" There were
the old-fashioned boxes that had garnished his mother's toilet-table
when he, a sickly child, slept in her dressing-room; the silver
taper-stand which the young advocate bought for her with his first fee;
a row of small packets inscribed by her hand, and containing the hair of
such of her children as had died before her; and more odds and ends of a
like sort--pathetic tokens of a love which bound together for a little
while here on earth, and binds together for evermore in heaven,
Christian mother and son.
Sir Walter of the land
Of song and old romance,
Tradition in his cunning hand
Obedient as the lance
His valiant Black Knight bore,
Wove into literature
The legend, myth, and homely lore
Which now for us endure,
To charm our weary hours,
To rouse our stagnant hearts,
And leave the sense of new-born powers,
Which never more departs.
We thank him in the name
Of One who sits on high,
And aye abides in every fame
Which makes a brighter sky.
* * * * *
IV.
ABIGAIL ADAMS
(BORN 1744--DIED 1818.)
THE WIFE OF OUR SECOND PRESIDENT--THE MOTHER OF OUR SIXTH.
Abigail Smith, the daughter of a Congregational minister, of Weymouth,
Massachusetts, was one of the most noted women of our early history. She
left a record of her heart and character, and to some extent a picture
of the stirring times in which she lived, in the shape of letters which
are of perennial value, especially to the young.
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