It was the last tour of the many missions of the
old man's life. He was in the 8lst year of his age, and a few months
before he had lost by death a beloved wife with whom he had lived in
unalloyed affection and esteem for 58 years. (But a few months after
this meeting Elias was paralyzed and died.) Though it is sixty years
ago since--and I a little boy at the time in Brooklyn, New York--I can
remember my father coming home toward sunset from his day's work
as carpenter, and saying briefly, as he throws down his armful of
kindling-blocks with a bounce on the kitchen floor, "Come, mother,
Elias preaches to-night." Then my mother, hastening the supper and the
table-cleaning afterward, gets a neighboring young woman, a friend of
the family, to step in and keep house for an hour or so--puts the two
little ones to bed--and as I had been behaving well that day, as a
special reward I was allow'd to go also.
We start for the meeting. Though, as I said, the stretch of more than
half a century has pass'd over me since then, with its war and peace,
and all its joys and sins and deaths (and what a half century! how it
comes up sometimes for an instant, like the lightning flash in a storm
at night!) I can recall that meeting yet. It is a strange place
for religious devotions. Elias preaches anywhere--no respect to
buildings--private or public houses, school-rooms, barns, even
theatres--anything that will accommodate. This time it is in a
handsome ball-room, on Brooklyn Heights, overlooking New York, and in
full sight of that great city, and its North and East rivers fill'd
with ships--is (to specify more particularly) the second story of
"Morrison's Hotel," used for the most genteel concerts, balls,
and assemblies--a large, cheerful, gay-color'd room, with glass
chandeliers bearing myriads of sparkling pendants, plenty of settees
and chairs, and a sort of velvet divan running all round the
side-walls.
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