# Robert Carter: His Life and Work. 1807-1889/Chapter 5

CHAPTER V.
Mr. Samuel Thomson, Mr. Carter’s father-in-law, died at his country residence on the Hudson, June 10, 1850, leaving behind him an honored name and a place in many hearts which never could be filled. He was possessed of remarkable physical beauty, a presence which made an impression wherever he went. He was a man of incorruptible integrity and large benevolence, his tender heart making him ever the friend of the widow and the fatherless. He had been for many years an elder in the Scotch Presbyterian Church in New York. Some ten or fifteen years before his death, he had made himself a beautiful country home on the northern end of New York Island, at a place which is now known as Inwood. When he took up his residence there, there was no church within several miles, and he used to drive with his family to church at West Farms. Many of the people in the neighborhood were utterly irreligious, and as the family drove to church they could see the farmers at work in their fields. By and by they began to be ashamed of their Sunday work, and would run and hide themselves as they saw the good man’s carriage approaching. Mr. Thomson cared for their souls, and lost no time in building on his own grounds a pretty little church, of which he was the first ruling elder, and for many years the main support. This church, happy and prosperous, ​has been ever since his best monument. On its walls a tablet erected by the unanimous vote of the congregation records his virtues and his liberality.
In 1853, Mr. Carter's mother-in-law, Mrs. Thomson, left her beautiful home upon the Hudson, where the cares of her hospitable mansion were growing heavy for her increasing years, and came to live with her daughter in New York. Her presence in Mr. Carter’s family was a constant benediction. She was as a second mother to his children, already so fully blessed in their own mother. Her beautiful, unselfish life left on them an impress never to be forgotten. Perhaps the two things most strongly associated in their minds with her were the Bible which was her constant reading, and the needle with which her ever active and skilful fingers were so steadily employed. She was a veritable Dorcas in preparing “coats and garments” for the poor. Never did fingers fly faster than hers, and never were stitches more beautifully set. Such was the loving kindness of her nature that only strangers thought of calling her Mrs. Thomson, while Auntie Thomson was a familiar name in many homes. On her lips was the law of kindness, and indeed all the description of the virtuous woman of Proverbs might be applied to her. Beecher says that no home is complete without the baby’s cradle and the grandmother’s rocking-chair, and certainly the corner that held that capacious rocker with its venerable occupant was a blessed feature in Mr. Carter’s home. He and his mother-in-law loved each other as own mother and son. For six weeks of every autumn his own mother came from Saratoga County to occupy another rocking-chair in the family room, and the two silver-haired old ladies made a beautiful picture as they sat together.
​Old Mrs. Carter was a striking and original character. Her speech was seasoned with plenty of Attic salt, as when she remarked of some one who had risen from poverty to affluence and was spoiled by the rise, “Ah! when soles get to be upper leathers they're awfu’ stiff.” Her son Robert was idolized by her, and woe be to him who spoke slightingly of her treasure. It is related that when her son wrote to her, on his first coming to America, that some one had said that his being a foreigner might make it harder for him to get a position, “Hech, sirs!” said she, “they have a guid face to ca’ my son a foreigner.” When her son was at Peebles, he saw in the Bible of one of his pupils some verses which pleased him so much that he copied them and sent them to his mother. They appealed to her mother feeling, and to her latest days she loved to repeat them, in her rich expressive voice, and with her beautiful Scottish accent:—
LINES BY A MOTHER IN HER SON'S BIBLE.
Remember, love, who gave thee this, When other days shall come,— When she who had thy earliest kiss Sleeps in her narrow home; Remember ’t was a mother gave The gift to one she’d die to save.
That mother sought a pledge of love, The holiest for her son, And from the gift of God above She chose a goodly one; She chose for her beloved boy The Source of life and light and joy,—
And bade him keep the gift, that when The parting hour should come They might have hope to meet again In an eternal home;
She said his faith in it should be Sweet incense to her memory.
And should the scoffer in his pride Laugh that fond faith to scorn, And bid him cast that gift aside That he from youth had borne, She bade him pause and ask his breast If he or she had loved him best.
A parent’s blessing on her son Goes with this holy thing; The love that would retain the one Must to the other cling; Remember ’t is no idle toy, A mother’s gift!—remember, boy!
She was a woman of unusual intelligence, and a great reader; in fact, for many years she did little but read, as she lived with one or other of her children, and had no household cares. In addition to her long sojourn in New York every fall, her son always visited his mother in the summer, and his thoughtful care made every provision for her comfort.
After her husband’s death, old Mrs. Carter always led the family devotions herself, and conducted them with great unction and propriety. On one occasion the son of an old friend came out from Scotland, and went to her house for a visit. When night came, she, supposing that he was a Christian, handed him the Bible, and asked him to lead the family prayers, but he was obliged to say, “I cannot do it.” She took the Bible herself and read a chapter, then one of the old Scottish Psalms was sung, and all knelt in prayer. She prayed earnestly for her guest, and he was much impressed with the whole service. He saw the contrast between his twenty-five years of prayerless life and the earnest, faithful Christianity of this old lady, and that prayer ​was used to bring him to Christ. For many years he was an elder in a church in a Western city.
Mr. Carter’s home life was very beautiful. He and his wife were always married lovers, and entirely one in all their thoughts and aims and plans. In training their children, the two prominent ideas were love and obedience. He spoke in the last summer of his life of the remarkable gift of his wife in the training of children. Her will was law to them. Though her voice was never raised above its ordinary sweet and gentle utterance, they knew that its commands must be obeyed. Probably none of them remember being punished, because any discipline of that kind was gotten over in their very earliest years; but they had a very clear idea that any infringement of her commands would by no means escape chastisement. That knowledge was enough, and extreme measures did not need to be resorted to. She was a born teacher, though she never exercised her talents on any but her own children and grandchildren. Her children all learned to read almost as they learned to talk, so easy was the effort made to them, so carefully was their interest stimulated. Just a few minutes was given to the task each morning, and so pleasant was the exercise that the little ones would bring the book of their own accord and take the lesson as if it were a game. They all learned to read at four, and after that there were no more questionings, “What shall I do?” It was a book-loving and book-supplied home, and the children took to it like ducks to water. After they learned to read, little technical instruction was given until they went regularly to school, which was sometimes not until they were eleven years old.
Mr. Carter had a great idea of travel as a means of education, and they were taken to Europe repeatedly, ​and every summer had some trip,—to Niagara or the White Mountains or the Thousand Isles. When they were little, three or four months of every year was spent in the country, Mr. Carter taking a house in the neighborhood of the city, from which he could go to business every day. He was very fond of little excursions, and in the spring and fall afternoons would take his family to Hoboken, or Staten Island, or High Bridge, or some other rural neighborhood. After Central Park was made, he was a constant visitor there, and his friends would laughingly ask him if he was a Park Commissioner. Both parents made companions of their children to an unusual degree. The father would accompany them to the schoolhouse door on his way to business, and they would go down to his store in the afternoon for the pleasure of walking home with him, and these walks were by no means silent. His daughter remembers only one occasion on which he did not respond to her childish chatter, and that was one morning on the way to school, during the business crisis in 1857. He said, “I can’t talk to you this morning; I have something very important to think about.” The occurrence was so unprecedented as to fill her with amazement, and remained in her mind as something very puzzling until, in after ​years, she solved the mystery by concluding that the failure of some business friend might have caused him distress, As he owed no man anything, these periods of financial depression gave him little personal uneasiness. It was a great benefit to his children to have his well-stored mind and large experience placed so constantly at their disposal, and as they grew older and came to maturity he conversed with them on terms of equality, which were often surprising to themselves. He enjoyed the intercourse as much as they did.
The evening hours of the family were delightful. The parents gave themselves up to the children. The mother was very fond of “blind man’s holiday,” as she called the interval between daylight and dark; and as the twilight came on, books and work were laid aside, and by the light of the open fire she took part with her little ones in romping games, until the father came in to the cheerful evening meal. Then all joined in play together until the little ones were sent to bed, and then those who were in school went over with their father the lessons which had been already carefully prepared. They were not allowed to ask for help until they had done their very best by themselves, and even then the help given was only by suggesting, not by showing, the way out of the difficulty. It was a rare thing for any of his children to take to school or college a lesson in Latin or Greek which had not first been gone over with him, and this was kept up till his sons graduated from college.
A young man from Scotland came to New York with a letter of introduction to him. Before leaving his home his father said to him, “You must be careful how you behave when you visit Mr. Carter; he is an elder in the church, and will tolerate no frivolity.” When ​the young man came to deliver his letter, the family were engaged in a game of blindman’s-buff in their dining-room, Mr. Carter went to his guest in the parlor, and, remembering his own days of loneliness when he was a stranger in a strange land, he thought a little taste of home life would do him good; so he asked him if he would not like to participate in the frolic, and the invitation was gladly accepted. The young man wrote to his father: “You need not have cautioned me about behaving soberly before Mr. Carter. I have had the jolliest evening at his house I ever spent in my life. He is as full of fun as a boy.”
After the death of Mrs. Carter, Mr. Peter Carter wrote the following description of the home which he most intimately knew.
“Napoleon, it is said, being on one occasion asked what was the greatest need of France, replied, ‘Mothers.’
“And so the greatest need of America is Christian mothers. One beautiful illustration of this crowning glory of woman was Mrs. Robert Carter, of this city, who, on the 19th of July last, entered into her rest. Like the Shunamite woman in the days of Elisha, ‘She dwelt among her own people.’ Born in New York in 1810, her whole life was spent in this city. Baptized in the Scotch Presbyterian Church by the eminent Dr. John M. Mason, she continued till her death in the membership of that church.
“Her first-born was a bright and lovely boy, too sweet, too lovely for earth. He exhibited that beautiful evidence of the Holy Spirit’s indwelling not unfrequently seen in those who are early transplanted to the garden of Paradise. Scarlet-fever, that fearful and fatal disease among children, carried him into the Saviour’s arms, For nearly fifty years that loving mother cherished the memory of her darling boy. Other children were given to her to train for usefulness, and ​how faithfully she did so the writer of this can testify, as it was his privilege to dwell beneath her roof for seventeen years while the process of training was going on. People often complain of the difficulty of bringing up children in a great city, but it was amongst its temptations and difficulties that she brought up hers.
“As day by day I saw the absorbing devotion of that young mother to her little children, I sometimes wondered, as a child will, whether such devotion would pay. But it did pay, and with compound interest. The little homes that have gone out from this one, modelled on the same pattern, are in turn training up sons and daughters to be the heads of similar Christian households by and by. Thus the influence of one wise Christian woman is being felt, and will be felt, in places far remote from her home. And though she has gone to her reward, the work still goes on, and will, from generation to generation.
“As her children gathered round her, the missionary box became a prominent and important institution, For the cure of certain faults, and for the doing of certain services, little sums were paid by this careful mother to her children, with the understanding that they were to go into the missionary box.
“The children were brought up to consider others rather than themselves,—to remember that the only way to be happy was to labor for the happiness of others.
“The Sabbath evenings in this good woman’s house, to those who, like the writer of this, were privileged to be with her through many years, will not soon be forgotten.
“As the silent twilight shaded into the night, and before the candles were lighted, books were laid aside, and hymns and Scripture verses were repeated in rotation round the family circle. Ter favorite selection was Watts’s version of the Fifty-first Psalm:
‘Show pity, Lord, O Lord, forgive! Let a repenting rebel live.’
​“Nothing was ever considered unimportant that had any bearing on the temporal or spiritual welfare of her children. Their diet was plain and substantial, and that simple food was partaken of with a relish unknown to those pampered children who are fed with luxurious dainties. A liberal education was provided and a plentiful supply of entertaining books, and when they were older and the circumstances of their parents permitted they were indulged with extensive travel, both at home and abroad, But increasing wealth was never considered any reason for foolish extravagance. The only change it made in the household was the larger indulgence in the blessed privilege of Christian giving, in which the children were encouraged to take part.
“In her sweet home the question was never raised whether square dances were right and round dances wrong, because dancing was not indulged in at all. Nor whether a game of whist was right and other card-playing wrong, because cards never found a place in that household. Nor whether drinking a glass of wine was a sin or not, because the law and the practice of the house was to drink nothing that was intoxicating. Nor whether certain plays were moral or others immoral, because the theatre was a place not to be visited.
“The object of life was not personal gratification, but to do something for God’s glory and the good of men. They were carefully taught that salvation was through Christ alone; that a true life must be founded on a true faith. A happier household it was never my lot to see. To her was made good the promise in the Ninety-first Psalm, ‘With long life will I satisfy her.’
“She lived to see her children all settled in life,—to see two of her sons successful ministers of the blessed Gospel of Jesus Christ, and the others serving God in the work he has given them to do,—to see all of her many grandchildren that were over fourteen years of age members of the church.”
​Sunday was a busy day in the Carter household. Church and Sunday school morning and afternoon filled the daylight hours. All his life he was exceedingly careful to support the influence of the clergy. No word of criticism of sermons ever passed his lips. In every sermon he found something good, and he literally obeyed Herbert’s advice, “Judge not the preacher.” As twilight came on, all assembled in the sitting-room, and exercises of a varied character were begun. Half the Assembly’s Shorter Catechism was recited on one Sunday evening, half on the next; the children were questioned about the services of the day, and even very little ones encouraged to tell what they remembered of the sermon; hymns were repeated in turn, and some of the children were very ambitious not to recite a hymn that had ever been given in the circle before, which involved a good deal of research in hymns, ancient and modern. Bible verses were read or repeated.
Mr. Carter’s solemn and earnest talks as they sat in the quiet room, lighted often only by the open fire, can never be forgotten by his children. They will carry the impression of them to eternity. One of his sons specially remembers a story told on one Sabbath evening of a father who was a godly man, but whose children, while loving and dutiful to him, were utterly uninterested in the claims of religion. In vain he talked with them; they remained careless and unimpressed. One morning he came down to prayers, and took up the Bible, but was so overcome by deep feeling that he could not proceed. The children gathered about him. “What is the matter, father; are you ill?” “No, but I have had a terrible dream, and I cannot get over the horror of it.” “What was it, father?” ​“I dreamed that it was the day of judgment. The throne was set, and the books were opened. The dead, small and great, were gathered an innumerable multitude. I stood at the right hand of the Judge; my beloved wife was at my side. I looked about for my children, and I could not see them, I turned to the left hand of the Judge, and there stood my beloved ones. I beckoned to them; I called, ‘Come over here, you are on the wrong side’; but a gesture from the Judge held them bound where they stood, while from his lips came the words, ‘Because I have called and ye refused, I have stretched out my hand and no man regarded; but ye have set at naught all my counsel and would none of my reproof; I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when your fear cometh.’ The shock of the dream awoke me. O my children, shall we indeed be separated at the last day?” “No, father, no,” they exclaimed, “our father’s God shall be ours.” As he told this story with thrilling voice and heartfelt emotion, not one of the little company about him but resolved that there should be no separation for them from God and heaven and parents at the great day,—that they would all meet,—
“No wanderer lost,—a family in heaven.”
“I hae but ae son, my ain dear Donald, Had I ten I wad gie them a’ to Charlie,”—
and then he appealed to Christian mothers to devote their sons to the service of a nobler Prince.
The speeches of Dr. Duff produced a most profound impression in America, and caused a great awakening of interest for Foreign Missions. On the 13th of May he embarked for Liverpool on the steamship “Pacific,” on which Mr. Carter had also taken passage for himself and family. Just before the steamer left the wharf, Mr. George H. Stuart, of Philadelphia, in the name of a very few American friends, placed in the hands of Dr. Duff a draft for five thousand pounds, for the benefit of a college the Doctor was founding in Calcutta.
The ten days’ voyage gave opportunity for much delightful intercourse with Dr. Duff. Mr. Carter, after consultation with his fellow passengers, went to the captain, and proposed that Dr. Duff should be invited to make an address in the cabin every evening during the voyage, and the captain courteously and cordially agreed, and himself attended the meetings as regularly as was possible. One of Mr. Carter’s sons overheard a gay young passenger saying to a group of his companions, “Dr. Duff and that man Carter are bound to get up a revival before we get to Liverpool.” Nothing would have pleased better Dr. Duff or Mr. Carter. The Doctor gave a most interesting series of lectures on the life of Abraham, and the passengers attended with scarcely an exception, as did also the sailors who were off duty. Dr. Duff suffered terribly from sea-sickness, yet night after night tottered into the cabin, hardly able to hold himself erect; but in a very short time he forgot all his disabilities in the earnestness of his eloquence. He frequently spoke for two hours, and no one ever wearied. ​The night the “Pacific” reached Liverpool, Dr. Duff was in the midst of a lecture, but though he continued to speak for half an hour the captain was the only person who left the cabin. This was a remarkable tribute to Dr. Duff’s eloquence, as several gay young men had betted heavily as to which of them should be the first to reach shore, and before the Doctor ceased speaking the tender left the side of the ship, and all the passengers had to spend the night on board.
This journey in Europe in 1854 was a great pleasure to Mr. Carter and his family. It is not generally thought that a European trip is of much advantage for children, and the oldest of these was but fifteen years of age; yet they all felt in after years that these months of travel with so capable a leader as their father were of more value in their education than years of schooling. He was an enthusiastic traveller, seeing everything, going everywhere, loving the beautiful in nature, revelling in the scenes of history and chivalry and verse, full of anecdote and poetry, and almost encyclopedic in information, which he delighted to impart. This enthusiasm was contagious. No one could look in his beaming face without longing to enjoy what he enjoyed so much.
He greatly enjoyed taking his children to the scenes of his childhood, and showing them the house where he was born, the arbor where he sat with his book overlooking the path along which his cousin walked to aid him in his studies, the old kirkyard where his forefathers slept, the Rhymer’s Tower, and “the bonnie, bonnie broom of the Cowden Knowes.” He spent nearly a month in Earlston, and the beautiful scenery of Berwickshire became very familiar to all. Kelso, Melrose, Dryburgh, Abbotsford, were visited ​repeatedly, Perhaps there was no view that he enjoyed more than that from Bemerside Hill, and he loved to tell that on Scott’s funeral day his favorite horse, led riderless in the procession, stopped just where the magnificent prospect burst upon the view, showing what its master’s habit had been. His knowledge of and love for poetry were very great, and he seemed to have an appropriate quotation for every scene. In Melrose Abbey he was greatly impressed with an inscription on an old tombstone, and he often quoted it in after years:
“Earth walks on the earth glittering with gold, Earth goes to the earth sooner than it wold, Earth builds on the earth castles and towers, Earth says to the earth, ‘All shall be ours.’ ”
At another time he was much struck by an inscription on an old sun-dial;
“I’m a shadow,—so art thou. I mark time,—dost thou?”
With one of his sons he at this time made quite an extensive tour in the Highlands, a trip which was always a vivid memory to the boy. He said long afterwards, that no one could know what his father was as a traveller until he had him off entirely by himself, with no baggage but what could be carried in the hand, and no care to burden him. On one occasion they travelled all day on the stage-coach going to Inverness, and on the box-seat sat a stout gentleman with a Scotch cap pulled down over his eyes. The next day this same gentleman came up to them on the Caledonian Canal boat, and saluted Mr. Carter with a hearty greeting. It was Dr. Norman Macleod. “Why, father,” said the boy, “this gentleman rode with us on the ​coach all day yesterday.” Both were greatly disgusted to think that they had lost so much valuable time, but they made up for it by a day of most enjoyable converse, Just as they were nearing Oban at night, Dr. Macleod exclaimed, “By the way, I had a lady put under my charge this morning, with the request that I would see after her a little, and I have never thought of her all day. I must look her up.” Mr. Carter writes of this interview, “He was brimful of Celtic lore, and gave me many pictures of Highland life.” They had met before and become well acquainted in New York, a short time after the Disruption, when Dr. Macleod came into the store with letters of introduction. On being asked if he was a Free Churchman, he replied, “No, I’m afraid you will think I am a black sheep.” But Mr. Carter, though greatly interested in the Free Church, knew no narrow lines in his friendships. Strong in his own convictions, he always respected those of others, and saw very clearly the wide ground on which all Christians could meet.
While in Edinburgh Mr. Carter had much pleasant intercourse with Principal Cunningham, and while in London with Dr. James Hamilton. Much of his enjoyment in all his journeys to Europe arose from association with men with whom he had long held correspondence. In Kelso he again met Mrs. Duncan, who had visited his house in New York, and whose Memorial of her daughter, Mary Lundie Duncan, he had published, as well as several other of her books.
Mrs. Duncan’s first husband had been the Rev. Dr. Lundie, a distinguished clergyman of Kelso. After his death she had married the Rev. Dr. Duncan, while her daughter, Mary Lundie, married his son, also a clergyman. Another daughter married the Rev. Horatius ​Bonar, D.D., the well known poet, and Mrs. Bonar herself wrote the beautiful hymn—
“Pass away earthly joy, Jesus is mine.”
A few years before, Mr. Carter from his mother-in-law’s country-house had witnessed the burning of the steamboat “Henry Clay” on the Hudson. He told Mrs. Duncan that among the passengers was a young and lovely American lady, whose body was found with the memorial of Mary Lundie Duncan clasped in her hands, with her finger marking the place in the volume where she had been reading when the death messenger came to her.
Mrs. Duncan was a lady of remarkable personal beauty and stately presence, and her conversation and correspondence were greatly valued by Mr. Carter. Among the books he published for her was the Memorial of her son, Rev. George Lundie, missionary to Samoa. In her book, “Children of the Manse,” she gives an account of the early training of her children, and those who read it will not wonder that such a family life as hers resulted in such lives as those of Mary, George, and Catharine Lundie.
An amusing incident of her early married life was often related by Mr. Carter. When the Total Abstinence movement first began, Mr. Lundie and she became strong advocates of the cause. In those days it was the custom to give a glass of whiskey in addition to the regular pay to any one who came about a house for an odd job; but Mr. and Mrs. Lundie made up their minds that such things must be stopped in their house. A man was hired to carry in their winter coal, and when the work was done Mrs. Lundie told him that the minister had ​joined the Temperance Society and had decided that there must be no more giving of whiskey in their home. But,” said she, “here is sixpence for you, and that will be far better for the wife and bairns than that you should be drinking whiskey.” As he walked down the street he met Mr. Lundie, who said, “I suppose my wife did not give you any whiskey to-day, Jock.” “Na, na, sir.” “Well, here is a shilling for you, and you‘ll find yourself far better off than if you had had the whiskey.” Jock took the shilling, and with that and Mrs. Lundie’s sixpence he got more whiskey than he had had in many a day, and came reeling back to the manse, where he stood holding on to the front gate, waving his hat and shouting, “Mr. Lundie and the Temperance Society forever! Mr. Lundie and the Temperance Society forever!”
After some months of travel in Great Britain and on the Continent, the party returned to America. They had sailed to Europe on the “Pacific,” one of the Collins line of steamers, and on the voyage Mr. Carter had noticed some little incident which he thought betokened negligence in the arrangements of the vessel. He had almost forgotten the circumstance, and while in London he went to the Collins office and chose state-rooms on the “Arctic,” doing everything but actually engage his passage. Suddenly there flashed into his mind a recollection of the incident, and he decided to take passage on the Cunard steamer “Europa,” which sailed the same week, The “Arctic” was lost on that voyage, and a large number of passengers perished. At Halifax the “Europa” took on board and carried to Boston the survivors of the wreck. After leaving Halifax, a heavy fog settled down over the “Europa,” just as it had around the “Arctic” at the time of the collision which caused ​her to founder, and it was a most pathetic sight to see her rescued passengers peering out into the obscurity from the deck of the “Europa,” and dreading lest they might again encounter shipwreck. A few years later, the “Pacific” sailed from port and was never heard from again.
When he was leaving home on this voyage to Europe, one of his Sunday school teachers came to him to talk about a boy in her class who had long been very troublesome, and said: “I wish before you go that you would dismiss that boy from the school. It is hard enough work for us to control him while you are here, the only person of whom he stands in awe. When you go, he will be unmanageable.” Mr. Carter told her that he could not take the responsibility of dismissing a boy from what was perhaps the only good influence in his life. One of the first letters that reached him in England informed him of the death of this boy by drowning while bathing on Sunday. Over and over again in after life he spoke of this, and thanked God that he had not turned that boy out of school, as if he had done so he should have felt that he had given him the opportunity of Sabbath-breaking which led to his death.
On their return to America Mr. Carter’s two eldest sons, fifteen and fourteen years of age, matriculated at the New York University, whence they graduated with the first and second honors of their class, in 1858. All through their college course Mr. Carter exercised the same careful oversight over their studies that he did when they were in school, and their young companions always had a ready welcome to the house. Hospitality was ever one of his most marked virtues. He kept open house, and the family were seldom without guests, ​and he made a model host, cordial and hearty, and full of chat and anecdote. His conversational powers were of a high order, and the table talk and evening gatherings in the parlor were very delightful. He had as visitors clergymen from all parts of the world, and his children have delightful memories, at a little later period, of such men as Bishop Bickersteth, Rev. John Ker of Glasgow, Dr. McCosh, Dr. Monod of Paris, Dr. Thornwell of South Carolina, and many others.
In 1856 the bookstore was removed from 285 to 530 Broadway. He had a lease of the old store, but his landlord, without asking his consent, took away the light from the back of the store by building over the skylight, and at the same time took away one third of the front of the store by building a staircase there. The work was begun without giving the slightest notice. When he went down to the store one morning, he found the books had been taken down from one side of the front, and the workmen were starting the new stairway. Remonstrance was in vain; the landlord would not give in. A lawyer was consulted, who said that the case was a clear, though it might be a tedious one. But Mr. Carter decided to keep to his old resolution rather to suffer wrong than to go to law. He did not wish it said that one Christian man was suing another. He immediately began to look about for a store, and bought one on the corner of Broadway and Spring Street. In a few years it was worth twice what he paid for it, so his peace-loving propensities brought him nothing but good.
The old store at 285 was under the Irving House, where a great many colored servants were employed. One day the proprietor came to Mr. Carter and told him that one of the waiters was a runaway slave, and ​that he had heard that his master had come to New York with a search-warrant, and was expecting to arrest him and carry him off to the South. Mr. Carter gladly contributed towards the poor fellow’s travelling expenses to Canada, as he had repeatedly done in similar cases before. That afternoon the fugitive slave took passage on a Hudson River boat for Albany, when, just as the boat started, a carriage was driven furiously up, and his master with a constable came on board. The feeling was so strong against the Fugitive Slave Law that the master did not think it best to raise a commotion on the boat by arresting him at once, but thought he would take quiet possession of the man when they were disembarking at Albany. The poor slave cowered down among some bales in the forward part of the boat, and felt that his hour had almost come. Among the passengers he noticed a man with a very benevolent countenance, and he thought he would throw himself upon his protection. He managed to attract the gentleman’s attention, and told him his story while his master and the constable were amusing themselves in the cabin, knowing that the boat did not make any stops before reaching Albany, and feeling sure that their victim was securely trapped. The kindly man’s sympathies were all aroused by the poor fellow’s story, and he went to the captain to see what could be done. The captain said that it would not do for him to seem to take any part in the matter, but that the gentleman might tell the slave that when they reached Albany the vessel would accidentally touch the pier, and then veer off into the stream again, that he must be ready to spring for liberty, and that it would then take about half an hour to turn the boat and touch the wharf properly, and in the mean while the train for Canada would ​be off. The programme was fully carried out, the slave sprang off and dashed through the crowd at the landing, and the boat veered off to rectify the captain’s unfortunate blunder. The master came up to the captain in a towering passion, “Do you see what you have done? Your stupidity has allowed my servant to escape.” “You did not take me into your confidence. How did I know you had a servant on board? If you had only told me, I might have had him put in irons.” The slave-owner had to swallow his wrath, and in a few minutes the whistle of the train was heard on its way to Canada, bearing with it one man who felt that he had a right to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”
One day a nice-looking colored man, a clergyman, came into the store begging money for his church, and entered into conversation with Mr. Carter, and told him his history. He had been a slave in Kentucky; his master was a very hard man, drinking and gambling. The slave was very fleet of foot, and had won prizes for his master at the races. He married a young girl on a neighboring plantation, and then, being filled with fear lest he should be sold away from her, he went to her master, who was a very benevolent man, and begged him to buy him, that he might be with his wife. The planter bought him, made him his coachman, gave him a comfortable little cabin, and for a while he was perfectly happy. But one day he was driving out his master and a friend, and overheard a conversation in which the master said that he was sick of the plantation life, and had serious thoughts of selling out and going North to live. The slave’s heart sank within him. He had had one bad master, and did not want another.
​He talked the matter over with his wife, and they decided that he must take the first opportunity to escape to Canada, and then, as soon as he could earn the money, he should buy her freedom. A few days after, he was sent on an errand to a neighboring town, and embraced the opportunity to run away. He got safely to Canada, but in a short time he found that he could get higher wages at the Cataract House at Niagara; so he crossed the river and took service there, being very anxious to buy his wife’s liberty as soon as possible. One day as he entered the dining-room he saw his master at one of the tables. He started back in dismay, hurried out of the door, and made his way as quickly as possible to the Canada side. His master noticed the confusion, and inquired the cause, and found that his former slave was in the neighborhood. He sent word to him to come and see him, as he wanted to talk with him, and he need have no fear of being captured. The slave knew that he could fully trust his master’s honor, and came to see him. The master said to him, “Don’t you think you have treated me very badly? I only bought you because you pleaded so earnestly with me. I did everything I could to make you comfortable, and I thought you were happy and contented.” “Yes, massa, you were very good to me, and I loved you very much.” “Why then did you leave me?” “Do you remember that day I was driving you with Mr. So-and-so, and you said that you were thinking of selling out?” “Yes, I remember, but I did not think you heard.” “I heard it all, and I felt that I could not stay and be sold down the river. Don’t think me ungrateful, but I felt I must be free.”
They talked for some time, and at last the master said, “I think you have talents that would fit you for ​preaching to your own people. I will give you free papers, and support you while you study for the Methodist ministry.” The next year he came North again, bringing the man’s wife and little child. He gave them all manumission papers, and interested himself for them until his death. “O Mr. Carter,” said the poor man the tears rolling down his cheeks, “he was a good man, my massa. He was the best man I ever saw in my life.”
The former slave was now settled in a little African Church in New York. Mr. Carter asked him how he was off for books. “That is my worst trouble I have hardly any books. It is like making bricks without straw.” Mr. Carter laid out a long row of commentaries and other books, and asked him if he had any of those. “Not one of them. But, Mr. Carter, I have no money, I cannot buy books. The money you have given me is for the church.” Mr. Carter told him they were his as a gift. “O how can I thank you! I never saw so many nice books together in my life.” They were made up in a huge bundle, and lifted to his shoulder, and Mr. Carter said his beaming face, as he went off with his load trying to bow his thanks to the very last, was a sight to see, He came about the store a good deal while he was stationed in New York, but finally removed to a distant part of the country.
Mr. Carter was greatly interested in the colored race. A colored Sunday school connected with the Scotch Church always met with hearty support and co-operation from him. His brother Peter was its superintendent for more than thirty years, and the families of both brothers were largely represented among its teachers.
One of the oldest members of the Scotch Church and ​warmest friends of Mr. Carter was a colored woman named Katy Ferguson, born a slave in 1774. When she was but four years of age, her mother was sold to another master, and torn from her forever. Katy, in speaking of this cruel separation long afterwards, said, “Mr, B. sold my mother, and she was carried away from me; but I remember that before we parted we knelt down, and she laid her hand on my head and gave me to God.” When Katy was fifteen years old, she joined Dr. Mason’s church. Some of the members objected to having one of her color sit down with them at the communion table. Dr. Mason heard of this feeling, but said nothing until the time of the communion service, when he came down from his pulpit, and, passing along the aisle to the pew where the trembling Katy sat, took her by the hand, and, leading her forward, said, “Whosoever shall do the will of my Father which is in Heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother. For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; we have been all made to drink into one Spirit. Where there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision, Barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free; but Christ is all, and in all.” And seating her at the holy table, which was spread in the aisle, and around which according to Scottish custom the communicants sat, he said again, as he put into her hand the memorials of our Saviour’s love, and in a tone and manner that filled every heart with deepest emotion, “Eat, O friend! drink, yea drink abundantly, O beloved!” The scene was most affecting and impressive, and most effectually accomplished the end desired.
Katy supported herself by making delicate confections for dinner and evening parties. She was a woman of ​earnest piety. She started the first Sunday school in New York, early in the present century, by gathering together into her room poor little street waifs, black and white, for she had no color prejudice. Hers was also the first Children’s Aid Society. She picked up from the streets at different times forty-eight orphan or destitute children, fed and clothed and educated them to the best of her ability with the aid of the public schools, until she could find suitable homes for them, or else herself trained them to a useful womanhood or manhood. It is said that every one of these children turned out well. Of this faithful negro woman it may be said truly, “She hath done what she could.”
Mr. and Mrs. Carter frequently visited her in her home and helped her in her work. One day when she was nearly eighty years of age she called to see Mrs. Carter, and seemed greatly exhausted with her long walk from her down-town home. When she was leaving, Mrs. Carter said, “Don't think of walking home, Katy, here is money for your stage fare.” “Why, Mrs. Carter, they wouldn’t let a colored woman ride in an omnibus.”
A very few weeks later she entered into her eternal rest. Doubtless the poor old negro woman, who had been grudged a welcome by some professing Christians into the church below, and had trudged with weary steps along earth’s highways, was carried by angels to the pearly gates and had an abundant entrance ministered unto her into the light and glory above. There would be no stay in the Master’s step to meet her, and His “Well done, good and faithful servant!” was as full and hearty to her as to many whom the church has honored as its noblest and best.
In a letter from Mr. Carter to his family, written from Charleston, he makes mention of another old ​colored woman in whom he was greatly interested. In 1855 he went as a delegate to the General Assembly at Nashville, Tennessee, visiting on the way at the house of a very dear friend, Mr. James McCarter, a bookseller of Charleston. The names of the two friends were a good deal alike, and their faces were still more so; in fact, they were often told that they looked like twins. Mr. Carter writes:—
“It is now the hour which we usually spend in talking of the things that concern our eternal interests. How I miss you all now! It is too much for me to think of it! May God bless you all!
“Mr. McCarter took me in the morning to his church, where we heard Mr. Jones from Philadelphia. In the afternoon I went to Dr. Smyth’s church, and heard an excellent sermon from the text, ‘Unite my heart to fear thy name.’ O that all our hearts were thus united in the fear and love of God!
“I then went to the colored Sabbath school, and my heart melted within me to see a hundred black children listening to the instructions of their teachers, and not any of them with Bible, hymn-book, or text-book in their hands. How sad it is that, in this land of Sabbaths and Bibles and good books, so large a portion of our fellow beings should be deprived of the privilege of reading God’s blessed Book! The teachers are evidently men of God, doing the best they can under the circumstances; but how little fruit can be expected where such barriers are thrown up to the free ingress of the Gospel! The mode of instruction is that used in infant schools. The teacher puts questions, and all answer at once. If they do not know the answer, he repeats the words, and they follow. Their singing of ‘The Happy Land’ was beautiful.
​“An old woman in Mr. McCarter’s family was introduced to me. I asked her how old she was. ‘Don’t know, massa.’ ‘Do you know the Lord Jesus?’ ‘O yes, massa, I sleep with Jesus, I walk with Jesus, I eat with Jesus, I drink with Jesus. Jesus has promised to come soon and take me home.’ And then, pressing her hands upon her breast, she exclaimed, ‘O how happy I shall be!’ Mr. McCarter said that grace had done more for her than any one he ever knew.
“O my dear children, how much reason have you to bless God that you are not placed in the condition of slaves! and yet the poor slave that talked with me to-day about the love of Jesus may take a higher place in the kingdom of Heaven than some of us. May God enable us all to improve our privileges, and while it is yet to-day labor in the Lord’s vineyard as we have opportunity!
“There is much here to arrest the attention of a Northern man, but I do not wish, on the evening of the Lord’s day, to speak of things temporal and transitory. O that the scenes I have witnessed may make me more devoted to the service of the Master than ever before! My mind has been so tossed about and harassed that I cannot attain that blessed peace which I have so often enjoyed at home. The Sabbath has been for many years so laden with blessings, that when I occasionally wander abroad I miss exceedingly the quiet and peaceful enjoyment which I prize so highly. May we remember each other daily at the throne of grace, and fervently pray for such blessings as we so much need. We can thus help each other mightily, though far separated, and in blessing each other be ourselves blessed.
“To-morrow at eight we leave for Nashville. I shall hope for letters there from you all. Will not that be ​fine? O that I had them now! Farewell, and may the Good Shepherd of the sheep watch over, lead, and bless us all.”
It may not be amiss to insert here another letter of Mr. Carter’s, written two years before, while a delegate to the Assembly at Philadelphia, as a specimen of the letters he constantly wrote to his family when separated from them. On this occasion he had been home on furlough over Sabbath, and writes on his return to his post:—
“My dear Wife,—With the tenderest feelings I parted from you this morning. The few hours we spent together from Saturday evening until I left you this morning were hours of as unmingled enjoyment as we ever expect to enjoy this side Heaven. Truly, our Father has bountifully blessed us. O that our lives may be wholly consecrated to Him!
“The dear children! I did feel sorry that we had not indulged them with a ride this morning, it was so fine and clear and mild. May we be enabled to deal faithfully with them, and may the Lord and Saviour dwell in them richly by his Spirit. O to see them safe in the ark!
“Dear T―, you have now reached the age at which your father was enrolled a member of the church visible. I sat down at the communion table when I was fourteen years of age, and the Master whom I have served has not been a hard Master. I have reason to bless him for the way in which he has led me from that day to this. ‘Choose ye this day whom ye will serve.’ O delay not! Pray earnestly that your father’s God, the God of your mother, may be your own God, and may the Comforter manifest Jesus in your heart now and forever.
​“Dear S―, what I have said to T― is nearly as applicable to you. You have grown up together, studied together, eaten together, travelled together. He for whom you are named is an angel in heaven, and will joy over you when you enter in the narrow way that leadeth unto life.
“Dear R―, what shall I say to you? I need not ask you if you love your father and mother. I know you do. Then, my dear boy, pray to God to bless you, and keep you, and lead you in the path your fathers trod, that you may when you die enter their bright abodes on high.
“And my dear little daughter, my only daughter, if you be as good and happy as your parents pray you may be, your portion will be that of those who love and serve the Lord. You will do what you can to please your papa and mamma, and above all to please God. Never forget that God sees you by day and by night. And when you pray, ask for his blessing, as you would ask mamma for bread when you are hungry, or water when you are thirsty.
“And now, my dear wife and children all, my heart yearns over you. May we all be of one heart and of one mind, children of the Most High, journeying to our home above!
“Poor Grandma [Mrs. Thomson], I suppose you think it unkind to address you last. But you know the feelings we all cherish towards you, and it is not so easy to admonish one who was in Christ before I was born. May your last years be your brightest, your happiest, your holiest. Though the earthly spring in which you so much delighted be dried up, the Fountain is still open. May it refresh you daily!”
Mr. Carter’s earnest longing for the conversion of his ​children was early gratified. His oldest son says, that when a few years later he told his father that the youngest of the family, thirteen years old, wished to unite with the church, he burst into joyful tears, exclaiming, “I have n’t deserved this. How good God is to me,—so much better than I deserve!” He had no greater joy than to see his children walk in the truth. In his old age he rejoiced with joy unspeakable as one after another his grandchildren came into the fold. He was wont to say, with thanksgiving, that of his twenty-five grandchildren all over twelve years of age were members of the church, some of them entering into communion at a very tender age.
He was greatly interested in the cause of Total Abstinence, and took every opportunity to enforce his views on this subject. The following stories were often told by him in public addresses and in private conversations:—
“When a boy of twelve years, I was in a field a mile from home, on a bright October day, helping to gather in the potato crop. A man came up to us, and asked if we had heard the news. We said no. ‘Last night on his way home from the fair Rob Scott murdered two men without any apparent cause.’ In our village there were two fairs or great market days in the year. On these days the liquor shops were doing a great business, and men who were sober all through the year became intoxicated. Rob Scott was of this number. He had tasted whiskey only once before in his life, and that fatal night he overtook two men walking peacefully home, and in a frenzy knocked down one and then the other, and ran to a cottage a short distance off and cried aloud, ‘I have killed two men down on the road.’ He was known by the family, as he lived only a half-mile ​from the spot, and they said, ‘You are crazy, it cannot be so.’ ‘It is so. Go and see.’ They went and found the two men. One of them said, ‘I am Simm, from Greenlaw.’ The murderer ran thirty miles that night, to Berwick. The whole country was quickly roused, and next day he was arrested and carried to the Jedburgh jail He was tried and condemned to die on the spot where the fearful crime was committed. Thousands came to witness the execution. I was in that crowd. At a turn of the road I was within a few feet of him, and such a haggard face I never saw. It haunted me for many a year. When on the scaffold, he in a loud voice that was heard by thousands prayed for mercy,—that he might be delivered from bloodguiltiness,—prayed for the widows whom he had made widows, and for the children whom he had made fatherless. I never heard such earnest pleading, and I never forgot it.
“The poor man had been visited by several clergymen, one of whom preached from the text, ‘It is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation, that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the chief.’ This made a deep impression on his mind, and he was hopefully converted. The lesson I learned from Rob Scott’s sad story never has been forgotten. I dreaded the taste, or even the touch, of the insidious poison, and long before I had even heard of a temperance society I labored to save my young friends from the use of ardent spirits. After I entered into business in New York, many of the Scottish immigrants on landing called on me, and I used to urge them to sign at once the temperance pledge, and many of them did so. Others declined, and alas! many went to the drunkard’s grave.”
​“One day a carriage came to the door of my shop, and a lady stepped out, and came up to me and took me by the hand, and asked, ‘Do you not know me?’ I said, ‘No.’ ‘You and I were schoolmates: don’t you remember Jean?’ At once I recognized her. She was the daughter of the hardest man in my native village. He was profane and intemperate, and his poor wife and children had a hard time with him. He took the dead from their graves, and sold them to the surgeons for dissection. On one occasion his poor wife went into the barn after dark and touched a dead man’s hand, and she became a raving maniac. She was sent to Bedlam, where she died. His daughter Jean escaped from her miserable home, came to New York, and after some time married a young German mechanic, who rose to be a prosperous merchant in a large city in the interior, where she had a happy home. She wanted to purchase McCheyne’s works for a gift to a friend. While I was conversing with Jean, a miserable-looking young man entered the store, He had neither hat, shoes, nor stockings. One of my clerks went to him and asked him to go out; but he said he was very desirous to see me. I went to him and inquired what he wanted. He told me he was the son of a parish minister in Scotland whom I well knew, and that he was starving and almost naked. While I was talking with him, an elder of our church entered, and I asked whether he could give him something to do. He employed a large number of men, and, after talking with him, he said, ‘Come to-morrow morning to my shop, and I will give you something to do, and gave him his address. The young man promised to go. I then got him some clothing, and gave him money to get underclothing, and he left me. Next day at twelve o’clock the elder came and told me ​that the poor creature had not come. After five months he came again in as bad a plight as before, and I asked why he had not gone to the shop as he had been invited. He said he could not pass a grog-shop without a glass, and he went in and drank till the money I gave him was gone. I tried to reason with him, told him he had a good education and good example in his father’s house. He said, ‘You are mistaken; I was not well educated. We had whiskey at table in my father’s house every day, and I learned to love it then.’
“Here was a striking contrast. The daughter of a wretched father and the son of a leading clergyman had changed places, and what a change! How many since that time have I seen swept into the vortex of destruction by this horrid vice! O, what heaps of slain call out for vengeance on us! And yet the giddy dance of death goes round.”
In the summer of 1855 Mr. Carter went for the first time to Sharon Springs, New York. In this place he spent six summers, attracting there relatives and friends till there was often a party of sixty or seventy which gravitated round him as a centre. The society was delightful. There were always a good many clergymen in the house, sometimes eight or nine at a time,—Rev. Drs. Krebs, Nicholas Murray, Cleveland, and his own beloved pastor Dr. McElroy; Mr. Chauncey Goodrich and Prof. O. M. Mitchell, the eminent astronomer, were friends with whom he there had most delightful communion. Archbishop Hughes of the Roman Catholic Church was there one summer, and they had much pleasant intercourse with each other, talking over things ancient and modern. They found much common ground, but did not hesitate to discuss amicably controverted points, such as Pascal and the Port ​Royalists. They both regarded Milton and Young as favorite poets, and were drawn together by a fellow feeling in that respect.
A short time before, there had been a very “animated” correspondence between the Archbishop and Dr. Nicholas Murray (Kirwan) in the public press, and it was rather strange that they should be spending some weeks at the same hotel. They did not seek each other’s society, and Dr. Murray was a wee bit scandalized that Mr. Carter should be so intimate with the prelate.
When Mr. Carter first went to Sharon, there was no church in the place, and services were held in the parlors of the different hotels. He became a sort of ruler in the synagogue, arranging that such services should be held with the utmost regularity Sunday morning and evening, seeing that the chosen parlor was got ready, arranging that a minister should always be provided, seating the congregation, and having everything done decently and in order. There was always the best of preaching from some of the most prominent clergymen in the country. After a time churches were built and services kept up the year round.
While at Sharon, in June, 1859, Mr. Carter received a letter from Dr. J. H. Thornwell of Columbia, South Carolina, with whom he had long been on terms of intimacy. It gave an account of the sudden death of his daughter on the eve of her marriage. The letter was so remarkable that Professor Mitchell asked to be allowed to read it on Sunday evening at a religions service in the parlor of the hotel. Two years later Dr. Thornwell and Professor Mitchell were prominent leaders in the great struggle between the North and the South. Both passed from earth in the heat of the conflict, and met ​in the better country where all is peace. Dr. Thornwell’s letter is as follows:—
Theological Seminary, June 27, 1859.
My Dear Friend:— I have just received your kind and cordial letter of Christian sympathy, and as the subject is one upon which I take a melancholy pleasure in dwelling, I proceed at once to answer your tender and affectionate inquiries. You may remember that I told you of her approaching wedding. She was to have been married on the 15th instant, to a young man eminently worthy of any heart or any hand. I reached home on the morning of the 9th, and found her in bed with a raging fever. She had then been sick two days. Her symptoms appeared to me unfavorable, and I called in two other physicians. The next day I became alarmed, and on Friday gave her to understand that her case was critical. She was not at all disconcerted; she assured me that her peace was made with God; that though she had many earthly ties, and some of them very tender, there was nothing that she loved in comparison with the Lord Jesus Christ, and nothing that she was not ready to sacrifice at his call. She called all the family to her bedside, united in prayer with them, and gave to each a parting benediction. The scene was sublime beyond description. To see a young girl, elegant, accomplished, and highly esteemed, with the most flattering prospects in life, just upon the eve of her marriage with one whom she devotedly loved, resign all earthly hopes and schemes and joys with perfect composure, and welcome death as the voice of one supremely loved, was a spectacle that none who witnessed can ever forget. It was grand, it was even awful. It impressed some who were in the room in a way they were never impressed before, and I felt more like adoring God for the wondrous triumph of His grace than weeping for my own loss. After this scene she rallied, and the next day the physicians thought that there was a fair ​prospect of her recovery. When it was announced to her that she might yet get well, she said that she wished to have no choice in the matter; all that she desired was that God might be glorified, whether by her life or her death. For the sake of others she might desire to live, but upon the whole she would prefer, if it was the Lord’s will, to depart and be with Jesus, She spent the whole day in listening to the Scriptures, and conversing with me about the condition of the soul after death. She was perfectly calm and collected, and what she said was the deliberate utterance of faith, and not the language of excitement.
Before the last hour came she had a momentary conflict, but gained a glorious victory, and her joys were irrepressible; she threw her arms around my neck, and told me that her happiness was beyond expression; she felt the presence of Jesus, and rejoiced in him with joy inexpressible and fall of glory. It was a glorious death, a triumphal procession. What makes the whole matter more consoling is, that there had been for months a marked and rapid progress in divine things. She had been much in prayer, and as a proof of her intense spirituality she has left behind her a paper containing her reflections and feelings and purposes in the prospect of her marriage, and all bespeak the condition of one whose eye was single to the glory of God. It is a precious document, absolutely amazing for her years. Two days before she was taken sick, she had been on a visit to some friend in Sumter, and upon her return spoke to her mother of the delightful communion she had enjoyed with God in prayer. The Master was evidently maturing her for Heaven. The family has been amazingly sustained. The truth is, we dare not murmur, The grace has been so transcendent that it would be monstrous to repine. I feel my loss, for I loved her very tenderly; but I bless God for what my eyes have seen, and my ears heard. We have been afraid to grieve, the triumph was so illustrious, My second daughter is a professor of religion, and I think a true child of God. ​My boys are still out of the ark. Pray for us, my dear friend, especially pray that I may have no unconverted child. The event has been greatly sanctified to me and my wife. God grant that we may never grow faint. I never relax my hold upon the covenant. Jesus has been more precious to me than I have felt him for a long time, and the Gospel more glorious, Henceforth I am bound, I trust, for eternity. I want to live only for the glory of God. Pray for me and mine, The Lord bless you, and reward you for your kind and Christian sympathies.
As ever yours,
J. H. Thornwell.