Morris tribune. [volume] (Morris, Minn.) 1880-2000, 1881-04-28
THEODORE PARKER'S WIDOW.
Sketch of Life, Courtship and Characterize
Domestic Woman.

Sketch of Life, Courtship and Character-A
Domestic Woman.
The widow of Theodore Parker died at
her residence in Boston Saturday night the
9th inst Mrs. Parker was sixty seven
years of age. Her husband died May 10,
1860, in the fiftieth year of his age, and was
buried at Florence, Italy, where he had
gone in search of health. Her funeral
took place on the 18th, and was attended
by many old friends of the family.
Miss Lydia Cabot was blue eyed, brown
haired, diffident girl of 10 when young
Theodore Parker at the age of % first met
her in WATERFOWL, Mass, where he was
teaching private school, and she was fin
ishing her education under the eye of Dr.
Convers Francis, the brother of Mrs. Child,
who was then the minister of Watertown.
Theodore and Lydia taught in his Sunday
school and boarded in the same family
that of good Mrs. Broad. They took walks
together along Beaver Brook, and to the
Waverly oaks, and surveyed the view from
Wellington and Prospect hills. The natur-
al result followed, such as Keats describes
in Isabelle" p
'Fair Isabel, poor simple Isabel!
Lorenzo, young palmer in Loves eye!
They could not in the self-same mansion dwell
Without some stir of heart some malady;
They could not sit at meals, but feel how well
1t soothed each to be the other by;
They could not, sure, beneath the same roof
sleep,
But to each Other sigh and nightly weep
ssWith every morn their love grew tenderer,
With every eve deeper and tenderer still;
He might not in house, field or garden stir,
But her full shape would all his seeing ILL.,
And his continual voice was pleasanter
To her than noise of trees or hidden rill;
Her lutte string gave an echo of his name,
She spoiled her half done broidery with the
same" o..
Their attachment had happier sequel
than of Lorenzo and Isabella, they we're
engaged in October, 1888, married in April,
1887, and settled in the little parsonage
house at West Roxbury III the following
home in their pilgrimage, for Parker was
born at Lexington and Miss Cabot at New
ton, the only daughter of John
Cabot, who was connected with the Essex
county family of that name, and also with
the Jacksons and other noted Boston peo-
pie of that period. Writing to Miss Cobbe
in Ireland, in 1857 Parker said of his wife:
''We have been married nearly twenty one
yeras, and have never child. We have
moderate little property, partly my wife's
inheritance, partly my earnings; a good
house, large collection of books. Her
name was Cabot; the family claim descent
from the famous Giovanni Cab otti, who
discovered these parts of the continent.
Her domestic name is Bear, or Bersie; and
various symbols of Beauty and the Beast
appear in the house. AS usual she is nearly
the opposite Of her husband, except in the
matter of hilantbrophy. You are very dear
to us oil. ought to say my wife was born
September 10, 1878; and so is three years
younger than I. She is tall, with blue eyes
and brown hair, little white beginning to
steal in insidiously." At her husbands
death, two or three years after this, Mrs.
Parker's hair was sprinkled with gray, and
for years now it has been snow white. AS
he intimates in the letter just quoted, they
had few intellectual traits in common,
thought their sympathies for mankind were
the same. Mrs. Parker had little learning
and cared little to acquire more; she had
not much expression and seldom took an
active part in conversation, while her hus-
band was a master in that way; she was of
quiet and undemonstrative disposition,
while he was activity itself, and full Of the
broadcast and tenderest sensibilities. But
she was devoted to him and thirsted less
| for "the talents not her own" than most
wives do in similar situations; she was a
| perfect housekeeper In her own way,
and made it easy for him to exer-
else the hospitality to which his
generous heart prompted him. She adopt
ed his opinions, either because they were
her own, or for the more feminine reason
that they were his, and he was hers; and
when he was called on to make the sacrifices
and endure the reproaches which fell up
on him, she did not make his burden heav-
Ter by her own regrets. She had not the
quick wit, the sprightly talent, the self sup
pressing tact of Carlyle's JEANNE, but,
like her, she made the pathway of domestic
care and pecuniary difficulty easier for her
husband to walk in. They were never rich,
but never poor, and it was through her
means and her good management that he
was left free to do his work without the
burden of debt and embarrassment on his
shoulders This was much and so was the
sincere and undivided affection which she
gave him. "
| F-a-f.rs.r 2 81. g.-..ss-.EE