Rensselaer Gazette, Volume 3, Number 32, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 November 1859 — Page 2

; I’ottrn. LITTLE WILLIE WAKING IP. BY REV. E. H. SEARS. Some have thought that in the dawning, In our being’s freshest glow, God is nearer little children Than their parents ever know; Apd that if you listen sharply, ■ Better things than you can teach, And a sort of mystic wisdom Trickles through their careless speech. Hoiiv it is I cannot answer, But I know a little child, Who, among the thyme and clover, And the bees, was'running wild, And he came one summer evening, With his ringlets o’er his eyes, And his hat was torn to pieces, Chasing bees and butterfles. “Now I’ll go to bed, dear mother, For I’in very tired of play!” And he said his “Now I lay me,” In a kind of careless way; Anil he drank the cooling water, From his little silver cup, And said, gaily: “ When it's morning, Will the Angels take me up?" Down he sank with roguish laughter, In his little trundle-bed, And the kindly god of slumber Showered the poppies o’er his head. ‘•What could mean his speaking strangely ?” Asked his musing mother then—“o, ’twas nothing but his prattle; What cun ho of angels ken?” There he lies, how sweet and placid, And his breathing comes and goes Dike a zephyr moving softly, And his cheek is like a rose; But she leaned her ear to listen If.his breathing could be heard: “O’,” she murmured, “if the angels Took my darling at his word!” Night, within its folding mantle. « Hath the sleepers both beguiled, And within its soft embracings Rests the mother and her child; Up she starteth from herdreaming, For a sound had struck her ear, And it comes from little Willie, Lying on his trundle near! Up she springeth, for it strikes upon Her troubled ear again, And his breath, in louder fetches, Travels, from his lungs in pain, And his eyes are fixing upward On some face beyond the room; And the blackness of the spoiler From his cheeks hath chased the bloom. Never inose his “Now I lay me” Will lie said from mother’s knee; Nover more, among the-clover, Will he phase the humble-bee; Through the night she watched her darling, Now despairing, now in hope; And (about the break of morning, Did the angels take him up!

IMiscdkiricous. [For tlie Rensselaer Gazette. TIIK i'WJ GRAVES OF ST. 11 ELF. NA. BY NELIL. NARI.IE. I’lantelil in the depth of the sea stands the Is! ind of! St. Helena. Itself a monument in the world of waters, its rocky tablets are xvriten o’er with the mystic characters of fame. Their import has been borne by wind ■ and wave to every country and people, and who knot's not where, alter ‘ Life’s fitful fever over” they laid them to rest—the warrior and the.Christian 1 The world has ever had its heroes, but none more bold and daring than Napoleon. The history of hisilife is one without a precedent or imitator. Rising from the mists of obscurity ; shining at first with an uncertain and fitful light, but acquiring splendor with every movement, he became brightest among , the constellations of glory—a sun among stars. ’ The heart of the great world throbbed with a quickened, fevered pulse, then stood s’ill with wrjnder as the pageantry of Napoleon passed by; but as the years rolled on bringing successive changes to all, save the Immutable One, the finger of destiny removed the crown from the peerless brow—placed there; by r an .indomitable will. He f-who had sported with “principalities and powers,” who bestowed on his favorites kingdoms and empires, is borne powerless to I he lonely isle made justly memorable by the sad tragedy enacted there. Like .al bauble, thrown upon the beach of bis ocean prison, had he danced on the Aide of popular favor, and was now cast upon the • bleak shore of neglect and scorn, alone and friendless, to die. In his rocky bed he slept [well; nor thunder of cannon, nor the deeptoned antheirj of the surging sea could awaken a response in the solemn aisles of the heart of the rfiighty dead. Years rolled on. A white-winged vessel parts the chested wave, bearing to loved -Romes long absent ones—joy to many hearts weary j th. hope deferred. ißut one is there whose heart beats not with thought of beholding an earthly home, but her native land on high. She has heard those “Effectual Whispers, whose stjll small voice The soul itfojf more feels than hears;” “Higher, immortal spirit, higher!” In sweet ‘’retrospection the scenes of her life pass in review before the spirit already plumed for flight; the life struggle; noble sacrifices of 1 self, without chronicle or outline; the contest with ignorance and vice in a heathen land; the triumph of truth ever superstition—these were the purified soul’s nepenthe. As the last, shadow—death—closed roundsweet perception given—she heard the triumphal song of the redeemed and the echoes sweeping arfbwn the solemn avenues, to the throne of the “I Am.” With “still lingering hold of hands” to the ' earthly Jeye, she passed the swelling tide.

Che Inssehcr todix

IL F. DAVIES, Editor <Sc Proprietor.

Jfamiln to foreign anb gonustic politics gricultnrr.

VOL. 3.

guided by the angel voice—“ Sister spirit, come away!??' Home in heaven reached at last. And as the frail bark anchored upon the “Rock of Ages,” the ocean ship that bore the lovely form, whence life had fled, anchored u pon the rock of St. Helena. Where the warrior hero slept the sleep that knows no waking, they laid down to dreamless slumber, nil that remained of the Christian heroine. No, not all; her living, holy thoughts still dwell in the breasts of thousands, for she guided Heaven’s pure light into hearts dark with ignorance and superstition. Many call her “blessed” who wilfcbe gems in the crown of her rejoicing. The crown of dust crumbled at his feet as Napoleon, the Conquer of Nations, was borne to the “rock of the sen but, as to the same shore was berne the form of Mrs. Judson—the missionary—the courts of Heaven resounded victory! “Glory to God in the highest!” and her radiant brow was wreathed with crowns immortal. Garrettsville, Nov. 1, 1859.

[Front the New York Independent.

A PERSONAL INTERVIEW WITH CAPT. BROWN’S WIFE.

Fist/ of a Lady to the Charlestown Jail. I write this morning, on board a steamboat, a hasty account of a personal interview last evening with Mrs. Mary Brown, wife of Capt. John Brown, now under sentence of death in Virginia for having bravely failed in a brave deed. I am scarcely at liberty to mention at what place Mrs. Brown has lately ,been staying, of whose hospitkiity-she has been sharing. I may say, however, that after her return from Baltimore, where she was stopped on her half-made journey to her husband, she has been the guest of a family residing in one or the most beautiful regions of a neighboring State, who have proved themselves kind friends, not. only to herself but to her husband, and who were the more glad to bid her welcome to their hou e, because the lady of the household, with her son, had already made a visit to Capt. Brown in his prison at Charlestown since his sentence of death. Mrs. Brow n's stay with these friends terminated this morning. She is now on her way to Philadelphia, to meet Mr. Sennott, the counsel for her husband’s defense. I conversed with her during entire evening. But only ten minutes ' acquaintance is enough to show that she is a woman worthy to be the wife of such a man. She is tall, large and muscular, giving the impression at first sight of a frame ca -able of great strength and long "endurance. Her face is grave and thoughtful, wearing, even in this hour of her trial, an expression of soberness rather than of sadness, as if, like her husband, she had long since learned how to suffer and be calm. Her manner is singularly quiet and retiring, although her natural simplicity and modesty cannot hide the evident force of character, and strength of will and judgment, which have fitted her so long to be a counselor in her husband’s enterprises and a supporter in his trials. She is a native of Whitehall, near Lake Champlain, and has been the mother of thirteen children; but, notwithstanding the cares of her numerous family, and her many privations and struggles independent of household burdens, she still appears as fresh and hale as if she were only now in the prime and vigor of life. A NEWSPAPER CORRECTION. The conversation, of course, was of the scenes at Harper's Ferry—both those which have already been enacted, and those which are shortly to follow. She alluded, with subdued though evident emotion, to the wounds of her husband, and to the loss of her two sons, Watson and Oliver, who fell in the struggle. But she made no such remark as that recently attributed to her in a New England newspaper, “that four of her sons had already been slain, and she would be willing that all the rest of her family should be made a sacrifice, if necessary, to the cause of freedom.” These words, she said to me, could never possibly have fallen from her lips, for she had already felt too many griefs to court any fresh sacrifices; and she could not think, without pain, of any new deathstroke to her family. She would not shrink from any necessary trial or struggle when the hour came for it, but she could not look forward with composure to any further lessening of her family, already too sadly broken. She regretted that such a remark should have been but in her mouth, “for,” ns she observed,“they were unnaotherly words.” She said that she had been so long accustomed to sorrows that she had been trained to bear them. While living in Ohio, four of her children died, from dysentery, within eleven days, three of whom irerc carried to the

RENSSELAER. JASPER COUNTY. IND., WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 30, f 859.

grave together on the same day! She mentioned in this connection, that her huband had always been a watchful nurse and the chief care-taker of the children, and of herself, during periods of sickness. CAPT. brown’s RELIGIOUS CHARACTER. I adverted, in alluding to Capt. Brown’s religious opinion, to the common report that he was an Old-School Presbyterian. She replied that he had been a church-member ever since he was a boy; that he united, at sixteen years of age, with a Congregational church in Hudson, Ohio, and that on removing to Pennsylvania, thirty years ago, he transferred his membership to the Presbyterian church, with which he had since remained connected. She said that the religious element of his character hid always been the ruling mo’ive of his life. He had always observed religious exercises in his household with exemplary regularity. It has been for many years the custom of the family to read the Bible every morning, in regular course of chapters, each member reading in turn a verse. She said that her husband’s familiarity with texts of Scripture was so great that he could detect almost the slightest misquotation of any passage, and that if a portion of the verse in almost any part of the Bible were read or repeated to him, he could immediately repeat the remainder. His conversation frequently abounded with Scripture texts, and his letters were always filled with them. I asked if she knew what were his favorite passages, to which she replied, j “He had a great many; but one was ‘Remember them tha: are in bonds as bound with them." How nobly his life has proved his deephearted sympathy or the slave! In his habits of living, his wife testified that he was always singularly self-denying. As an example, he never suffered himself or his family to wear expensive clothing. His standing admonition was, “Let us save the money, ami give to the poor.” Day before yesterday, when some clothes were sent from New \ ork to Mrs. Brown, to go in a box to her husband, among the articles was a new coat ol fine brown cloth, which, when it was shown to h r, she immediately pronounced too gay for her husband to wear. It was accordingly sent back; and last evening there came in return a coarser coat, which better suit liis taste, and which the brave old Puritan might not think to good for him to put on! He never in his life has used tobacco or ardent spirits, and never, until within the last few years, has taken tea or coffee. His mode of living has been so rigidly temperate that, in Kansas, he would sometimes go for da s with scarcely a mouthful of food, and suffer no faintness or exhaustion. HIS LONG .MEDITATED DESIGN. * I referred incidentally to the design upon Harper’s Ferry as having been premeditated for two years, to which she immediately replied : “Not for two years, but for twenty! He had been waiting twenty years for some opportunity to free the slaves; we had all been waiting ’.tfith him, the proper time when he should put his resolve into action, and when at last the enterprise of Harper’s Ferry was planned, we all thought that the time had now come: Mr. Brown was sanguine of success; we all were equally sonffdent; he had no idea, nor did any of the family, that the experiment would result in defeat: we all looked to it as fulfilling the hopes of many years.” As I listened to this I could not help half exclaiming, “What heroic words! What a man! What a woman!” I wrote down these sentences a few moments after they were uttered, and as I repeated them, she added: “For.he has borne the yoke of the oppressed as if upon his own neck for these thirty years.” She made several and repeated references to various newspaper accounts in which her husband’s character had been misrepresented. -he had been pained to see him described as a cruel man, for, as she said, “No man ever had a kinder heart. He is generous by nature. He had always aimed to impress his family with a spirit of benevolence. He has always taught his children to be unselfish; to act always for others before acting for themselves. His sympathies for the poor and the oppressed have always been too easily excited.” I inquired as to his habit of carrying firearms about his person. She said that since the many threats upon his life, during and since his efforts in Kansas, he had carried a revolver, but never before, HIS RECENT LETTERS to MRS. BROWN. I may mention that I saw last evening a letter from Capt. Brown to his wife, dated November 8, and brought away by the lady who visited him nt Charlestown. This let-

"FREEDOM NATIONAL—SLAVERY SECTIONAL.”

ter is too private, and I might almost say, too sacred to be exposed in print to every eye. Mrs. Brown is unwilling that it should be made public, both for her own sake and her husband’s. But I violate no confidence in saying that this letter, written in prison, is no less remarkable than the memorable speech delivered in Court. It breaths the same heroic spirit; it is marked by the same simplicity of style; it expresses the same conscientious conviction of the rightfulness of his undertaking; it exhibits throughout the same unwavering courage, and the same strong faith in God. To the many overflow ing expressions of bis sympathy for his wife and children, given in this letter, I do not feel at liberty to allude, further than to say that they are as warm, as tender and and as delicate as ever were written by a husband to a wife. They prove that his delicacy is equal to his courage, and that his heart is not only as brave as a hero’s, but as tender as a child’s. During the evening another letter came directed from the prison, dated November 10. This fresh message was briefer than the other, but of the same character and in the same spirit. A BOX FOR CAPTAIN BROWN. For several days past, until last evening, Mrs. Brown has been actively engaged, aided by some female friends, in preparing clothing to be sent to her husband. A sewingmachine had been busy at work from morning till night for two days. Last evening the box was packed, and this morning sent to the cars, containing shirts, stockings, pocket-handkerchiefs, a pair of easy slippers, some writing materials, two or three favorite books, and some preserved fruits and other delicacies. A great number of friends crowded around it, each anxious to add something for the old man’s comfort, before the cover was nailed on. From this scene Jl r s. Brown retired, sobbing, to another part of the room, and for a few moments was unable to control her emotion, excl.liming, “Poor man! he will not need them long!” But perhaps-the troubled Governor of Virginia, and his Sheriff’who is making ready for the Second of Docember, may find, before the time shall roll around, some othervictim to keep up the honor of the fatal Friday , and may be glad, after all, not to hang the brave old man! THE VISIT TO CAPT. BROWN IN PRISON. The lady whose visit to Charlestown has been already mentioned, went there chiefly to assist Mrs. Lydia Maria Child, whom she expected to meet in the prison; but as Captain Brown had meanwhile written to Mrs. Child not to come, the new volunteer nurse found herself an entire stranger (except to her own son who accompanied her) in a community not over-disposed to be hospitable to strangers. She arrived at Charlestown shortly affer Captain Brown’s speech in court. She spent more than two days in vain entreaties with the Sheriff to secure admission to the jail. Hearing tha Capt. Brown, whom she had informed of her arrival, was anxious to see her, and not being willing Io take the Sheriff’s short answer alter her long journey, solicited Mr. Sennott’s aid, who at last persuaded the Judge to grant a permit of entrance. She refers to the visit in the jail as one of touching interest. She obtained two in- i terviews, the first of an hour, and the other of a shorter period. She describes the prison as a large brick building that seemed to be formerly used as a dwelling-house. Capt. Brown was occupying, with his fellow-prisoner Stephens, a room on the ground-floor, about sixteen feel square, opening with a single door into a long gallery, and lighted through a single small window, grimly defended by heavy double bars. Mrs. S , on entering, found Captain Brown lying on a cot, and Stephens on a large double bed. Capt. Brown arose from i his bed to receive his guests, and stood a few moments leaning against the bedstead, immediately lying down again from weakness. His visitors were struck with the cheerfulness of his expression, and the calmness of his manner. He seemed not only passively resigned to his fate, but cheerful under it, and more than willing to meet it. My friend said to him. “I expected Mrs. Child would be here to i introduce me; I am sorry not to find her, for her presence would make this room brighter j for you.” He smiled and replied: “I have written to her the reasons why! she should not come; but she was very kind—very kind!” Somo questions were then asked as to the : treatment and care he had received; to which he said: “I wish it to be understood by everybody, that I have been very kindly attended; for

TERMS; SI 50 per Year, in Advance.

if I had been under the care of father or brother, I could not have been better treated than by Capt. Avis and his family.” Capt. Avis is the jailor, of whom all the reports speak in high terms for his humane and courteous conduct not only to these but to all his prisoners. When another allusion was made to Mrs. Child, Capt. Brown remarked: “The reason why I did not wish her to come, and why I did not wish my wife to come, was for fear lest they would be barrassed aad annoyed, and on this account I would be troubled myself.” A BUNCH OF LEAVES. Mrs. S had carried with her into the jail a large bunch of autumn leaves, gathered in the morning from the woods. There was no nail on the wall to hang them by, and she arranged them between the grated bars of the window. She gave to the sufferer a full blown rose, which he laid beside his cheek on his pillow. The old rain seemed to be greatly touched with these tokens of thoughtfullness. lie is said to have always been a great lover of nature, particularly of the grandeur of forest scenes. Mrs. S drew a chair near his bed-side* and taking out her knitting, sat by him for an hour. She has preserved his complete conversation, of which I can only give a small portion. She says: “I never saw a person who seemed less troubled or excited, or whose mind was less disturbed and more clear. His remarks are pointed, pithy, and sensible. He is not in the least sentimental, and seems to have singularly excellent common-sense about everything.” She asked him the direct question—“ Were you actuated, in any degree, in undertaking your lute enterprise,by a feeling of revenge!” adding that a common impression to that effect had gone abroad. He manifested much surprise at tin's statement, and after pausing a moment replied : “I am not conscious of ever having had a feeling of revenge; no, not in all the wrong done to me and my family in Kansas. But I can see that a thing is wrong and wicked, and can help to right it, and can even hi pe that those who do the wrong may be punished—and stiil have no feeling of re’enge! No, I have not been actuated by any spirit of revenge!” He talked a good deal about his family, manifested solicitude for their comfort alter I he was gone, bu expressing his great confidence and trust in God’s kind Providence in their behalf. When some allusion was made to the sentence which he had received, he said very deliberate!}’ and firmly, and as my friend says, “almost sublimely.” “ I do not think I can better serve the cause I love so much, than to die for it!" She says that she never can forget the impressive manner in which be uttered these solemn words. She replied: “It is not the hardest thing that can happen to a brave man to die; but it must be a great hardship for an active man to lie on his back in prison , disabled by wounds. Do you not dread your confinement, and are y<?u not afraid it may wear you down, or cause you to relax your convictions, or regret your attempt, or make your courage fail!” “I cannot tell,” he replied, “what weakness may come over me, but I do not think that I shall deny my Lord and Master Jesus Christ, as I certainly should if I denied my principles against slavery.” When the conversation had proceeded thus far, as it was known outside the jail that a Northern lady was inside, a crowd began to collect, and although no demonstration of violence was made, yet there were manifest indications of impatience; so that the Sheriff' called to the jailor, and the obliged to put an end to the interview. A second visit was made on the second day afterward. The popular excitement had grown so great on accout of the first visit, that on the succeeding day it was deemed unadvisable to attempt another.

Wednesday, November 16.

OO’A German had made a fortune in Philadelphia by selling milk. He started for home with two bags of sovereigns. On shipboard he counted one bag of treasure. A mischievous monkey was watching his operations. As soon as it was replaced and tied up, and the other bag emptied, Jacko snatched up the full one, and was soon at the masthead. He opened the German’s bag, and after eyeing the pretty gold, he proceeded to drop one piece upon the deck, and another in the water, until he had emptied the bag. When he had finished, the German threw up his hands, exclaiming, “He must be the dyyel, for what come from the vater he does give to the Vatet, and what came from the milk ho gives to me.”

NO. 32.

I have been thinking hew horrible it must be to see anybody one cares for, drunk; the honest eye dull and meaningless; the wise lips jabbering foolishness; the whole face and figure, instead of being what one likes to look at, takes pleasure to see in the same room, even—growing ugly, irrational, and disgusting—more like a beast than a man. Yet some women haw.' to bear it, have to, speak kindly to their husbands, hide their brutishness, and keep them from making worse fools of themselves than they can help.. I have seen it done, not merely by working men’s wives, but lady-wives in drawingrooms. I think, if I were married, and I saw my husband the least overcome by wine, not “drunk” may be, but just excited, silly, otherwise than his natural self, it would nearly drive me wild. Less on my account than his. To see him sink—not for a great crimtf, but a contemptible, cowardly bit of sensualism—from the hight where my love had placed him; to have to take care of him, to pity him—ay, and T might pity him, but I think the full glory and passion of my love would die out, then and there, forever.— Life for a Life. OkJ*W hile at Alexandria, in Egypt, during his late Oriental visit. Senator Seward waftpresented with three splendid Arabian horses, which he has shipped from Alexandria. Two of them will, we understand, be presented to the New York State Agricultural Society, o^7"Prentice, in one of his recent witty feuiletons, says that in America it takes three to make a pair: he, s e, and a hired girl. Had Adam been a modern, there would have been a hired girl in Paradise to look after little Able and raise Cain.

THEODORE TILTON.

Singular Instances of Presentiment.

In Schubert’s Spiegel der Natur, (Mirror of Nature,) the author relates, in his chapter on instinct, the following facts as proofs of a certain divine impulse in man. “A gentleman, an acquaintance of the celebrated French authoress, Mme, Beacmond, was about making a pleasure trip on the river wit* a party of friends. Everything was ready, and be was just entering the boat, when his sister, a deaf mute, came suddenly and most anxiously running along, and seized her brother’s arm and coat, tried to keep him back; but finding this unavailable, she threw herself at his feet, and taking hold of his knees, expressed by the most imploring gestures her wish that he should desist from going on the Wafer. “Touched by the painful entreating expression in tiie face and posture of the deaf mute, several persons joined in the prayers of the poor unfortunate girl, and her brother finally yielded to her wishes. It was fortunate that he did so, for the boat had gone but a short distance on the river, when a sudden gust of wind made it capsize. Several of the company found a watery grave, and he, who could not even swim, would, no doubt have met with the same fate, if his sister, by some divine presentiment, had not prevented his going. “Once, on an evening, a rich affd benign! farmer felt, by some sacred impulse, impelled to send, at. a late hour, some articles of food to a poor family in the neighborhood. “Wherefore so late; cannot this be done as well to-morrow!” said those around him. “No,” replied he, “it must be done now.” While insisting, the worthy farmer did not know what a blessing his benevolent action? was just then to the tenants of the poor hut r for there the father—he who had to nourish and sustain the family—had fallen sick; the mother was infirm already, and the children had been crying for bread for, nearly two days—the youngest was nearly dead from hunger. Thus their most pressing wants were at once removed, and perhaps some lives saved “Another gentleman, living near some coal mines in Selesia'y awoke one night from his sleep with an irresistable impulse to go down in his garden. lie rose, went down;' the same impulse led him out of the back gate of his garden into the fields, where he arrived just in time to save the life of a miner, who, in climbing up a ladder, missed his footing and fell down the shaft into a coaltub, which his son was at that time winding up, but by the increased weight was unable to do so now alone. “A venerable clergyman in England once felt, likewise, an unexpected desire to pay, late at night, a visit to a friend of his, whom he knew to be ol a very melancholy turn of mind. Though extremely tired by the cares and labors of the day, and though the distance to his friend’s house was very great, the venerable gentleman could not resist his secret impulse. So he went, and, strange to say, arrived there just in time to prevent his friend from taking his own life. The nightly visit and friendly exhortations hatß such a wholesome effect on the depressed: spirits of his friend, that he never again attempted to commit suicide. “Professor Buchner, at Marburg, being cnee in very pleasant company, felt a strong desire to go home and remove his bed from, its old place to another corner of his bedroom. He yielded to the impulse. Having done so, he felt again at ease and went back to his friends. During the night a large portion of the ceiling in the room, jast at the spot where his bed formerly stood, crumbled down, and would no doubt have crushed him to death had it not been removed from there.”

Horrible, Though True.