Part 24

John Albert Broadus, the most distinguished clergyman and writer Kentucky Baptists have produced, was born near Culpepper, Virginia, January 24, 1827. At the age of sixteen years Broadus united with the Baptist church; and he shortly afterwards decided to study for the ministry of his church. He taught school for a time before going to the University of Virginia, in 1846, and he was graduated four years later with the M.A. degree. While at the University Broadus was greatly impressed by Professors Gessner Harrison, Wm. H. McGuffey, and E. H. Courtenay. In 1851 Broadus declined a professorship in Georgetown College, Georgetown, Kentucky, in order to become assistant instructor of ancient languages in his _alma mater_ and pastor of the Charlottesville Baptist church. In 1857 it was decided to establish the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary at Greenville, South Carolina, and Broadus, James P. Boyce, Basil Manly, Jr., William Williams, and E. T. Winkler, were the committee on establishment. Boyce and Manly urged the curriculum system, but Broadus advocated the elective system so earnestly that he completely won them over. "So, as Mr. Jefferson had drawn a new American university, Mr. Broadus drew a new American seminary." The Seminary opened in 1859 with the members of the committee, with the exception of Williams, as the professors. Boyce was elected president, and Broadus occupied the chair of New Testament Interpretation and Homiletics. Twenty-six students greeted the faculty; and all were soon hard at work. After a few years, however, the Civil War came and the Seminary shortly suspended. During the war Dr. Broadus was a chaplain in the Confederate armies. At the close of the war work in the Seminary was resumed with seven students enrolled, Dr. Broadus having but one student in homiletics, and he was blind! The lectures he prepared for this blind brother were the basis of the work that made him famous, _The Preparation and Delivery of Sermons_ (Philadelphia, 1870), which is at the present time the finest thing on the subject, a text-book in nearly every theological school in Christendom. Dr. Broadus declined chairs in Chicago and Brown universities, and the presidency of Vassar College, in order to remain with the Seminary, the darling of his dreams. In 1873 he read his notable paper in memory of Gessner Harrison at the University of Virginia; and the next year he joined Dr. Boyce in Kentucky in the effort that was then being made to remove the Seminary to Louisville. His lectures before the Newton Theological Seminary were published as _The History of Preaching_ (New York, 1876). In 1877 the Seminary was removed to Louisville, Dr. Boyce remaining as president and Dr. Broadus as professor of homiletics. From the first the Seminary was a success, it now being the largest in the United States. In 1879 Dr. Broadus delivered his noted address upon Demosthenes before Richmond College, Virginia, which is regarded as one of the very finest efforts of his life. In Louisville he became the city's first citizen, honored and beloved by all classes. In 1886 Harvard conferred the degree of Doctor of Divinity upon him; and later in the same year one of the most important of his books appeared, _Sermons and Addresses_ (Baltimore, 1886). This was followed by his famous _Commentary on Matthew_ (Philadelphia, 1887), which was begun during the darkest days of the Civil War, and is now considered the best commentary in English on that Gospel. Dr. Boyce died at Pau, France, in 1888, and Dr. Broadus succeeded him as president of the Seminary. In January, 1889, he delivered the Lyman Beecher lectures on _Preaching_ at Yale; and some months later his _Translation of and Notes to Chrysostom's Homilies_ (New York, 1889) appeared. In the spring of 1890 Dr. Broadus delivered three lectures before Johns Hopkins University, which were published as _Jesus of Nazareth_ (New York, 1890). He spent the summer of 1892 in Louisville preparing his _Memoir of James P. Boyce_ (New York, 1893); and _A Harmony of the Gospels_ (New York, 1893), his final works. Dr. Broadus died at Louisville, Kentucky, March 16, 1895.

BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Life and Letters of John Albert Broadus_, by A. T. Robertson (Philadelphia, 1900); _Library of Southern Literature_ (Atlanta, 1909, v. ii).

OXFORD UNIVERSITY[14]

[From _Life and Letters of John A. Broadus_, by A. T. Robertson (Philadelphia, 1901)]

We had four and a half hours at Oxford, and spent it with exceeding great pleasure, and most respectably heavy expense.

At University College we saw a memorial of Sir Wm. Jones, by Flaxman, which I am sure I shall never forget--worthy of Sir Wm. and worthy of Flaxman. At Magdalen College we saw the varied and beautiful grounds, with the Poet's Walk, where Addison loved to stroll. At New College we visited the famous and beautiful chapel. (New College is now five hundred years old.) These are the most remarkable of the nineteen colleges. You know they are entirely distinct establishments, as much as if a hundred miles apart, and that the University of Oxford is simply a general organization which gives degrees to the men prepared by the different colleges. Then we spent one and a half hours at the famous Bodleian Library, the most valuable (British Museum has the largest number of books) in the world. Oh, the books, the books--the early and rare editions, the illuminated manuscripts of the Middle Ages, the autographs of famous persons, and the portraits, the portraits of hundreds of the earth's greatest ones. Happy students, fellows, professors, who have constant access to the Bodleian Library.

SPURGEON

[From the same]

I was greatly delighted with Spurgeon, especially with his conduct of public worship. The congregational singing has often been described, and is as good as can well be conceived. Spurgeon is an excellent reader of Scripture, and remarkably impressive in reading hymns, and the prayers were quite what they ought to have been. The sermon was hardly up to his average in freshness, but was exceedingly well delivered, without affectation or apparent effort, but with singular earnestness, and directness. The whole thing--house, congregation, order, worship, preaching, was as nearly up to my ideal as I ever expect to see in this life. Of course Spurgeon has his faults and deficiencies, but he is a wonderful man. Then he preaches the real gospel, and God blesses him. After the services concluded, I went to a room in the rear to present my letter, and was cordially received. Somebody must tell Mrs. V---- that I "thought of her" repeatedly during the sermon, and "gave her love" to Spurgeon, and he said such a message encouraged him. (I made quite a little story of it, and the gentlemen in the room were apparently much interested, not to say amused.)

We went straight towards St. Paul's, where Liddon has been preaching every Sunday afternoon in September, and there would be difficulty in getting a good seat. We lunched at the Cathedral Hotel, hard by, and then stood three-quarters of an hour at the door of St. Paul's, waiting for it to open. Meantime a good crowd had collected behind us, and there was a tremendous rush when the door opened, to get chairs near the preaching stand. The crowd looked immense in the vast cathedral, and yet there were not half as many as were quietly seated in Spurgeon's Tabernacle. There everybody could hear, and here, in the grand and beautiful show-place, Mr. Liddon was tearing his throat in the vain attempt to be heard by all. The grand choral service was all Chinese to me.

FOOTNOTE:

[14] Copyright, 1901, by the American Baptist Publication Society.

MARY J. HOLMES

Mrs. Mary Jane Holmes, a family favorite for fifty years, was born at Brookfield, Massachusetts, April 5, 1828. She became a teacher at an early age, and at Allen's Hill, New York, on August 9, 1849, she was married to Daniel Holmes, a Yale man of the class of 1848, who had been teaching the year between his graduation and marriage at Versailles, Kentucky. Immediately after the ceremony he and his bride started to Kentucky, where Mrs. Holmes joined her husband in teaching. In 1850 they gave up the school at Versailles, taking charge of the district school at Glen's Creek, near Versailles. Here they taught for two years, when Mr. Holmes decided to relinquish teaching for the practice of law, and they removed to Brockport, New York, their home henceforth. Mrs. Holmes returned to Kentucky in 1857, for a visit, and this, with the three years indicated above, included her Kentucky life. Having settled at Brockport, she began her career as a novelist. Her first and best known book, _Tempest and Sunshine, or Life in Kentucky_, was published in 1854. Mr. Middleton, one of the chief characters in this novel, was a rather close characterization of a Kentucky planter, Mr. Singleton, who resided some miles from Versailles; and his daughter, Sue Singleton, subsequently Mrs. Porter, always claimed, though facetiously, that she was the original of _Tempest_. It is now known, however, that Mrs. Holmes had not thought of her in delineating the character, and that the Singleton home is the only thing in the book that is drawn from actual life with any detail whatever. In her Kentucky books that followed _Tempest and Sunshine_, she usually built an accurate background for characters that lived only in her imagination. Besides _Tempest and Sunshine_, Mrs. Holmes was the author of thirty-four books, published in the order given: _The English Orphans_; _Homestead on the Hillside_, a book of Kentucky stories; _Lena Rivers_, a Kentucky novel, superior to _Tempest and Sunshine_; _Meadow Brook_; _Dora Deane_; _Cousin Maude_; _Marian Grey_, a Kentucky story; _Darkness and Daylight_; _Hugh Worthington_, another Kentucky novel; _The Cameron Pride_; _Rose Mather_; _Ethelyn's Mistake_; _Millbank_; _Edna Browning_; _West Lawn_; _Edith Lyle_; _Mildred_; _Daisy Thornton_; _Forrest House_; _Chateau D'Or_; _Madeline_; _Queenie Hetherton_; _Christmas Stories_; _Bessie's Fortune_; _Gretchen_; _Marguerite_; _Dr. Hathern's Daughters_; _Mrs. Hallam's Companion_; _Paul Ralston_; _The Tracy Diamonds_; _The Cromptons_; _The Merivale Banks_; _Rena's Experiment_; and _The Abandoned Farm_. About two million copies of Mrs. Holmes's books have been sold by her authorized publishers; how many have been sold in pirated editions cannot, of course, be ascertained. Mrs. Holmes died at Brockport, New York, October 6, 1907.

BIBLIOGRAPHY. Allibone's _Dictionary of Authors_ (Philadelphia, 1897, v. ii); _The Nation_ (October 10, 1907).

THE SCHOOLMASTER

[From _Lena Rivers_ (New York, 1856)]

And now Mr. Everett was daily expected. Anna, who had no fondness for books, greatly dreaded his arrival, thinking within herself how many pranks she'd play off upon him, provided 'Lena would lend a helping hand, which she much doubted. John Jr., too, who for a time, at least, was to be placed under Mr. Everett's instruction, felt in no wise eager for his arrival, fearing, as he told 'Lena that "between the 'old man' and the tutor, he would be kept a little too straight for a gentleman of his habits;" and it was with no particular emotions of pleasure that he and Anna saw the stage stop before the gate one pleasant morning toward the middle of November. Running to one of the front windows, Carrie, 'Lena, and Anna watched their new teacher, each after her own fashion commenting upon his appearance.

"Ugh," exclaimed Anna, "what a green, boyish looking thing! I reckon nobody's going to be afraid of him."

"I say he's real handsome," said Carrie, who being thirteen years of age, had already, in her own mind, practiced many a little coquetry upon the stranger.

"I like him," was 'Lena's brief remark.

Mr. Everett was a pale, intellectual looking man, scarcely twenty years of age, and appearing still younger so that Anna was not wholly wrong when she called him boyish. Still there was in his large black eye a firmness and decision which bespoke the man strong within him, and which put to flight all of Anna's preconceived notions of rebellion. With the utmost composure he returned Mrs. Livingstone's greeting, and the proud lady half bit her lip with vexation as she saw how little he seemed awed by her presence.

Malcolm Everett was not one to acknowledge superiority where there was none, and though ever polite toward Mrs. Livingstone, there was something in his manner which forbade her treating him as aught save an equal. He was not to be trampled down, and for once in her life Mrs. Livingstone had found a person who would neither cringe to her nor flatter. The children were not presented to him until dinner time, when, with the air of a young desperado, John Jr. marched into the dining-room, eyeing his teacher askance, calculating his strength, and returning his greeting with a simple nod. Mr. Everett scanned him from head to foot, and then turned to Carrie half smiling at the great dignity which she assumed. With Lena and Anna he seemed better pleased, holding their hands and smiling down upon them through rows of teeth which Anna pronounced the whitest she had ever seen.

Mr. Livingstone was not at home, and when his mother appeared, Mrs. Livingstone did not think proper to introduce her. But if by this omission she thought to keep the old lady silent, she was mistaken, for the moment Mrs. Nichols was seated, she commenced with, "Your name is Everett, I b'lieve?"

"Yes, ma'am," said he, bowing very gracefully toward her.

"Any kin to the governor what was?"

"No, ma'am, none whatever," and the white teeth became slightly visible for a moment, but soon disappeared.

"You are from Rockford, 'Lena tells me?"

"Yes, ma'am. Have you friends there?"

"Yes--or that is, Nancy Scovandyke's sister, Betsy Scovandyke that used to be, lives there. Maybe you know her. Her name is Bacon--Betsy Bacon. She's a widder and keeps boarders."

"Ah," said he, the teeth this time becoming wholly visible, "I've heard of Mrs. Bacon, but have not the honor of her acquaintance. You are from the east, I perceive."

"Law, now! how did you know that?" asked Mrs. Nichols, while Mr. Everett answered, "I _guessed_ at it," with a peculiar emphasis on the word guessed, which led 'Lena to think he had used it purposely and not from habit.

Mr. Everett possessed in a remarkable degree the faculty of making those around him both respect and like him, and ere six weeks had passed, he had won the love of all his pupils. Even John Jr. was greatly improved, and Carrie seemed suddenly reawakened into a thirst for knowledge, deeming no task too long, and no amount of study too hard, if it won the commendation of the teacher. 'Lena, who committed to memory with great ease, and who consequently did not deserve so much credit for her always perfect lessons, seldom received a word of praise, while poor Anna, notoriously lazy when books were concerned, cried almost every day, because as she said, "Mr. Everett didn't like her as he did the rest, else why did he look at her so much, watching her all the while, and keeping her after school to get her lessons over, when he knew how she hated them."

Once Mrs. Livingstone ventured to remonstrate, telling him that Anna was very sensitive, and required altogether different treatment from Carrie. "She thinks you dislike her," said she, "and while she retains this impression, she will do nothing as far as learning is concerned; so if you do not like her, try and make her think you do!"

There was a peculiar look in Mr. Everett's dark eyes as he answered, "You may think it strange, Mrs. Livingstone, but of all my pupils I love Anna the best! I know I find more fault with her, and am, perhaps, more severe with her than with the rest, but it's because I would make her what I wish her to be. Pardon me, madam, but Anna does not possess the same amount of intellect with her cousin or sister, but by proper culture she will make a fine, intelligent woman."

Mrs. Livingstone hardly relished being told that one child was inferior to the other, but she could not well help herself--Mr. Everett would say what he pleased--and thus the conference ended. From that time Mr. Everett was exceedingly kind to Anna, wiping away the tears which invariably came when told that she must stay with him in the schoolroom after the rest were gone; then, instead of seating himself in rigid silence at a distance until her task was learned, he would sit by her side, occasionally smoothing her long curls and speaking encouragingly to her as she poured over some hard rule of grammar, or puzzled her brains with some difficult problem in Colburn. Ere long the result of all this became manifest. Anna grew fonder of her books, more ready to learn, and--more willing to be kept after school!

Ah, little did Mrs. Livingstone think what she was doing when she bade young Malcolm Everett make her warm-hearted, impulsive daughter _think_ he liked her!

ROSA V. JEFFREY

Mrs. Rosa Vertner Jeffrey, one of the most beautiful of Kentucky women, whose personal loveliness has caused some critics to forget she was a gifted poet, was born at Natchez, Mississippi, in 1828, the daughter of John Y. Griffith, a writer of considerable reputation in his day. Her mother died when she was but nine months old, and she was reared by her aunt. When Rosa was ten years of age her adopted parents removed to Lexington, Kentucky, where she was educated at the Episcopal Seminary. In 1845 Miss Vertner--she had taken the name of her foster parents--was married to Claude M. Johnson, a wealthy citizen of Lexington, and she at once took her place as a great social and literary leader. One of her sons, Mr. Claude M. Johnson, was mayor of Lexington for several years, and he was afterwards in the service of the United States government. In 1861 Mrs. Johnson's husband died, and she removed to Rochester, New York, where she resided for two years, when she was married to Alexander Jeffrey, of Edinburgh, Scotland, and they returned to Lexington, her home for the remainder of her life. Mrs. Jeffrey died at Lexington, Kentucky, October 6, 1894, and no woman has yet arisen in Kentucky to take her position as society's favorite beauty and poet. She began her literary career as a contributor of verse to Prentice's _Louisville Journal_. Her pen-name was "Rosa," and under this name her first volume of poems was published, entitled _Poems, by Rosa_ (Boston, 1857). This was followed by _Florence Vale_; _Woodburn_, a novel; _Daisy Dare and Baby Power_ (Philadelphia, 1871), a book of poems; _The Crimson Hand and Other Poems_ (Philadelphia, 1881), her best known work; and _Marah_ (Philadelphia, 1884), a novel. Mrs. Jeffrey was also the author of a five-act comedy, called _Love and Literature_. As a novelist or playwright she did nothing especially strong, but as a writer of pleasing poems her place in the literature of Kentucky seems secure.

BIBLIOGRAPHY. _History of Kentucky_, by R. H. Collins (Covington, Kentucky, 1882); _The Register_ (Frankfort, January, 1911).

A GLOVE

[From _The Crimson Hand and Other Poems_ (Philadelphia, 1881)]

In a box of airy trifles--fans, flowers, and ribbons gay-- I chanced to find a tasselled glove, worn once on the first of May. How long ago? Ah me, ah me! twelve years, twelve years today! Alas! for that beautiful, fragrant time, so far in the past away, And crowned with sweeter memories than any other May, Standing alone, in a checkered life--it was my wedding day!

The passing hours were shod with light, and their glowing sandals made Such sunny tracks that they guide me yet through a retrospect of shade. Through changes and shadows of twelve long years, down that love-lit path I stray; The winters come and the winters go, yet it leads to an endless May. No leaves of the autumn have fallen there, and never a flake of snow Has chilled the path of those May-day hours that gleam through the long ago!

The flowering cherry's wild perfume came stealing, bitter sweet, From fragrant breezes drifting heaps of blossoms to my feet; The flowers are dust, but the bees that bore their subtle sweets away Dropped golden honey on the path of that beautiful first of May. And the sweetness clings, for I gather it in wandering back today.

Twelve years! twelve years!--a long, long life for a little tasselled glove! Yet, I treasure it still for his dear sake who clasped with so much love The hand that wore, on that festal night, this delicate, dainty thing-- His forever! bound to him by the link of a wedding ring! The glove is soiled and faded now, but the ring is as bright today As the love that flooded my life with light on that beautiful first of May.

A MEMORY

[From the same]

A memory filled my heart last night With all its youthful glow; Under the ashes, out of my sight, I buried it long ago; I buried it deep, I bade it rest, And whispered a long "good-by;" But lo! it has risen--too sweet, too blest Too cherished a thing to die.

In the dim, dim past, where the shadows fall, I left it, but, crowned with light, A spirit of joy in the banquet-hall, It haunted my soul last night. One earnest, tender, passionate glance-- I cherished it--that was all, As we drifted on through the mazy dance To a musical rise and fall.

It rose with a weird and witching swell, 'Mid the twinkling of merry feet, And clasped me close in a wild, strange spell Of memories bitter-sweet; Bitter--because they left a sting And vanished: a lifelong pain; Sweet--because nothing can ever bring Such joy to my heart again.

To me it was nothing, only a waltz; To the other it meant no wrong; Men may be cruel--who are not false-- And women remember too long.

SALLIE R. FORD

Mrs. Sallie Rochester Ford, the mother of good _Grace Truman_, was born at Rochester Springs, near Danville, Kentucky, in 1828. Miss Rochester was graduated from the female seminary at Georgetown, Kentucky, in 1849, and six years later she was married to Rev. Samuel H. Ford (1823-1905), a Baptist preacher and editor of Louisville and St. Louis. She was her husband's associate in his literary enterprises, rendering him excellent service at all times. Her last years were spent at St. Louis, in which city she died in February, 1910, having rounded out more than four score years. Mrs. Ford's religious novel, _Grace Truman, or Love and Principle_ (New York, 1857) attracted wide attention in its day, and it was reprinted many times. It was read by thousands of young girls; and ministers descanted upon it in their sermons. While the work sets forth that the Baptist road is the only right of way to heaven, and is sentimental to the core, it is fairly well-written, and it undoubtedly did much good. A copy of it may be found in almost any collection of Kentucky books. _Grace Truman_ was followed by _Mary Bunyan_ (New York, 1859); _Morgan and His Men_ (Mobile, Ala., 1864); _Ernest Quest_ (New York, 1877); _Evangel Wiseman_ (1907); and Mrs. Ford's final work, published at St. Louis, _The Life of Rochester Ford, the Successful Christian Lawyer_.

BIBLIOGRAPHY. _How I Came to Write "Grace Truman: An Appendix_ to the 1886 edition; Adams's _Dictionary of American Authors_ (Boston, 1905).

OUR MINISTER MARRIES

[From _Grace Truman_ (St. Louis, 1886)]