Page:Robert Carter- his life and work. 1807-1889 (IA robertcarterhis00coch).pdf/192

176 the first time that we ever saw a face to which we were afterwards to look up with such a tender veneration was when Robert Carter and Dr. McCosh were on the lawn in front of the old farmhouse playing croquet. But the dear elder did not, any more than the learned divine, fail to seize every opportunity for doing good. He attended a little church among the bills, and his contribution to it was fully one tenth of the pastor’s salary; and when the latter was laid upon a bed of sickness, no visits were more frequent and more welcome than those of this man of God, whose very presence in the sick-room was a benediction.”

One of Mr. Carter’s most delightful memories of Stockbridge was of an evening at Dr. Field’s house, with Dr. McCosh, Dr. Mark Hopkins and his brother Dr. Albert Hopkins, and Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe. It was an occasion never to be forgotten by any who listened to the flow of brilliant conversation.

The little church to which Dr. Field alludes was one in the village of Curtisville, about two miles from Stockbridge. The first summer that he visited Berkshire he was boarding with his family in a pleasant house, beautifully situated between Stockbridge and Curtisville, and with a lovely view over the picturesque hills and valleys of Berkshire. There can hardly be a more beautiful village on earth than Stockbridge, with its magnificent elms shading its broad street,—with its lovely homes, where culture and refinement have made their abode since Eliot and Jonathan Edwards lived there. The first Sunday Mr. Carter drove with his party to Stockbridge to church, but during the following week he noticed a spire near at hand among the trees, and inquired if there was not a church within walking distance. “O yes, there is the Curtisville church, but it is a plain little affair. You would not