Miss Ellis's Mission Part 1

Miss Ellis's Mission.

by Mary P. Wells Smith.

"_It was a very contemptible barley-loaf she had to offer, compared with your fine, white, wheaten cake of youth and riches and strength and learning; but remember she offered her best freely, willingly, faithfully; and when once a thing is offered, it is no longer the little barley-loaf in the lad's hand, but the miraculous satisfying Bread of Heaven in the hand of the Lord of the Harvest, more than sufficient for the hungry mult.i.tude._"

"_'And so there is an end of poor Miss Toosey and her Mission!'...

Wait a bit! There is no waste in nature, science teaches us; neither is there any in grace, says faith. We cannot always see the results, but they are there as surely in grace as in nature._"

MISS TOOSEY'S MISSION.

MISS ELLIS'S MISSION.

This little sketch of Miss Ellis's life and work owes its first suggestion to Rev. J. Ll. Jones, of Chicago, who soon after her death wrote: "Why not try for a little memorial of her, to be accompanied with some of the most touching and searching extracts from the letters both received and written by her, and make it into a little booklet for the instruction of Post Office Mission Workers?... Can you not make it something as touching as 'Miss Toosey,' and far more practical,--that is, for our own little household of faith?... We do not want it primarily as a missionary tool, but as a wee fragment of the spiritual history of the world,--something that will lift and touch the soul of everybody.... In short, give us an enlightened Miss Toosey; her mission being as much stronger as Sallie Ellis was more rational and mature than the original 'Miss Toosey'!"

No one knowing Miss Ellis could read the touching little story of "Miss Toosey's Mission" without being struck by a resemblance in the characters, though a resemblance with a marked difference. As one said, "I never saw her going up the church aisle Sundays, with her audiphone, her little satchel, her bundle of books and papers, and her hymn-book, without thinking of Miss Toosey." In both lives a seemingly powerless and insignificant personality, through the force of a great yearning to do a bit of G.o.d's work in the world, achieved its longing far beyond its fondest dreams. As I read the many letters from all over the country that have come since Miss Ellis's death, as I realize how the spiritual force that burned in the soul of this small, feeble, seemingly helpless woman reached out afar and touched many lives for their enduring enn.o.blement, her life, so meagre and cramped in its outward aspect, so vivid and intense within and on paper, seems to me not without a touch of romance. To perpetuate a little longer the influence of that life is the object of this sketch.

SALLIE ELLIS was born in Cincinnati, March 13, 1835. The old-fashioned name Sallie, at that time popular in the South and West, was given her in honor of an aunt. She disliked sailing under the false colors of "Sarah." In letters she usually signed herself "S. Ellis," because, as she explained to one correspondent, "I do not know myself as _Sarah_, and Sallie is not dignified enough in writing to strangers; so I usually prefer plain S." Late in life, however, for reasons of dignity, she sometimes felt forced to adopt Sarah as what she called her "official signature."

Her father, Mr. Rowland Ellis, was born in Boston, but while yet young removed to Cincinnati, where he still lives in a vigorous and honored old age. Although his mother, in all her later years at least, was a devoted attendant upon Theodore Parker's services, Mr. Ellis in early life was a Baptist. But when the Unitarian Church was founded at Cincinnati, in 1830, his name appears among the organizers, of whom he is almost the sole survivor. Of that church he has always been a devoted supporter and constant attendant. He was a leading banker of the West, and Sallie was born into one of the most elegant and luxurious homes in Cincinnati. The Ellises kept open house, exercised the most generous hospitality, and made, as one says who knew them well then, "such a beautiful use of their money. The Ellises were just the people who _ought_ to have money." Mrs. Ellis is described as a woman of unusual loveliness of character. Out of the eight children, Sallie was thought to be the mother's favorite, because, it was supposed, she was always puny, shy, and delicate. "Sallie shall always have what she wants," said the mother, "because she wants so little." But mothers _know_, and undoubtedly the mother saw deeper than others into the rare spiritual quality concealed from the world under her delicate child's quiet, reserved exterior. Her older sister remembers of Sallie's childhood: "As a very young child she exhibited strongly marked peculiarities of character. Her affection, conscientiousness, piety, and love of duty made her different from the rest of us as children. I remember well that at home or at school there were never any rebukes for Sallie. Though very social by nature, as young as at five and six years of age she loved to be alone, and would sit in the corner of her mother's room, with face turned to the corner, musing, and talking in a low tone to her doll. When our father and mother would take the children to entertainments of various descriptions, such as children enjoy, Sallie would invariably express her preference to remain at home. If she thought her parents wanted her to go, she went."

For some years Sallie attended the private school of Mrs. Anne Ryland, an English Unitarian (a former parishioner, I think, of Rev. Laut Carpenter, and connected by marriage with Rev. Brooke Herford), a lady of n.o.ble character, and a teacher whose culture and methods were in advance of her age. In a volume of poetry presented Sallie by this teacher, is this inscription, whose old-fashioned quaintness of phrase pictures for us the Sallie Ellis of thirteen, then, as always, faithful to duty.

"Mrs. Ryland has been much gratified by the general deportment of Miss Sallie Ellis since she has been under her charge. Miss Ellis has evinced an evident desire to please, by a strict observance of the rules of the school, and by a.s.siduous and persevering attention to all her studies. She has made improvement in them all fully commensurate with her laudable endeavors, in Grammar, Geography, and Orthography particularly. It is with unfeigned regret that Mrs.

Ryland has to add, to the foregoing expression of her approval of her dear pupil's conduct, the last word,--Farewell."

Later, she attended the private school of Rev. William Silsbee, who says of her, "She was always studious and well-behaved, one of the most faithful of all my pupils." Mr. M. Hazen White, for so many years superintendent of the Unitarian Sunday school, was also one of her teachers. When seventeen, she was sent to Mrs. Charles Sedgwick's school, in Lenox, Ma.s.s. A schoolmate describes her then as a quite pretty, black-eyed girl, of delicate physique, a good and studious but not brilliant scholar, very quiet and retiring, and almost morbidly reserved. The few friends she made here, however, were life-long, and she corresponded with some of the Lenox schoolmates until her death.

"She was a perfect dancer," says the schoolmate.

Treasured among Miss Ellis's papers were found some pages of a schoolgirl's alb.u.m, marked, "At Mrs. Sedgwick's School, Lenox, Ma.s.s., March, 1852." It contains verses descriptive of each pupil, written apparently by Mrs. Sedgwick. The little pen-picture of the schoolgirl paints well the woman of later years.

SALLIE ELLIS.

If device for an old Latin motto were asked, No invention would need to be very much tasked; For the "multum in parvo" _you_ safely might stand, With book, needle, or pen, ever found in your hand.

A little, wee body with strong, earnest will, That steadily works with the force of a mill; A mind quite untiring, whatever it do, Its manifold ends with good heed to pursue: Hands busy and strong play deftly their part, And these all controlled by a good, honest heart.

Bright indeed looked Sallie's future in those days. A year or two more at school, then a return to the loved mother and the beautiful home, and a "coming out" into the brilliant world with all the advantages attending wealth and position. But the clouds were already gathering which in coming years were to darken for her in quick succession the sunshine of earthly prosperity. She was called home from school by the illness of her mother. The mother died, leaving Sallie the oldest daughter at home, to fill her place as best she might to five little brothers and sisters.

Her sister says: "Our dear mother's death was the turning-point in Sallie's life. She was so shrinking, sensitive, and tender by nature, no one could fully understand her but a mother who had watched the hidden beauties of her character expand from infancy to girlhood."

The mother's memory was fondly cherished, her loss deeply mourned, all Miss Ellis's life. Over the dying bed of the worn and weary woman of fifty smiled down the radiant face of the mother, painted when a young, blooming girl. Among Miss Ellis's papers was found a ma.n.u.script volume of eighty-one pages of selections, copied in her clear, firm handwriting, index of the spirit's strength. It is headed, "Crumbs of Comfort for the Afflicted." The selections are from the Bible, sermons, hymns, and poems,--all breathing of religious trust and help in grief,--a beautiful and touching collection. The first page reads,--

"Begun in Nov. 1870.

"These selections are made in memory of my dear mother, who was called away many years since, and through whose death I was led to think of a higher life,--the _true_ life of the soul.

"'Oh, I believe there is no _away_; that no love, no life, goes ever from us; it goes as He went, that it may come again, deeper and closer and surer, and be with us always, even unto the end of the world' (_Patience Strong's Outings_)."

One of the selections is an anonymous poem, "The Strength of the Lonely." On one page Miss Ellis had written (signed "S. E."), "I can but believe that G.o.d allows a mother still to watch over and care for her family when he takes her from this world, and in our affliction that he draws us to himself, and to Jesus as our guide to him, through her spiritual influence, just as, while upon earth, he permitted her to be his instrument to lead and guide us in all that is good. All children too, even the youngest, are G.o.d's instruments for good, and their ministries cease not with their earthly life. The departed are with us everywhere, through our daily duties,--

"In the loneliest hour, in the crowd, they are nigh us."

A year or two after the mother's death Sallie joined the Unitarian Church, being baptized by Rev. A. A. Livermore, of whom she writes in a letter: "Rev. A. A. Livermore was settled here from the time I was fourteen to twenty-one, and he formed my religious character." Fitting indeed was it that he who has trained so many young men for the ministry should dedicate to G.o.d's service this young woman, also destined to be his minister to many souls. An old lady in the church remembers seeing Sallie go up to be baptized, leading a little brother by each hand, all the little children being baptized at the same time. To one of her nature, the vows then taken were a most sacred, real consecration of her whole self to G.o.d,--vows to be n.o.bly fulfilled in the life.

Mr. Livermore writes of her:--

"During my pastorate of the Unitarian Church in Cincinnati, Mr. and Mrs. Rowland Ellis were valued parishioners of mine, and their children were all baptized by me. It was a lovely group of little folks, and the spirit of that consecration has gone largely through all their lives, and given them, I believe, the Christian flavor.

They have, too, been very warmly united as a family, and in health and sickness, in life and death, they have borne strong testimony to the blessed anchorage of a positive religious faith.

"They were also diligent attendants on the Sunday school in the bas.e.m.e.nt of the old church. Sallie's bright face and upright att.i.tude was to be seen in her place as sure as the Sunday came.

"After I left Cincinnati I saw her but seldom, but on those occasions she always spoke of the earlier times in the church and the Sunday school with a warmth and glow of memory that showed that they had been real points of life to her mind and character. And especially after her deafness became a chastening hand laid upon her character, and family sorrows and bereavements followed in the train, it was plain that she found her religious trust the one thing needful."

Within another year business reverses swept away Mr. Ellis's entire fortune. As he had meantime married a lady who proved a most capable and devoted mother to the younger children, Sallie, released from domestic cares, felt that she ought to do something to a.s.sist her father. "She was so modest," says a friend, "I don't think it ever occurred to her that she could teach school. But she said there was one thing she knew she could do, and do well, and that was, to dance." So Miss Sallie became a dancing-teacher, having cla.s.ses of children in their mothers'

parlors.

Another friend (whose boys, now stalwart men in the church, were among Miss Ellis's pupils) says of her: "She was a lovely dancing-teacher. She not only taught the children to dance well, but she taught them such gentle, lovely manners. Indeed, the significant thing in Miss Ellis's life, to me, was her faithfulness. Whatever her hand found to do, she did, and did well. Because she had been so faithful at dancing-school, she was able to be so successful a teacher. Because, when taught sewing, she tried so hard to do her best, she became such a beautiful sewer, and was able to teach sewing;" for a sewing-cla.s.s was another expedient of those days.

Her father moved to Chicago in 1851, where he resided three years. There Miss Ellis attended Mr. Shippen's church, taught a Sunday-school cla.s.s, and had a cla.s.s of newsboys evenings. After the return to Cincinnati, while Miss Ellis was at the sea-sh.o.r.e, she began to experience a painful roaring in the ears. Hearing, never quite perfect, was soon almost totally gone. The following years are little, to outward sight, but a record of invalidism, of trying this or that doctor, but still ever decreasing health and strength. Many dyspeptics, from Carlyle to lesser folk, have felt their disease, like charity, a cover for a mult.i.tude of sins. Miss Ellis suffered from chronic dyspepsia of aggravated type, from catarrhal and other troubles which finally wore away the always frail thread of life in consumptive decline.[1]

[Footnote 1: The death of two brothers, of a dear little niece, and of a fondly loved sister,--a woman beloved by all who knew her, who died only about a year before Miss Ellis, leaving five motherless girls--were among the trials of her maturer years.]

But through all these hard years Miss Ellis was doing what she could, and longing to do more. Until deafness prevented, she always taught in Sunday school. She was a devoted attendant on all church services, and worker in all church causes. The perfection of her handiwork made it in great demand. Knowing now Miss Ellis's possibilities, one almost grudges the Unitarian children, and the innumerable but beloved little nephews and nieces, the years of "Aunt Sallie's" life that went into dainty embroidery and perfect mittens for their wearing. The church fairs were always liberally aided by her willing hands. Indeed, it is difficult, without seeming exaggeration, to express her pa.s.sion of devotion to her church. It was literally her life. Outside her family, to which she was warmly attached, everything centred for her there, and for many years one of her heaviest crosses was her inability to render the service she desired to her church and denomination.

The portrait prefacing this book was taken in 1871, when Miss Ellis was thirty-six years old,--perhaps the saddest period in her life. Youth, health, fortune, hearing, dear friends, had gone one after another. The future looked dark indeed. She felt within herself capacities for which there seemed no earthly opportunity. The face wears a sadder expression than that characterizing it in later life, when at last she had found her real work.[2]

[Footnote 2: The kindness of Mr. Frank R. Ellis, of Cincinnati, Miss Ellis's youngest brother, enables us to place the portrait in this book.]

Rev. Charles Noyes was settled as Unitarian pastor in Cincinnati in 1872. To him Miss Ellis always attributed her first missionary impulse.

In a letter to Rev. W. C. Gannett, July 28, 1885, she said:--

"Yes, it is a _great_ source of comfort to have started the 'good seed,' and now to see so many stronger people taking up the work and doing so much better than I. A great deal is due to dear Mr.

Charles Noyes. He won me by his kind heart while here, and was so kind in lending me his ma.n.u.scripts always, and books, that he kept me along with the religion of the day. Then Mr. Weudte furthered the matter by putting me on the Missionary Committee, and finally started me out with the 'Pamphlet Mission.' You know the rest."

In her diary was a copy of a letter written Mr. Noyes on his departure from Cincinnati, dated June 23, 1875, a portion of which is here given.

"I cannot say 'so be it' to your departure without returning thanks for the many pleasant hours you have afforded me through your ma.n.u.scripts, the books and papers you have so kindly lent me from time to time. You have given me something to think about for a long time, so I can do without any sermons for a while. I do not expect to find so kind a pastor very soon.