s to-day. Between myself and my family there
still existed the breach I had created when I began to preach. With the
exception of Mary and James, my people openly regarded me, during my
theological course, as a dweller in outer darkness, and even my mother's
love was clouded by what she felt to be my deliberate and persistent
flouting of her wishes.

Toward the end of my university experience, however, an incident
occurred which apparently changed my mother's viewpoint. She was
now living with my sister Mary, in Big Rapids, Michigan, and, on the
occasion of one of my rare and brief visits to them I was invited to
preach in the local church. Here, for the first time, my mother heard
me. Dutifully escorted by one of my brothers, she attended church that
morning in a state of shivering nervousness. I do not know what she
expected me to do or say, but toward the end of the sermon it
became clear that I had not justified her fears. The look of intense
apprehension left her eyes, her features relaxed into placidity, and
later in the day she paid me the highest compliment I had yet received
from a member of my family.

"I liked the sermon very much," she peacefully told my brother. "Anna
didn't say anything about hell, or about anything else!"

When we laughed at this handsome tribute, she hastened to qualify it.

"What I mean," she explained, "is that Anna didn't say anything
objectionable in the pulpit!" And with this recognition I was content.

Between the death of my friend and my departure for Europe I buried
myself in the work of the university and of my little church; and as if
in answer to the call of my need, Mary E. Livermore, who had given me
the first professional encouragement I had ever received, re-entered my
life. Her husband, like myself, was pastor of a church in Hingham, and
whenever his finances grew low, or there was need of a fund for some
special purpose--conditions that usually exist in a small church--his
brilliant wife came to his assistance and raised the money, while her
husband retired modestly to the background and regarded her with adoring
eyes. On one of these occasions, I remember, when she entered the pulpit
to preach her sermon, she dropped her bonnet and coat on an unoccupied
chair. A little later there was need of this chair, and Mr. Livermore,
who sat under the pulpit, leaned forward, picked up the garments, and,
without the least trace of selfconsciousness, held them in his lap
throu