War showed his powers as a statesman in his diplomatic relations with
the Austrian Court, which honored him always both as a diplomatist and
as a patriot, his devotion to his country being a proverb among his
fellows.

In 1868 he was appointed Minister to England, but held the office only
two years. On both these occasions Motley proved his ability to meet
and master questions of state, and there is no doubt that, had fortune
led him into active political life, he would have made a brilliant
reputation.

He died in May, 1877, and was buried in Kensal Green Cemetery, near
London, England.

CHAPTER XIV

HARRIET BEECHER STOWE

1811-1896

Harriet Beecher Stowe, the first distinguished woman writer of
America, was born at Litchfield, Conn., in those old New England days
when children were taught that good little girls must always speak
gently, never tear their clothes, learn to knit and sew, and make all
the responses properly in church. Such is her own story of her early
education, to which is also added the item that on Sunday afternoons
she was expected to repeat the catechism, and on the occasion of a
visit to her grandmother, her aunt made her learn two catechisms, that
of her own faith, the Episcopal, and that of Harriet's father, who was
a Presbyterian minister. This discipline, however, had no depressing
effect upon the child, whose family consisted of a half-dozen healthy,
clever brothers and sisters, a father who was loved more than revered
even in those days when a minister was regarded with awe, and a
stepmother whose devotion made the home-life a thing of beauty to be
held in all after-years in loving memory.

The old Presbyterian parsonage where Harriet was born had in it one
room that was the child's chief delight. This was her father's study,
in a corner of which she loved to ensconce herself with her favorite
books gathered around her, and read or day-dream, while her father sat
opposite in his great writing-chair composing the sermon for the next
Sunday. Children's books were not plentiful in those days, and Miss
Edgeworth's _Tales_ and Cotton Mather's _Magnalia_ were her principal
resource, until one joyful day, rummaging in a barrel of old sermons,
she came upon a copy of _The Arabian Nights_. These flowers of fairy
lore took healthy root in the imagination of the little Puritan child,
whose mind had hitherto resembled the prim flower-beds of the New
England gardens, where grew only nat