He came to see us in “Much Ado about Nothing” and, next day sent me some little volumes of his work with a lovely inscription on the front page.  I miss him very much when I go to Boston now.

In New York, how much I miss Mrs. Beecher I could never say.  The Beechers were the most wonderful pair.  What an actor he would have made!  He read scenes from Shakespeare to Henry and me at luncheon one day.  He sat next to his wife, and they held hands nearly all the while; I thought of that time when the great preacher was tried, and all through the trial his wife showed the world her faith in his innocence by sitting by his side and holding his hand.

He was indeed a great preacher.  I have a little faded card in my possession now:  “Mrs. Henry W. Beecher.”  “Will ushers of Plymouth Church please seat the bearer in the Pastor’s pew.”  And in the Pastor’s pew I sat, listening to that magnificent bass-viol voice with its persuasive low accent, its torrential scorn!  After the sermon I went to the Beechers’ home.  Mr. Beecher sat with a saucer of uncut gems by him on the table.  He ran his hand through them from time to time, held them up to the light, admiring them and speaking of their beauty and color as eloquently as an hour before he had spoken of sin and death and redemption.

He asked me to choose a stone, and I selected an aquamarine, and he had it splendidly mounted for me in Venetian style to wear in “The Merchant of Venice.”  Once when he was ill, he told me, his wife had some few score of his jewels set up in lead—­a kind of small stained-glass window—­and hung up opposite his bed.  “It did me more good than the doctor’s visits,” he laughed out!

Mrs. Beecher was very remarkable.  She had a way of lowering her head and looking at you with a strange intentness—­gravely—­kindly and quietly.  At her husband she looked a world of love, of faith, of undying devotion.  She was fond of me, although I was told she disliked women generally and had been brought up to think all actresses children of Satan.  Obedience to the iron rules which had always surrounded her had endowed her with extraordinary self-control.  She would not allow herself ever to feel heat or cold, and could stand any pain or discomfort without a word of complaint.

She told me once that when she and her sister were children, a friend had given them some lovely bright blue silk, and as the material was so fine they thought they would have it made up a little more smartly than was usual in their somber religious home.  In spite of their father’s hatred of gaudy clothes, they ventured on a little “V” at the neck, hardly showing more than the throat; but still, in a household where blue silk itself was a crime, it was a bold venture.  They put on the dresses for the first time for five o’clock dinner, stole downstairs with trepidation, rather late, and took their seats as usual one on each side of their father.  He was eating soup and never looked up.  The little sisters were relieved.  He was not going to say anything.