All the Days of My Life: An Autobiography

For several days his enemy watched him, then I saw them frequently together and apparently on the most friendly terms. One afternoon when I was on deck and watching them in eager conversation, Mrs. Curtis sat down at my side. She looked at them, and then at me, and asked, “Do you like that acquaintanceship?”

“No,” I answered. “He is a bad man.”

“The Governor?”

“Yes.”

“Perhaps you should not say that – you may not be right.”

“I am right,” I replied. “I think he knows every sin that has a name.”

“I wish,” she continued, “that Mr. Barr did not listen so eagerly to him. We were in hopes of your coming to Boston, but now that he has caught the Western fever, nothing will cure him but an experience of the West. Mr. Curtis thinks you are both unfit for Chicago.”

“I know we are.”

“Poor child!” she exclaimed. “I intended to have taken such good care of you.”

Then tears sprang to my eyes. I leaned my head against her breast, and if she had been an Englishwoman, she would have kissed me.

It was, alas, quite true that Robert had fallen completely under the spell of his enemy. His lure had been the wonderful West, which Robert was now determined to visit, before we definitely settled, “We will go as far as Buffalo, Milly,” he said to me, “see Niagara, and cross into Canada. We may find just what we like in Canada. If so, we shall still be under the British flag. If we do not like Canada, then we will go westward to Chicago.”

I pleaded for a trial of Boston, but Robert would not listen to me. “Every one on the ship says, ‘Go west,’” he replied. “Let us see with our own eyes, and judge for ourselves.”

I was grieved and offended at the time, but I can understand now the influence primarily working against Boston. He longed for rest and travel and change. All his life he had been kept strictly to his lessons, and his business. He had never had a holiday, unless his mother and sister and her children were with him, and this going where he liked, seeing what he liked, doing what he liked, and resting whenever he wished to rest, possessed irresistible charms. He could not deny himself. He could not go to Boston and settle at once to business of some kind. I do not blame him. He had had no youth. He was naturally poetic and romantic, but while the modern spirit of travel and recreation was just beginning to make both age and youth restless and expectant.

“Even his childhood knew nothing better,Than bills of creditor and debtor – ”

Yet at that time I could not reason thus, and the refusal of the kind offers made us by Mr. and Mrs. Curtis, appeared to me a wilful flinging away of good fortune. Also, I apprehended nothing but danger and sorrow from any step taken on the advice of a man, whom nothing could make me trust. Alas! an apprehended danger can not always be a defended one. I believed firmly that heaven chalked the line that brought us to New York. I saw no white road leading us to Chicago. I felt that in turning away from Boston we had lost opportunity’s golden tide.

On the fifth of September, A.D. 1853, we landed in New York. The Atlantic’s dock was on the East River, and we went to a large hotel some where in the lower part of the city. I think just below Trinity Church. Robert was like a boy out on a holiday. Everything delighted him. We rode about seeing what there was to see, and among other things the Crystal Palace; but as we had spent three weeks at the original in London in 1851, we were disappointed. However, I was greatly pleased with the dry goods stores and astonished to find dresses ready made, more so when I discovered I could slip comfortably into them, and that they looked as if they had been expressly made for me. It was always such a labor to have a dress made in England, that I laughed with delight at this sensible convenience, and bought many more than I needed. I was afraid I might never have such another opportunity.

As I call to remembrance the events of those few days in New York of 1853, I smile and sigh over our ignorance and our happiness. For instance when driving about the city one day, I saw exposed for sale what appeared to me some wonderfully large plums. I asked Robert to buy some, and he did so but when I tasted them, I was astonished and disappointed. They did not taste like plums; they did not taste nice at all. In fact they were tomatoes, and I was about to throw them away when the Irishman who was driving us asked for them, saying, “They would be fine with his supper’s beefsteak.” Then I laughed, for I remembered Mr. Pickwick and what came of his beefsteak and tomato sauce. But I had really never before seen a tomato, for in the North of England they could not ripen, and I think it is only under glass they ripen in the southern counties. At this day they are plentiful in all parts of England, but they are imported from the Channel Islands and the Continent.

Such small blunders were common enough, and gave us much amusement; for seeing that I could not alter Robert’s arrangements, I entered into all that interested him with that simplicity of heart, which accepts the inevitable and enjoys it. Besides, I was then only twenty-two years old, and twenty-two has hopeful eyes, and sees things on their best side. But in less than a week, we had exhausted the New York of 1853, and we went to Buffalo. I remember our ride up the banks of the Hudson very well, but no kind angel whispered me then, that I should, after thirty-five years had come and gone, make my home there.

I was delighted with Buffalo, especially with the picturesque beauty of its frame residences. A house made of wood was a wonder to me, and their balconies and piazzas, their little towers and pinnacles, and their green outside blinds, made me long for such a home. But we only remained two days in Buffalo, and then went to Niagara, which disappointed me at first, though the roar of its waters remained in my ears for many days. The change into Canada was remarkable. I know that in England the crossing of the Tweed, makes you immediately sensible that you are in Scotland; but this sensation of passing rapidly from one country to another, was much stronger in stepping from the United States into Canada, and the Scottish atmosphere was intensified as soon as you entered a house or spoke to any one.

“Well, Robert,” I said, “we did not cross the Atlantic for this kind of thing. Let us go back to New York.”

“This kind of thing, seems very comfortable and respectable,” answered Robert, a little piqued, “but as you do not like it, we will go on to Chicago. You know, Milly, we have come into an unknown world, and we must take it as we find it.”

It would be tedious to follow our wanderings from place to place for the next six weeks, but at last I rebelled against any more travel. “I am tired to death, Robert,” I said. And he smiled and told me, that I never looked better. “And the children are too tired to sleep; Mary is crying to stop,” I added. That was a thing to be looked after. For to an English and Scotch husband – and for anything I know to the contrary, to all kinds of husbands, the children are sacred objects, and of far greater importance than the wife. The children are his; they are flesh of his flesh, and blood of his blood. They represent his family, and if they were lost, there is no positive certainty of there being more. But wives are only relatives by marriage, and wives are certain and plentiful. At least I never saw a man, however old and ugly, that did not consider himself eligible for any woman he fancied. So when Robert heard the children were weary, he blamed himself – and me, at once.

“We have been very thoughtless,” he said. “We ought to have considered their youth. Of course they could not endure the travel we enjoyed. What do you think? Shall we stay in Chicago? It appears to me as likely a place as any I have seen.”

“Very well,” I answered. “Only, dear Robert, let us have a home, one of those dear little wooden cottages. Four or five rooms to begin with, will do.”

He laughed at what he called my “primitive ideas” and went to look for a cottage, while we stayed in the Sherman House. But for two days he found nothing “fit to live in” and on the third day, said he was going to the North Side. “They tell me,” he added, “it is the aristocratic part of the city, and I suppose rents will be high.”

“Well,” I replied, “we have a saying in England, that we should choose a house beyond our means, dress up to our means, and live below our means.”

About noon he came home satisfied. He had found exactly what he liked – “a new house, just finished, the only brick house on the North Side.”

“Brick!” I exclaimed.

“Yes. So comfortable. Mr. Wadsworth’s big house is just a little nearer the lake, General Butterfield’s directly opposite, and the Ogdens’ not far away. You will like it, Milly.”

“Have you decided to rent it, Robert?”

“I have rented it. After lunch, leave the children with Nora, and let us go to buy the furniture.”

In going through this house, I saw that it was large enough for a family of fourteen, and I proposed that we only furnish at present the rooms we were going to use. Reluctantly Robert agreed to this proposal, and reluctantly also, he submitted to my “primitive ideas” regarding the furnishing. But in two or three days, we had at last a comfortable home, though the little wood cottage had not materialized.

Then Robert rented a small office on Lake Street, and advertised himself as an accountant, and soon appeared to be very busy and very happy. Every night when we were sitting together, he told me wonderful stories about the big fortunes made so rapidly in Chicago, and was so excited over them, I could not help an anxious look at his shining eyes and flushed face. Generally I discredited these reports, and answered, “There is no easy way to wealth, Robert. Don’t believe in impossibilities.”

“They happen every day in Chicago,” he would reply. “I wish that I had come here ten years ago. I should have been a rich man now.”

It was in this exaggerated spirit he met his new life, and there was no Mr. Curtis near to check his impetuosities. I wonder whether I was happy at this time. I have no doubt I appeared so, but I must have been very lonely. It was different with Robert. Every day he made fresh friends and he began to join societies for this and that purpose, and seemed to be in constant request. But it was Thanksgiving Day when I received my first caller, a Miss Dagget, the sister of the principal grocer in Chicago. She lived so close to me, that we could stand at our doors and converse without raising our voices.

From her conversation, however, I learned that I had been thoroughly discussed. Mrs. Nicholson had thought from our taking such a large house, that I might be going to keep boarders, and Mrs. Ogden had said she had heard, I was very well educated, and what a charity to the North Side it would be, if I opened a school and saved the children, the danger of crossing the dreadful draw-bridge. I said nothing at the time about Mrs. Ogden’s idea, but it took possession of me, and the result was that I opened a ladies’ school on the second of January, 1854. I limited the number of pupils to four boarders, and twelve day scholars, and made the terms prohibitive to all but the class, whose patronage I desired. They were indeed the cause of much conversation, but those paying them were proud of the circumstance, and liked to make it known by their complaints. It was their privilege, and did me more good, than harm.

A week before school opened, my number was complete, the spare rooms were furnished for the four boarders, and I had written to a New York Agency to send me a resident teacher who could speak French and teach music. My first pupil was one of the boarders, a Miss Sarah Morgan, a lovely affectionate girl about fifteen years old. I have not thought of her for many a year, but as soon as I began this sentence, she came smiling into my memory, and I see her childish face with its apple bloom complexion, and her fair brown hair, just as I saw her the first day she came to me.

After the opening of my school there was no lack of callers and social invitations, but as it was impossible to accept all, I declined all; yet in many other ways, I received constant tokens of appreciation and good will. I began to be really happy. My children, my house, and my pupils kept every moment busy; and when the session closed early in June, the school had proved itself a financial success, and there were few women on the North Side more popular than myself. Of course I enjoyed it. Work was always a necessity to me and it is my belief, that when people work hard, they like to do it.

One afternoon during the vacation a brother of one of my pupils passed, and asked me if I had “read today’s paper;” I said, “I have not;” and he replied, “Then I will leave you mine.” After he had gone, I opened it without interest, but instantly saw Robert’s name in large type. It was above an account of a Know Nothing meeting; he had been speaking against the society, and the man I feared, in favor of it.

The speeches did not concern me, it was the fact that this man was in Chicago, and associated with Robert, that filled my whole consciousness. I looked backward a few weeks, put this and that together, and was then sure he had been in Chicago a long time. Robert’s silence troubled my very soul. Confused intuitions, obscure presentiments, took possession of me. My mind reached backward and forward, and began to foresee and foretell, and I had a cold shudder at my own thoughts.

Then I went into the house, for my anxiety usually runs into motion. If I sit still and bear it, I have become stupefied, while motion calls up whatever comfort or strength I can lay hold of. But during the last busy half-year, I had lost something of my general spiritual aptitude, at least the stream of that life ran deeper and darker, and I could remember nothing that had any message for me. For I had not then read, or I should not have forgotten John Milton’s fine advice against an unhappy looking forward to doubtful or questionable misfortunes:

“Be not o’er exquisiteTo cast the fashion of uncertain evils,For grant they be so, while they rest unknown,Why need a man forestall his day of grief,And run to meet what he would most avoid?”

I said nothing to Robert until after supper, then when he was placidly smoking, I told him what I had read. Was it true, I asked.

“Yes, Milly, it was true,” he replied.

“Then that man is here? In Chicago?”

“Yes.”

“Has he been here long, Robert?”

“About three months.”

“And you never told me?”

“You hate him so bitterly. Why should I annoy you by speaking of him?”

“But, Robert, if talking about him, was also talking about yourself?”

“I did not say it was.”

“Have you anything to do with him? Tell me truly, Robert.”

“Yes, I have unavoidably found myself compelled to have a great deal to do with him.”

“How?” I persisted.

“You have read ‘how’ in one way, Milly. He himself asked me to answer his speech. He thought that I, being an alien, would make a proper opponent. I am a fair speaker, and I think I have learned a little about American politics.”

“Robert!” I said, “you have no more knowledge of American politics, than a Hindoo has of skating.”

He did not contradict me; he never did that, but he changed the conversation, and I had hard work to keep my temper under control. Perhaps I did not succeed very well; for when he bid me good night he said, “Milly, we will not be cross about nothing. I do not interfere with your scholars, and you must give me the same freedom. I have to transact business with men I do not personally like, and the man you hate so unnecessarily, has never done me any harm.”

“Robert!” I answered, “listen to me this once, and I will say no more. Remember what Peter Grey told you. He said, ‘I have escaped from him, as a bird from the fowler’ – furthermore, that he hated young men, and found his pleasure in their destruction – that he stalked them as a Highland Chief stalks stags for his amusement. Such a man must either be insane, or have a fiendish disposition. Are you going to be his next victim?”

“My dear Milly,” he answered, “you let your imaginations and superstitions rule you too much. I have often heard you say, that we only meet the people in this world, we are meant to meet.” Then he kissed me, and I felt that I had done more harm than good. I had promised not to speak on this subject again, so I had virtually released him from any similar confidence. In the dark I went over and over our conversation, and wrung my hands miserably at the mistake I had made. Yet perhaps it was a fatality. Perhaps I was too imaginative and superstitious. Well then, there was nothing to be had, and nothing to be saved by interfering with destiny. I tried to dismiss the subject, and to take my life day by day and be happy.

In September the school opened with a full roll, and the session was a remarkably pleasant one. On the following Christmas Day I had a third daughter whom we called Edith. After this event, all went well until the extreme heat compelled the closing of the school a few days before the usual time. Both I and my children felt it severely and Edith was very ill. She never quite recovered, but slowly withered away like a plucked flower. In August a terrible fear came into my heart, and on August the twentieth, while my dear mother was watching every mail for some word of my promised visit, I was watching my dying daughter.

But much as I suffered, Robert suffered more. He was devotedly attached to this child, for she showed from her earliest consciousness a singular love for him. She was never quite happy but in his arms. She wept whenever he left her. How ever sick or sleepy she was if he entered the room she entreated him with smiles and little happy cries to take her in his arms; and when all was nearly over, at the last moment, she opened her eyes, looked at him, and with a smile passed away forever.

We were broken-hearted. I know not how I endured the next few days. It was a new sorrow. I would hear of no comfort. Robert bore his grief trustfully and manfully, but I would not listen to anything he could say. I could not pray. I could only think of the little soul struggling through the nameless woe with the angel of the river, and of the multitude of little children at the same hour passing with her,

“… as a stream across the stream,Or as visions across a dream,For as clouds of doves to their windows fly,The clouds of souls unto God flit by.”

She was such a tender little soul, if she stumbled in the river who would care for her? Numberless mothers must have had such fears, and the sweetest and tenderest of singers, answered them a few years ago:

“Day and night Christ standeth,Scanning each soul as it landeth;Over the floods He bendeth,With a face that hath once been dead.…“And when the children comeTo pass through the dreary River,Christ stretcheth forth His hand,A gentle piercèd hand,And draws them safe to Land.”

To those who know nothing of this loss, my grief may seem unreasonable; but the fathers and mothers who have turned away from an open grave, blind with tears, and with heart and flesh failing them, they will understand.

Yet I had not been left without intelligence of the coming sorrow. Three nights before her death, at the midnight, as I lay thinking with the child asleep in my arms, the warning notice came. I knew then, that some of my family were called, and my thoughts went at once to my father. I either did not, or would not associate it with my child, until the symptoms of her dissolution were at hand. If it was an inimical Presence that predicted such relentless, inexorable doom, who would carry my little child safe through the river of death, and up to the celestial city? And as I mused on these things, a sweet Spanish tradition read years before came into my memory – that an angel sat outside the gate of heaven with shoes for the barefooted babies, who came there unshod – and I remembered that Edith had been laid to rest unshod, and had a passionate fit of weeping.

But comfort was at hand. The thought of the gate of heaven made me remember that heaven had twelve gates, and that they were always open. So then, when God took from us our beloved, He did not shut them up in the heavenly city. Its twelve gates stand open, and the angels ascend and descend; and go in and out on their heavenly messages. Jacob saw them; weeping mothers and good and suffering souls have seen them. No doubt, the child would be safely carried home. And I blessed God for the smile with which she went. Surely

“The Shepherd from His Fold,

Had smiled and drawn her unto Him.”

It was this thought which enabled me to dry my eyes, and to set my hands to the duty they had to perform. For the school was to meet late in September, and I had not done anything, as yet, towards the welfare of the next session. Yet I knew that if it was to be successful, I must set the key-note of enthusiasm and delight in the work, or all would be done with the left hand only; knew that if I went into the school room alert, and smiling, and with the air of a teacher expecting great things, I would have cheerful, busy, ardent girls around me; while if I showed depression and indifference, my attitude would have the same effect upon their spirits and ardor, that the putting down of the soft pedal has on the tones of a piano. For it is not what a teacher does, it is what she makes her scholars do, that is of lasting value.

Knowing these things well, because taught by experience, I tried to give myself to my duties with all my heart, and

“So nigh is grandeur to our dust,So near is God to man,When Duty whispers low, ‘Thou must,’The Soul replies, ‘I can.’”

The school opened well, so well, that the proprietor of the house we rented, asked me if I would like him to build a larger house with suitable school room attached. And this question revealed to me my innermost and as yet unacknowledged feeling —that we should not remain much longer in Chicago. I told myself that the climate was too cruel, the summer heat and the winter cold were alike dangerous. Croup lurked in the nursery all the time; I never went to bed without its remedies at hand; and again the school had unavoidably out-stripped its limits. At present it was too large; its demands exhausted even my young, fresh faculties, and physical strength. If I increased it, I should require more room and more assistance. I told myself these were my reasons for desiring a change, but down in my soul I knew they were only the reasons I should assign to the world at large – the deep, underlying motive beyond all others, and above all others, was Robert’s evident and constant anxiety. He came home every night mentally exhausted. It was not his grief for Edith’s loss; no, he sought me in that trouble, and we comforted each other. It was no God-sent trouble of any kind, or he would have done the same thing and I thought, and feared, but knew nothing certain.

One day about the middle of November, he returned home in such evident distress, that I could no longer keep silence. “Are you ill, dear Robert?” I asked.

“No, Milly,” he replied. “I am as well as a man can be, who is worried to death nearly.”

He was lying on the sofa, and I went close to him, and with kisses and sweet words begged to share his worry.

“Is it business?” I asked.

“Yes, and no. I could manage the business end, if it was not for that man. You know who I mean?”

“Yes, I know. What is the matter now? Tell me, dear.”

“I must. You will have to know, for in that quarter it is now kill, or be killed. He has made life too intolerable – and I struck him today. He promised me full payment, and he is able to keep his promise.”

“Then you must go away. He provoked that blow, because his revenge is ready. You must go at once – tonight – do not wait for the morning.”

“I have no money. I cannot go. I will not be driven away by him.”

“You do not want that creature to spill your life in the dust of Chicago! You do not want to commit murder! That part of the subject is settled. Where then will you go? You must have thought of this necessity as certain.”

“I have. I will say I am going to Kansas City, and go a little way in that direction – then cross to a line by which I can reach Cairo, and at Cairo take a boat down the Mississippi to some southern town. There I will wait for you, and we will go forward to Texas.”