act that he was an Episcopalian with strong attachment to
the forms of his church, as an Englishman might be expected to be.

Of Mrs. Pickard we learn more. She is said to have possessed a vigorous
mind, to have been well educated and a fine conversationalist,
with a commanding figure, benignant countenance, and dignified
demeanor, so that one said of her, "She seems to have been born for an
empress." Like her husband she was an Episcopalian though, according
to the Memoirs, less strenuously Episcopalian than Mr. Pickard. She
had been reared in a different school. Her father,--Mr. James
Lovell--we are told, was a free-thinker, or as the Memoirs put it,
"had adopted some infidel principles," and "treated religion with
little respect in his family." The "infidels" of that day were
generally good men, only they were not orthodox. Jefferson, Madison,
Franklin and Washington were such infidels. After Channing's day, this
kind of man here in New England was absorbed by the Unitarian
movement, and, as a separate class, disappeared. Mrs. Pickard was bred
in this school and she appears never to have forgotten her home
training. "She was unostentatious and charitable," says an early
friend, "and her whole life was an exhibition of the ascendency of
_principle_ over mere taste and feeling."

Her religious attitude becomes interesting, because in an exceptional
degree, she formed her remarkable daughter,--who was an only child and
until the age of thirteen had no teacher except this forceful and
level-headed mother.

With these antecedents, Mary Lovell Pickard was born in Boston,
October 2, 1798, John Adams being then President. In 1802, Mary having
passed her third summer, Mr. Pickard's business called him to London,
where he resided with his family two years, so that the child's fifth
birthday was duly celebrated in mid-ocean on the homeward voyage. In a
letter of Mrs. Pickard, written during this London residence, she
says, "Mr. Pickard is even more anxious than I to go home. Mary is the
only contented one. She is happy all the time." There is so much that
is sad in this record that, before we have done, the reader will be
glad the little girl had at least a bright and sunny childhood to
remember. It appears she did remember it. It may not be remarkable,
but it is interesting, that the experiences of this early London
life,--between her third and fifth year,--made an indelible
impression upon her, so that twenty years later w