Page:An Epistle to Posterity.djvu/121

98 daughters of Mr. James A. Hamilton, Mrs. Schuyler and Miss Mary Morris Hamilton, Mrs. Kirkland (the first of our female humoristic writers, author of A New Home, Who'll Follow?), Parke Godwin, Willis Gaylord Clark, Huntington, Frothingham, Lewis Lang, Dr. Osgood, and so on, met at his house; their names escape me, the list is so long.

Dr. Bellows's wit-combats with Mrs. Frances Anne Kemble were kept up twenty years, each giving the other friendly little pats; and no one enjoyed her witty retorts more than he did, although perhaps his ears tingled.

Dr. Bellows's life was a great part of New York, and of the war it was the bright and illuminated page. "Why does not some one write it? What a book it would be! I suppose his administration of the Sanitary Commission would read like a romance now — alas, how much of it I saw! and some of it I was.

I cannot remember when Dr. Bellows began to be a bright star in my life. We were neighbors in the country, and he often took my mother's tea. Many old associations continued to draw us together until his lamented death; and now that he is a brilliant memory I often find myself referring to that excellent example of undying cheerfulness, that patience in which he excelled all his peers. Dr. Bellows was a fortunate man outwardly; he was always first in every circle; he had enjoyed a great deal of the luxurious happiness of travel; the world was full of beautiful places for him to be happy in, for he made every day a holiday for all around him. He found that the bliss of a spirit was in action; he worked hard; but he had a great many grievous trials, for which he wore the armor of a Christian spirit. There could be no enlargement of