scene of the disaster, and, learning that Lizzie had gone to
the party, was amazed and greatly excited, that, "when our neighbors
were dying around us," our child, knowing the fact, should be permitted
to make one of a gay and thoughtless crowd! I was taken aback, for I
had not realized the distressing condition of the wounded, and
undertook to explain; but feeling condemned, mortified, and chagrined,
I immediately proposed to send for her, which he promptly approved of,
and, in a few moments, the carriage (which had just returned) was sent
back, with an explanatory note from me. Lizzie had that moment taken
her place in a cotillion, when the note was handed her. She read it,
made an apology to her partner, an explanation to her hostess, bidding
her "good evening," and, in a few minutes more, she was handed into the
parlor at home by her friend and escort, regretting, most of all, that
she had wounded that kind and tender father, who so deeply sympathized
in the sorrows and sufferings of others.

Our house was a gay one. It was thought too much so by some, and
perhaps gave umbrage to the feelings of a few of them, who, judging
from without, as they passed to and fro, and heard music, and could
discern from the street the moving of the heads in the brilliantly
lighted parlors, thought, and said, too, "what a shame to reflect
discredit upon the cause of Christ by revelry and dancing." "How much
better it would be to appropriate the expenditure of money in these
costly preparations to the poor," etc., etc. But, could they have seen
and felt the influence of a Christian light, of which he alone who
reflected it was unconscious, as he moved about in congenial mood with
the young and gay, or, quietly conversed with the grave, perhaps his
own dear pastor; had they but known that the calls upon the benevolence
of the Christian man were as sacred, and as cheerfully granted, as
those of the indulgent father, perhaps more so, they would not, I am
sure, have been so censorious. And then, had they known the facts in
the case, that no instrument of music, excepting the piano and guitar,
and occasionally a flute, and no professor to play on them, for the
purpose of keeping up a dance, had ever been in our house, these worthy
people, fastidious Christians as they may have been, could not have
felt so grieved.

We used wine too, but only at dinner and at suppers, with the
ladies. No side-board drinking was ever done in our hous