Henry Ware

“ Ease and prosperity make our greatest trial; we are never more blessed than when we are said to be in affliction. It is remarkable, that not one year has passed since I began this custom of recording to you these mercies, that there has not been some striking one on the list. What is to come this year? God knows; and in this I can rest satisfied. Henry's eyes are useless, and mine still in requisition; of course I do nothing else, except at odd moments, when he is away or asleep.
"Mary."
Mr. Ware's severe illness at this period seems to have been a crisis ”

“ And this was the state of mind in which the life at Framingham began, and continued to the end,—a state of suspense, entire uncertainty, unwillingness to be idle, but inability to enter confidently upon any plan, or engage vigorously in any employment. There is little, therefore, to be told of this period, in regard to occupation or incident. We can only show in what spirit Mrs. Ware met this new trial,—to many minds the hardest of all,—living without an object, yet striving to live cheerfully, busily, and profitably. ”

“ Why do we indulge so much in idealism, instead of the real pleasure of our existence? I have no opinion of this giving way to imagination in our estimate of life.
"Mary."
[Pg 74]
In the month of October a death occurred which awakened all her sympathy, and the sympathy and sorrow of a large community. The Rev. John E. Abbot, whose life and character Henry Ware has made familiar to us all, died in October, at his father's in Exeter, where Mary's friend was staying as a relative. To both of them he had been a Christian helper when they most needed Christian counsel and encouragement. ”

“ Near the trees stood a group of chiefs, among whom Henry recognized Yellow Panther, the Miami, and Red Eagle, the Shawnee, imposing men both, but not the equals of an extremely tall and powerful young chief, who was destined later to be an important figure in the life of Henry Ware. ”

“ The season which had been the first of Mary's coöperation with Mr. Ware, was the last of his active service as a pastor. He had overtasked his energies, and that change was impending which affected the whole of their remaining work in life. On his return from Northampton, where he had been preaching, in the month of May, 1828, he was arrested at Ware by a violent fever, which was followed by extreme prostration, and confined him there several weeks. His wife was in Boston, and in a state of health that made travelling neither easy nor wholly safe. ”

“ I am sure that I am not myself; I have not yet come to act freely in my new position in life; I am not 'at home,'—shall I ever be in this world?"
Thus did Mary Ware write to a friend and true sympathizer, whose residence in Milton was one of the great inducements that had drawn her to that place. She had been there but a short time, and had not yet risen from the complete exhaustion of body and mind—the effect of years of solicitude, exertion, and suffering—for which she made too little allowance. ”

“ I find it is a very different thing to be lone Polly Pickard, beating about the world, conscious that it could not interfere with any one's comfort or convenience if she were out of it, and to call myself Mary Ware, with all the appendages which belong to her,—the cares and comforts, the duties and privileges, from which she cannot disconnect herself. ”

“ It may be partiality which leads us to doubt whether there was ever more of fortitude and faith, in similar condition, than in the hearts of Henry and Mary Ware, as they turned their back upon the fond scenes of their labor, and, with the unavoidable consciousness of high qualification as well as affection, withdrew from all public service and peculiar trust. ”

“ Ware's first child was born; a son, who lived but few years, yet long enough to leave a deep impression of beauty and promise. Toward the last of August, Mr. Ware set out alone on a horseback journey for his health, riding through New Hampshire and Vermont to Montreal and Quebec, and returning in October. During the first part of this interval, his wife and infant child were at lodgings in Newton, where her next letter is dated, referring in the opening to a poetical epistle which she had received from her husband. That epistle, as published at length in the Memoir of Mr. ”

“ Ware's bodily as well as mental labor must have been unusually great. "It is true, I do not see how we are to set all the stitches which will be necessary to prepare eight people for a winter campaign in a cold house; but I have faith that we shall find a way." They were [Pg 326] much more free from interruptions than ever before. Their new neighbors and friends were not only kind, but considerate,—one of the best forms of kindness. Gratefully does Mrs. Ware acknowledge this. "How much there is in human life to interest our hearts! ”

“ Ware were separated for a time, she taking lodgings with her infant at Waltham Abbey, and he making an excursion alone for his health. Soon after he left her, Mary wrote to him thus:—"I am quite sure it was best for you to go, though there was some risk in it. If you only keep a sharp watch upon your 'excitables,' not mistaking the effect of them for strength, and so do not overdo, you will, I doubt not, be better for the jaunt; you will be gaining much mental satisfaction, and I am sure that will help the body.... Yours to 'Miss Pickard' is just received. ”

“ We are all well; that is, well enough to be free from anxiety on the subject;—neither Henry nor I good for much beyond a very narrow sphere, but free from disease. I keep very quietly at home. Indeed, I cannot do otherwise; a ride into Boston tires me so much, that I am not fit for any thing for a day after; a walk does the same. So I am fain to content myself with my home comforts; and to this end I have converted my chamber into a study, where Henry writes, I work, and Nanny plays all the livelong day. It is more like Sheafe Street comfort than any thing we have had since. ”

“ These troops are intended to accompany the young Queen of Portugal, whither she will shortly proceed to claim the Crown.”
p. 28125.*—“The portrait of Mr. Alderman Francis, painted by Lane, was hung in St. Andrew’s Hall, Norwich, this week.”
—*“Died lately at Wimbotsham, near Downham Market, aged 52, Mr. William Henry Ware, many years composer of music, and director of the orchestra at Covent Garden Theatre, and one of the masters of the Royal Academy, Woolwich.” ”

“ In the summer of 1815, Mary left Hingham, and returned to her home in Pearl Street, Boston, where another change had just occurred in the death of her grandfather, James Lovell. This left her grandmother very lonely, and for the remaining two years of her life Mary devoted herself to her care, and ministered to her wants, with the same assiduity and affection that marked her devotion in her mother's sickness. Not that she was wholly confined to the sick-room, or the house. Mrs. Lovell's health varied, and allowed occasional visits to friends in and near Boston, for several weeks together. ”

“ Arriving in Liverpool in April, she was made to feel at home immediately, by the kindness and sympathy of a kindred mind, in one to whom Dr. Channing had given her a letter, and whose name and sad fate are familiar to many,—Mrs. Freme, daughter of the Rev. Dr. Wells, who settled in Brattleboro', Vermont, where she afterward perished by fire. Mary's account of her interview with that excellent [Pg 100] woman is characteristic, as her first interest in a new country. ”

“ From Chatham Mary went to Waltham Abbey, and passed three weeks with the son of the only surviving brother of James Lovell. And in December, unwilling to be detained longer from the cousin to whom she designed to make one of her chief visits in England, and finding that sickness in the family prevented any one from coming for her, she took the coach alone, leaving London before daylight and riding to Salisbury, where some of her friends met her, and conducted her to their home at "Burcombe House," in that vicinity. ”

“ In 1738 Ware, while still holding the office of secretary to the board of works, was appointed clerk of works to his majesty's palace in the room of Henry Flitcroft [q. v.] , promoted, and from 1741 onward, till at least 1748, held office as ‘purveyor.’ In 1751–2, and again in 1757–8, he was employed as draughtsman, at a salary of 100l. a year, on the building of the Horse Guards from Kent's designs (see Horse Guards Accounts in Library Royal Inst. Brit. Arch.) About 1750 he altered or rebuilt the south and east fronts of Chicksands Priory, Bedfordshire, the home of the Osbornes. ”

“ I am afraid to go home, because I know I shall only be able to do half the requisite work, and to do that not more than half; yet to stay away is altogether out of the question." As usual, Mary was ready to do any thing that seemed best, even to go home alone with her new charge, if her husband would be benefited by remaining longer and acting freely. ”

“ Amidst all the exaggerated colouring of Patrick Henry’s biographer, there is doubtless enough that is true, to prove a power in the spontaneous energy of an excited speaker, superior in its effects to any thing that can be produced by writing. Something of the same sort has been witnessed by every one who is in the habit of attending in the courts of justice, or the chambers of legislation. And this, not only in the instances of the most highly eloquent; but inferior men are found thus to excite attention and produce effects, which they never could have done by their pens. ”

“ It made me feel for a little while—oh, I can hardly explain it—as if the old Mary Ware that I used to be was a million miles away, and as if the Mary Ware sitting here in Riverville was an entirely dif [192] ferent person. I couldn't make it seem possible that the 'me' who was sitting there in the hot June dusk, looking down on the lively streets, was the same person who only a few days before had no other excitement in life than making Jack's coffee or ironing Norman's shirts back in the hills of Arizona. ”

“ But a very tender regard lay under his smile of amusement, for the attitude she had taken, and a feeling of reverence possessed him as he saw her in the new light which this revelation of her spiritual life gave him. "Nobody is good enough for little Mary Ware," he had said once, when she was a romping child. ”

“ WILLIAM of Ware, or WILLIAM WARRE, Guaro, or Varron (fl. 1300?) , philosopher, born at Ware in Hertfordshire, entered the Franciscan order in his youth. He was S.T.P. of Paris, and spent most of his life there. ”

“ Ware sat enjoying the dainty meal were the best in the day for Mary, for she poured out her pent-up questions and speeches, reported all that had gone on since the last time she sat there, and crowded into that brief space as much of Jack's sayings and Norman's doings as she could possibly remember.
"Oh, it'll be so good to have you home again to stay!" she would say every time when Mrs. Ware rose to start back, ending her good-bye embrace with a tight squeeze. ”

“ It was a perfect June day, the kind that makes one feel that with a sky so fair and an earth so sweet life is too full to ask anything more of heaven. Time and again in the pauses that fell between their remarks, Mary's voice jubilantly broke out in the refrain of an old hymn that they all loved: "Happy day, oh, happy day!" And when Jack's deep bass out on the porch and Mrs. Ware's sweet alto in the pantry took up the words to the accompaniment of swishing broom and clattering cups, Norman hummed them too, like a big, contented bumblebee in a field of clover. ”

“ They reached the gate of the palisade and passed within. It was full dusk now, the forest blurring together into a mighty black wall, and the outlines of the houses becoming shadowy. The Ware family sat awhile that evening by the hearth fire, and John Ware was full of satisfaction. A worthy man, he had neither imagination nor primitive instincts and he valued the wilderness only as a cheap place in which to make homes. He spoke much of clearing the ground, of the great crops that would come, and of the profit and delight afforded by regular work year after year on the farm. ”

“ The Lea was described in a statute of 1424 as "one of the great rivers, which extendeth from the town of Ware till the water of the Thames, in the counties of Hertford, Essex and Middlesex"; and along this river there was carried at one time a very considerable quantity of produce and merchandise. The history of Ware goes back to, at least, the ninth century, when the Danes took their ships up to the town but were outmanœuvred by King Alfred, who diverted the stream, and left the vessels stranded. ”

“ As she recalled that promise now, her face dimpled again as it had then over the absurdity of such a thing. "The idea of Phil's thinking that Pink Upham is anybody to be considered seriously!" she exclaimed, as she recalled his uncouth laugh, his barbaric taste in dress, his provincial little habits and mannerisms, which in the parlance of the Warwick Hall girls, would have stamped him "dead common" according to their standards. She was still looking dreamily out into the snowy yard when Mrs. Ware came to the door to inquire with an anxious sniff,
"Mary, isn't something burning?" ”

“ Now she knew with what great task she was to keep tryst. She was to help in this struggle to free these poor people from the conditions which bound them. She was to help them reach out for their birthright, which was nothing more than a fair chance to help themselves.
Gazing up at the stars, a great wonder swept over her, that she, little Mary Ware, had been called to a destiny even greater than that of the Maid of Orleans. For was it not greater to enlist a nation in such warfare than to ride at the head of an army and spur men on to bloodshed? ”