Forty Years in South China | Page 6

and overwhelming a life
struggle. He went out into the world without means, and with no
educational opportunity, save that which was afforded him in the
winter months, in an old, dilapidated school-house, from instructors
whose chief work was to collect their own salary. Instead of postponing
the marriage relation, as modern society compels a young man to
postpone it, until he can earn a fortune, and be able, at commencement
of the conjugal relation, to keep a companion like the lilies of the field,
that toil not nor spin, though Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed
like one of these--he chose an early alliance with one, who would not
only be able to enjoy the success of his life, but who would with her
own willing hands help achieve it. And so while father plowed the
fields, and threshed the wheat, and broke the flax, and husked the corn,
my mother stood for Solomon's portraiture, when he said, 'She riseth
also while it is yet night, and giveth meat to her household. She layeth
her hands to the spindle, and her hands hold the distaff. She is not
afraid of the snow for her household, for all her household are clothed
with scarlet. Her children arise up and call her blessed, her husband
also, and he praiseth her. Many daughters have done virtuously, but
thou excellest them all.' So that the limited estate of the New Jersey
farmer never foundered on millinery establishments and confectionery
shops. And though we were some years of age before we heard the trill
of a piano, we knew well about the song of 'The Spinning-wheel.' There
were no lords, or baronets, or princes in our ancestral line. None wore
stars, cockade, or crest. There was once a family coat of arms, but we
were none of us wise enough to tell its meaning. Do our best, we
cannot find anything about our forerunners, except that they behaved
well, came over from Wales or Holland a good while ago, and died
when their time came. Some of them may have had fine equipage and

caparisoned postillion, but the most of them were only footmen. My
father started in life belonging to the aristocracy of hard knuckles and
homespun, but had this high honor that no one could despise. He was
the son of a father who loved God, and kept His commandments. What
is the House of Hapsburg or Stuarts, compared with being son of the
Lord God Almighty? Two eyes, two hands, and two feet, were the
capital my father started with. For fifteen years an invalid, he had a
fearful struggle to support his large family. Nothing but faith in God
upheld him. His recital of help afforded, and deliverances wrought, was
more like a romance than a reality. He walked through many a desert,
but every morning had its manna, and every night it's pillar of fire, and
every hard rock a rod that could shatter it into crystal fountains at his
feet. More than once he came to his last dollar; but right behind that
last dollar he found Him who owns the cattle on a thousand hills, and
out of the palm of whose hand all the fowls of heaven peck their food,
and who hath given to each one of His disciples a warrantable deed for
the whole universe in the words, 'All are yours.'
"The path that led him through financial straits, prepared him also for
sore bereavements. The infant of days was smitten, and he laid it into
the river of death with as much confidence as infant Moses was laid
into the Ark of the Nile, knowing that soon from the royal palace a
shining One would come to fetch it.
"In an island of the sea, among strangers, almost unattended, death
came to a beloved son; and though I remember the darkness that
dropped on the household when the black-sealed letter was opened, I
remember also the utterances of Christian submission.
"Another bearing his own name, just on the threshold of manhood, his
heart beating high with hope, falls into the dust; but above the cries of
early widowhood and the desolation of that dark day, I hear the
patriarch's prayer, commending children, and children's children, to the
Divine sympathy.
"But a deeper shadow fell across the old home-stead. The 'Golden
Wedding' had been celebrated nine years before. My mother looked up,
pushed back her spectacles, and said, 'Just think of it, father! We have
been together fifty-nine years!' The twain stood together like two trees
of the forest with interlocked branches. Their affections had taken deep
root together in many a kindred grave. Side by side in life's great battle,

they had fought the good fight and won the day. But death comes