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of reverent affection, as worthy of all the sacred renown to which he afterwards attained. Whilst the fastidious churchmen of Boston, if they ever saw, or thought of him at all, looked upon him as a plain, countrified parson, settled down exactly in his appropriate nook, not a parishioner of his entertained the shadow of a doubt but what he would have graced the lawn of a bishop, and the Palace of Lambeth, as much as ever a Leighton would have done. Sometimes the veil would be lifted, and disclose some touching and beautiful scenes in that humble parsonage, full of active, busy, and lovely children. The pastor was a great student indeed, but in the absence of all domestics, a scene might occasionally be realized which has been thus described: the gentle pastor, by snatches, reading a book open upon his knees, hearing a little one say its lesson, jogging the cradle with his foot, whilst his busy fingers were engaged in paring apples, to relieve the overburdened sharer of his humble lot.

Certain it is, that the "angustæ res domi" drove him to the necessity of taking a school, and this head is still sensitively alive to the memory of the falling lid of a desk, in no gentle manner, the hands being busy at play within, whilst the sudden exclamation, "What in the name of conscience are, you doing?" aroused the delinquent to a very startling recollection that that sleepless eye, and silent, stealthy tread, very rarely indeed left any fault undetected. The New Testament was read aloud, as one of the daily exercises, and the well-worn copy of the teacher, in the original Greek, was always in hand. It was enough. The ear, still more familiar with every word of the authorized version, was prompt to correct every miscalled word. The familiarity thus acquired with both, in the course of years, was wonderful.

The pastor and the bishop entertained very few diverse opinions. And yet these ears still tingle with almost the only stinging reproof, heard from him, as bishop: "I did not ordain you to keep school, sir!" They were addressed to a young man of parts and of family, who had long taught a profitable select school, and who, piqued that the Bishop should name a field of labor to him which yielded but a paltry pecuniary return, in comparison, resentfully remarked that he would sooner take up his school again. The distinction in the good

Bishop's mind lay just here: teaching is an admirable aid to the ministry as it had been in his own case for years-but for the ministry itself it is a miserable substitute. A disabled or utterly unsuccessful minister, one who, in fact, has from the first mistaken his calling, may turn to teaching as his sole occupation, and be blameless. In all other cases, to merge the character of the pastor in that of a teacher-to render the higher and nobler calling wholly subservient to the humbleris sadly to forget those soul-subduing and awful promises which are made in the Ordinal.

About this time he was also engaged, one or two evenings. in the week, in teaching a singing-school; not for the improvement of the music of his own church only, but for the benefit of all the lovers of sacred music in the whole village. His commanding person, his gentle yet decided manner, at once and without an effort commanding respect and preserving order in that very peculiar sphere of wild and hilarious misrule, his quick, elastic movements, his sweet, penetrating, and peculiarly melodious voice, and his extreme accuracy both in note and time, are all most vividly before the mind. As in the case of one of our younger Right Reverend Fathers, so, in his own, the writer was under the third and last trial, by which it was finally and forever determined that he was not all musical; nature not only having denied him voice and ear, but the capacity of deciding for himself whether he was singing false or true.

An interval of several years is rendered remarkable by no striking event. The Pastor, Teacher, Student, pursues the even tenor of his way, cultivating his own garden, laying in his own stores, incurring no debt, desiring no notoriety; but writing very finished and instructive sermons, diligently visiting amongst his small circle of parishioners, most of them of a very humble class, and living a pious life of exceeding simplicity and beauty, until his most unexpected election to the Episcopate of the Eastern Diocese. The circumstances of that election occurred some time before the date of these memories, and though some few incidents of minor interest might be added to the already published accounts, received at second-hand from survivors of the Vermont delegation, who, some think, turned the scale in the eventful election, yet the rule must not

be broken of adhering strictly to personal memories. An exception must be made, however, for the purpose of introducing one of the most striking incidents in the earliest years of his Episcopate, related so often by the Rev. Thomas Carlile, as to assume much of the distinctness of a memory. The occasion of his first allusion to it was this: we were together upon some diocesan business, at the house of the Rev. Dr. Morss, of Newburyport, when, upon a question of the interpretation of a canon, some one present mentioned his having corresponded with the then Bishop of New-Jersey, in order to arrive at a just solution of the difficulty. The gentle Bishop felt the discourtesy of such a course to the very quick, he himself not having been consulted; and not less sensitive to the rudeness. of alluding to it in such a presence, was our refined and tenderhearted friend, Mr. Carlile. The moment we were alone, he adverted to it in terms of severe reprehension, and then added that one case of undesigned disrespect towards his Bishop was enough for him. The letter of gentle reprimand which he had received, had, he hoped, effectually checked all such proclivity in him-if any such there were-more especially towards one so meek and unpretending as our Bishop.

The case which he thereupon related was on this wise: he was the youngest of some four or five resident graduates at Cambridge, amongst whom the distinguished names are remembered, of Wainwright, Boyle, Gibbs, and Otis, who, in the then exceeding dearth of clergy, were in the habit of filling the pulpits of the neighborhood very much as if they were clergymen in full orders, and at about the English rates, a guinea a service. And as, up to that time, "there had been no king in Israel, and every man did very much as seemed best in his own eyes," to give more dignity to the practice, they wore the black gown, ascended the pulpit, and drawing forth a manuscript-not indeed of their own composition, but a neat transcript of the sermon of some more able divineproceeded to declaim with an unction greater, probably, than they would have dared to attempt to infuse into more juvenile productions. Whether rumors of these irregular proceedings found their way or not to the doors of the General Convention at which Bishops Hobart and Griswold were consecrated, is not known; but certain it is that at that session the Canon was

passed which, in substance, has ever since been the law of the Church, regulating the practice of lay readers under like circumstances. Immediately upon his return to Rhode Island, our good Bishop wrote to Dr. Eaton, of Christ Church, Boston, to make the facts known to the young gentlemen at Cambridge, intimating to them in the most kindly manner that he should expect immediate compliance; at the same time, however, giving them plainly to understand that non-compliance would present a very serious bar to their ordination. No explosive, in any camp, ever produced greater consternation. Amid the comments of that community, to come down from their high pedestal and to strip themselves of their borrowed plumes, and that, too, as they at the time supposed, at the behest of an obscure country parson, just made Bishop, (for the functions of General Convention were at that time very inadequately compre hended,) why, it was not to be thought of for a moment. An indignation meeting was held, and the youngest of the fraternity was appointed to pen a remonstrance. The reply made him fully aware of the superior wisdom of his elders in performing such offices by an inexpert deputy; awakened him at once to the impropriety of the whole transaction, inspired him with unbounded respect and veneration for his Bishop, drew from him a heartfelt apology, and so put an end to the whole affair. It is believed that no candidate for orders since then has assumed the dress and place of a clergyman, though written sermons have sometimes been carried indiscreetly into the reading-desk instead of the printed copy.

To illustrate the then prevailing ignorance of Canons, and for some time after, a brief account will here be given of what occurred at the writer's own admission to the order of priests. Previous arrangements had been made for its taking place in old St. Michael's Church, Marblehead, of which he then had charge. The assisting clergymen were to be the Rev. Thomas Carlile, of Salem, and the Rev. Charles Burroughs, of Portsmouth, N. H., who, almost alone of all the clergy of that period, still survives, was to preach the ordination sermon. Brief space was given to the examination, on the evening of the twenty-third of June, 1818. Next morning, about breakfast-time, one of the very hottest days that ever glowed in June, it was found that no one had ever thought of the Standing Committee

Papers. A majority of the Standing Committee resided in Boston. Up to this time the irregular practice existed of signing such testimonials without convening the body. A special messenger was dispatched to Boston, with directions by no means to kill a horse, as was said to have been done under similar circumstances in the case of the Rev. Titus Strong, of Greenfield, (though a hundred miles then intervened, instead of fourteen,) but to spare no expense, and to be back in time for morning service. Some idea may be formed of the nervous condition of body, and distracted state of mind, on the part of the candidate, on this sacred occasion, until, early in the service, the Senior Warden handed the papers to the Bishop within the chancel.

On this occasion it was that the candidate first saw a Presbyter of the Church in full canonicals, cassock and all. Approaching the Rev. Mr. Burroughs, he said: "This is a cassock, I believe. I think I know the names of scarf and bands, but what is the name of this around your waist ?" "Indeed I don't know," said he, "all that I know is, if it were on a horse it would be called a circingle!" Distinctions in such ecclesiological niceties were little known in those rude working days. The scenes have often been described by many writers, which accompanied that remarkable attention to religion in Bristol, R. I., in which the ministry of the late Bishop Henshaw, then a very young man, was much more immediately employed than that of Bishop Griswold, who was much absent on visitation. It was a real work of God, wholly unaided by human artifices, and more free than usual from censurable extravagances; and the good fruits remain unto this day. The remote human instrumentality, as far as the episcopal portion of the community was concerned, most unquestionably was the long years of faithful scriptural instruction of their rector, and the influence of week-day evening meetings for familiar religious instruction.

Other services, at that time, made a deeper impression upon the writer's mind and heart, for as yet he was comparatively a stranger to the worship of the Episcopal Church. Still the impressions are very vivid of the tender seriousness, the subdued fervor, the heart-searching faithfulness of the preaching and exhortations of Bishop Griswold during that remarkable

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