of his case
could possibly suggest, but all to no avail.
But why dwell upon the fearful scene?
We have seen the little child contending with the
strong arm of the destroyer, and felt it was a fearful
thing for it to yield up its little life and pass forever
away from earth. But when we see the strong man
cut suddenly down, the man who has scarcely passed
the meridian of life, we “feel how dreadful
’tis to die.” The love of life is
strengthened by years. There are cords of association
binding him to it, the rolling, restless tide of business,
with its fluctuations and its cares, sweeps over him,
and seems binding him to earth. The love of children,
for whose welfare a kind father has so long been mindful,
and all the fond endearments of home and kindred,
are so many sacred ties binding him to life. But
all must be severed before the ruthless tyrant who
conquers conquerers, and has justly been styled, “the
king of terrors.”
And so it was in this case. Nature
yielded reluctantly every advantage gained by the
fearful foe, ’till her energies were exhausted,
and sinking down in quiet slumber, she yielded the
contest without a struggle.
About eight o’clock on Thursday
evening, a heavy stupor came over him, and the fearful
death-rattle warned us of the approach of the grim
messenger. We watched his failing breath with
agonizing emotions. But we turned from him one
little moment, and when we turned again, the lamp
of life was extinguished. O, the fearful agonizing
cry that arose by that death bed, when we realized
that the husband and father had passed away, forever
away. But while we wept and mourned, he slept
on unheeding. Death made little change in his
countenance, and when he was dressed in his accustomed
clothing, and laid in his coffin, he looked like a
weary man taking rest in sleep.
It was a pleasant day in mid April
that we bore him to his grave, and laid him down beneath
the green branches of the arbor vitae tree. How
many mournful thoughts pressed upon the heart, almost
crushing out the very life, as the mournful train
followed him to that sacred spot. Who that has
looked into an open grave, and seen the coffin of the
dearly loved lowered into it, but has felt an indiscribable
agony filling the heart, and blotting out all the
prospect of future earthly happiness? And who
that listens to the sound of the heavy, damp earth
as it falls upon the coffin, but will say, “oh,
has earth another sound like this?” And there
we left the husband and the father reposing beneath
the tree his own hand had trained, and in the yard
where he had spent so many hours laboring to beautify
the spot where he was so soon to lie down in his last
long sleep. By his side are the graves of the
two dear grand-children, who were wont to share in
his caresses, and his smiles. Silent now is their
greeting, as the weary grandfather lays down with
them in the place of graves: But eternity! oh
eternity! how is the meeting there? Have they
met? There are father, mother, brothers, sister,
and a long train of relatives from whom he has been
long separated. Have they recognized each other?
O, bewildering thoughts, be still, and cease your
restless longings; “secret things belong to
God,” and “what we know not now we shall
know hereafter.” But now, while the soft
winds of summer are gently sighing through the branches
of the arbor vitae tree that stands at the head of
the grassy mound that rises over the form of my buried
husband, I see by his side, the spot where, in all
human probability, this frame will soon be deposited,
to sleep with him in death’s silent halls, even
as I have journeyed with him through life. ’Till
then, let me turn to my mission, and endeavor by a
faithful discharge of every duty, to prepare for that
time, and strive by a holy life and godly conversation,
to so influence my children, that they may all seek
a city not made with hands eternal, and in the heavens.
And thus shall be answered my daily prayer, that we
may be a united family in heaven.
So we returned to the house beneath
the mild radiance of a Sabbath sun, to experience
that awful void that death makes in the domestic circle
to which so many bereaved hearts can respond.