Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1904-02-29
Earl Fitzgerald died

LOn0On. anu Dl5 SON. LOru 10Omas
Fitzgerald, soon after his fathers
death, in the reign of Henry VIII, WAS
executed on the charge OF treason,
their estate being confiscated. But
the only crime of which they were
guilty was chat of passionate love
for Ireland, and leadership il move
ment to free Ireland from English
tyranny.
1t is hardly necessary for me to say
that Mrs. Keys grew to womanhood
in a religious atmosphere, from her
earliest days receiving religious in
struction and training in the home;
for when you see an old person, sight
and hearing almost gone, but whose
soul delights in and feeds upon
the precious Word of God, which
memory brings to life, you may be
sure that such an one has enjoyed the
privilege of Christian home, and
Christian training. This was GER
tainly true of Mrs. Keys. Her father
and her mother were staunch and
loyal members o. the Church of
England; and earnest and devoted
Christians withal.
She sprang from long-lived stock.
Her mother attained to the good old
age of So, and her father lived to be
"a. None, however, of her brothers
or sisters attained to a great age, save
one, a sister who lived to be over
ninety. All these, her kin, seven
sisters and three brothers, have long
since gone to join the great silent
majority, while she solitary and alone
remains, as her parents would have
expressed it, ''a monument of Gods
mercy"
Her father and her mother, as loyal
members of the Church of England,
were opposed to John Wesley and the
religious movement for which he
stood; but Jane very early in life
experienced religion for herself and
became an enthusiastic and ardent
Methodist. To this faith she has
always been loyal, and she is, as you
know, to-day a loved and bonored
member of the Methodist church of
this place. In other days, when
bodily strength permitted, nothing
afforded her greater joy than to be
present at the class meeting, giving
public testimony to the love and
power of Christ; and in later years,
when denied this privilege because of
physical weakness and the increasing
infrmities of age, she has none the
less continued to give precious testi-
1nony in behalf of her Lord and
Master to all with whom she has
come in contact.
I have not the knowledge at my
command to enter into the details of
her life, so singularly blessed by God,
through all these hundred years; nor
is such a detailed description
necessary. She has lived quiet,
unassuming life, in which the care of
her home and family has naturally
taken up large part of her time and
energy.
A few of the leading facts of her
life may not, however, be out of
place. She was married, in Ireland,
in the year 1882, to John Keys, and
the first twenty years of her married
life were spent in Ireland, where also
her family of nine children were born.
Although she was not married until
she was twenty-nine years of age,
that fair day has now the sombre
background of seventy-one years.
Of her nine children, five are still
living, three of whom are with us on
this occasion. She came with her
family to Montreal in the year 1852,
she being then almost fifty years OF
age. They took passage in a sailing
vessel, and having a very stormy
voyage reached Montreal at last
having been nine weeks on the ocean
During this long and tedious passage,
one of her children died; and thereby
hangs tale. 1t was her intention to
have Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob
reproduced in the boys of her family
and we'll could she have carried out
this plan with her family of niue, haG
she only begun in time; but this she
did not do, and so there was Abra
ham, and there was Isaac, but Jacob
never came.
We shall never know what we hav.
1 lost in not having Jacob, but we d.
Y know what we have gained in having
Isaac, and so we have abundant caus,
s for thanksgiving that God has givel
i us such good man, and one 81
f interested in every good thing, as
: Isaac Keys.
4 Mrs. Keys came from Montreal Ma,
> 1, 1872. Soon after the organization
Of the Methodist church here she be
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