Julia Ward Howe Part 19

I have finished Tacitus' history, also his Germans.... Chev is not at all annoyed by the newspapers, but has been greatly overdone by anxiety and labor for Brown. Much has come upon his shoulders, getting money, paying counsel, and so on. Of course all the stories about the Northern Abolitionists are the merest stuff. No one knew of Brown's intentions but Brown himself and his handful of men. The attempt I must judge insane but the spirit _heroic_. I should be glad to be as sure of heaven as that old man may be, following right in the spirit and footsteps of the old martyrs, girding on his sword for the weak and oppressed. His death will be holy and glorious--the gallows cannot dishonor him--he will hallow it....

On Christmas Day, 1859, she gave birth to a second son, who was named Samuel Gridley. This latest and perhaps dearest child was for three short years to fill his parents' life with a joy which came and went with him. His little life was all beautiful, all bright. We a.s.sociate him specially with the years we spent at No. 13 Chestnut Street, Boston, a s.p.a.cious and cheerful house which we remember with real affection. The other children were at school; little Sam was the dear companion of our mother's walks, the delight of our father's few leisure hours. For him new songs were made, new games invented: both parents looked forward to fresh youth and vigor in his sweet companionship. This was not to be.

"In short measures, life may perfect be": little Sam died of diphtheritic croup, May 17, 1863.

This heavy sorrow for a time crushed both these tender parents to the earth. Our father became seriously ill from grief; our mother, younger and more resilient, found some relief in nursing him and caring for the other children; but this was not enough. She could not banish from her mind the terrible memory of her little boy's suffering, the anguish of parting with him. While her soul lifted its eyes to the hills, her heart sought some way to keep his image constantly before her. Her sad thoughts must be recorded, and she took up, for the first time since 1843, the habit of keeping a journal.

The first journal is a slender Diary and Memorandum Book. On May 13, the first note of alarm is sounded. Sammy "did not seem quite right." From that date the record goes on, the agonizing details briefly described, the loss spoken of in words which no one could read unmoved. But even this was not enough: grief must find further expression, yet must be repressed, so far as might be, in the presence of others, lest her sorrow make theirs heavier. This need of expression took a singular form. She wrote a letter to the child himself, telling the story of his life and death; wrote it with care and precision, omitting no smallest detail, gathering, as it were a handful of pearls, every slightest memory of the brief time.

A few extracts show the tenor of this letter:--

"MY DEAREST LITTLE SAMMY,--

"It is four weeks to-day since I saw your sweet face for the last time on earth. It did not look like your little face, my dear pet, it was so still, and sad, and quiet. But Death had changed it, and I had to submit, and was thankful to have even so much of you as that still face, for some days. Everybody grieved to part from you, dear little soul, but I suppose that I grieved most of all, because you belonged most to me.

You were always with me, from the time you began to exist at all. The time of your birth was a sad one. It was the time of the imprisonment and death of John Brown, a very n.o.ble man, who should be in one of the many mansions of which Christ tells us, and in which I hope, dear, that you are nearer to Him than any of us can be....

"You arrived, I think, at three in the morning, very red in the face, and making a great time about it. You were a fine large Baby, weighing twelve pounds.... I have some of your baby dresses left, and shall hunt them up and lay them with the clothes you have worn lately.... I gave you milk myself.... I used to lay you across my breast when you cried, and you liked this so well that you often insisted upon sleeping in that position after you were grown quite large. It hurt me so much that I finally managed to break you of the habit, but not until you were more than a year old.... I had a nice crimson merino cloak made for you, trimmed with velvet, and lined with white silk. I bought also a very nice crochet cap, of white and crimson worsted, and in these you were taken to drive with me....

"During this first year of your life I had some troubles, and your Baby ways were my greatest comfort. I used to think: this Baby will grow up to be a man, and will protect me when I am old. For I thought, dear, that you should have outlived me many years. But you are removed from us to grow in another world, of which I know nothing but what Christ has told me....

"You used to keep me awake a good deal at night, and this sometimes made me nervous and fretful, though I was usually very happy with you. I would give a good deal for one of those bad nights now, though at the time they were pretty hard upon me....

"... Your second summer brings me to the winter that followed. It was quite a gay winter for us at old South Boston. Marie, the German cook, made very nice dishes, and I had many people to dine, and one or two pleasant evening parties. You still slept in my room, and when I was going to a party in the evening, Annie[47] used to bring my nice dress and my ornaments softly out of the room, that I might dress in the nursery, and not disturb your slumbers. I was always glad to get home and undress, and it was always sweet to come to the bed, and find you in it, sound asleep, and lying right across.... I learned to sleep on a very little bit of the bed, you wanted so much of it. This winter, I bought you a pair of snow-boots, of which you were very proud....

[47] The child's faithful nurse.

"We all got along happily, dear, till early in April (1863), when your father desired me to make a journey with Julia, who needed change of scene a little. So I had to go and leave you, my sweet of sweets....

"We were glad enough to see each other again, you and I, and I felt as if I could never part with you again. But I was only to have you for a few days, my darling....

"Thursday I sat up in your nursery, in the afternoon, as I usually did, with my book--you having your toys. When I had finished reading, I built houses with blocks for you, and rolled the b.a.l.l.s and dumbbells across the floor to you. You rolled them back to me and this amused you very much. I go to sit up in your nursery in the afternoon now, with my book--the light shines in now as it used to do, and I hear the hand-organ and children's voices in the street. It seems to bring you a little nearer to me, my dear lost one, but not near enough for comfort."

The child's illness and death are described minutely, every symptom, every remedy, every anguish noted. Then follows:--

"It gives me dreadful pain to recall these things and write them down, my dearest. I don't do it to make myself miserable, but in order that I may have some lasting record of how you lived and died. You left little by which you might be remembered, save the love of kindred and friendly hearts, but in my heart, dear, your precious image is deeply sculptured.

All my life will be full of grief for you, dearest Boy, and I think that I shall hardly live as long as I should have lived, if I had had you to make me happy. Perhaps it seems very foolish that I should write all this, and talk to you in it as if you could know what I write. But, my little darling, it comforts me to think that your sweet soul lives, and that you do know something about me. Christ said, 'This day thou shalt be with me in Paradise': and he knew that this was no vain promise. So, believing the dear Christ, I am led along to have faith in immortal life, of which, dear, I know nothing of myself.

"Your little funeral, dear, was bitter and agonizing. The good G.o.d does not send affliction without comfort, but the weeping eyes and breaking heart must struggle through much anguish before they can reach it...."

There was no hea.r.s.e at this little funeral. The small white casket was placed on the front seat in the carriage in which she rode.

"We came near the gate of Mount Auburn, when I began to realize that the parting was very near. I now opened the casket, took your dear little cold hand in mine, and began to take silent farewell of you. And here, dearest child, I must stop. The remembrance of those last moments so cuts me to the heart, that I cannot say one word more about them, and not much about the life of loneliness and desolation which now began for me, and of which I do not see the end. G.o.d knows why I lost you, and how I suffer for you, and He knows how and when I shall see you again, as I hope to do, my dearest, because Christ says we are to live again after this life, and I know that if I am immortal, G.o.d will not inflict upon me the pain of an eternal separation from you. So, we shall meet again, sweet Angel Sammy. G.o.d grant that the rest of my life may be worthy of this hope, more dear than life itself....

"I must finish these words by saying that I am happy in believing that my dear Child lives, in a broader land, with better teaching and higher joys than I could have given him. I hope that the years to come will brighten, not efface, my mind's picture of him, and that among these, the cipher of one blessed year is already written, in which the picture will become reality, and the present sorrow the foundation of an eternal joy."

The following stanzas are chosen from among many poems on little Sammy's life and death:--

REMEMBRANCE

So thou art hid again, and wilt not come For any knockings at the veiled door; Nor mother-pangs, nor nature, can restore The heart's delight and blossom of thy home.

And I with others, in the outer court, Must sadly follow the excluding will, In painful admiration, of the skill Of G.o.d, who speaks his sweetest sentence short.

At this time she writes to her sister Annie:--

"I cannot yet write of what has come to me. Chev and I feel that we are baptized into a new order of suffering--those who have lost children, loving them, can never be like those who have not. It makes a new heaven and a new earth. The new heaven I have not yet--the blow is too rough and recent. But the new earth, sown with tears, with the beauty and glory gone out of it, the spring itself, that should have made us happy together, grown tasteless and almost hateful. All the relish of life seems gone with him. I have no patience to make phrases about it--for the moment it seems utterness of doubt and of loss.

"No doubt about him. 'This night shalt thou be with me in Paradise' was said by one who knew what he promised. My precious Baby is with the Beautiful One who was so tender with the children. But I am alone, still fighting over the dark battle of his death, still questioning whether there is any forgiveness for such a death. Something must have been wrong somewhere--to find it out, I have tortured myself almost out of sanity. Now I must only say, it is, and look and wait for divine lessons which follow our bitter afflictions.

"G.o.d bless you all, darling. Ask dear Cogswell to write me a few lines--tell him that this deep cut makes all my previous life seem shallow and superficial. Tell him to think of me a little in my great sorrow.

"Your loving "JULIA."

She had by now definitely joined the Unitarian Church, in whose doctrines her mind found full and lasting rest; throughout this sorrowful time the Reverend James Freeman Clarke was one of her kindest helpers. Several years before this, she had unwillingly left Theodore Parker's congregation at our father's request. She records in the "Reminiscences" his views on this subject:--

"'The children (our two oldest girls) are now of an age at which they should receive impressions of reverence. They should, therefore, see nothing at the Sunday service which militates against that feeling. At Parker's meeting individuals read the newspapers before the exercises begin. A good many persons come in after the prayer, and some go out before the conclusion of the sermon. These irregularities offend my sense of decorum, and appear to me undesirable in the religious education of my family.'"

It was a grievous thing to her to make this sacrifice; she said to Horace Mann that to give up Parker's ministry for any other would be like going to the synagogue when Paul was preaching near at hand; yet, once made, it was the source of a lifelong joy and comfort.

Mr. Clarke was then preaching at Williams Hall; hearing Parker speak of him warmly, she determined to attend his services. She found his preaching "as unlike as possible to that of Theodore Parker. He had not the philosophic and militant genius of Parker, but he had a genius of his own, poetical, harmonizing. In after years I esteemed myself fortunate in having pa.s.sed from the drastic discipline of the one to the tender and reconciling ministry of the other."

She has much to say in the "Reminiscences" about the dear "Saint James,"

as his friends loved to call him. The relation between them was close and affectionate: the Church of the Disciples became her spiritual home.

These were the days of the Civil War; we must turn back to its opening year to record an episode of importance to her and to others.

In the autumn of 1861 she went to Washington in company with Governor and Mrs. Andrew, Mr. Clarke and the Doctor, who was one of the pioneers of the Sanitary Commission, carrying his restless energy and indomitable will from camp to hospital, from battle-field to bureau. She longed to help in some way, but felt that there was nothing she could do--except make lint, which we were all doing.

"I could not leave my nursery to follow the march of our armies, neither had I the practical deftness which the preparing and packing of sanitary stores demanded. Something seemed to say to me, 'You would be glad to serve, but you cannot help anyone: you have nothing to give, and there is nothing for you to do.' Yet, because of my sincere desire, a word was given me to say, which did strengthen the hearts of those who fought in the field and of those who languished in the prison."

Returning from a review of troops near Washington, her carriage was surrounded and delayed by the marching regiments: she and her companions sang, to beguile the tedium of the way, the war songs which every one was singing in those days; among them--

"John Brown's body lies a-mouldering in the grave.

His soul is marching on!"

The soldiers liked this, cried, "Good for you!" and took up the chorus with its rhythmic swing.

"Mrs. Howe," said Mr. Clarke, "why do you not write some good words for that stirring tune?"

"I have often wished to do so!" she replied.

Waking in the gray of the next morning, as she lay waiting for the dawn, the word came to her.

"Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord--"