Page:Letters of Life.djvu/334

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322
LETTERS OF LIFE.

from the other side of Jordan, warn us to be ready to join their blissful company?

Other changes, besides those made by death, have also swept over me. Eight months after the decease of her father, my only child left my desolated hearthstone, having given her heart and hand to the Rev. F. T. Russell, a clergyman of the Episcopal Church, possessing amiable sympathies and attractive manners, and calling forth the strong attachment of an affectionate people during the nine years that he was rector of St. Mark's, in New Britain, a pleasant and flourishing town in our vicinity. He is at present Professor of Elocution in Hobart College, Geneva, N. Y.—a department for which he is eminently qualified, not only by the training of his accomplished father, but by having been himself a successful teacher of that science in various localities, for several years of his early life.

The happiness that my daughter enjoys and imparts in the conjugal sphere, by a faithful, unselfish discharge of every duty, should reconcile or lead me to rejoice in the transfer, which at first seemed like the extinction of the last lamp at my altar.

Rapidly have I sketched for you, dear friend, some of the bereavements that have cost my heart so much. It is not my purpose to murmur, but rather to thank Him who so long indulged me in the use of His loans, and had a full right to resume them.

My home, which might strike you as desolate, be-