Page:The Life of Mary Baker Eddy (Wilbur).djvu/147

Rh lint and bandages for the hospitals. In this work both sisters were active and much together in their old-time affectionate intimacy. With her wasting illness gone, Mrs. Patterson recovered her early comeliness, her cheeks again became rosy, her eyes sparkling, and her spirits gay. She wrote a letter at this time to Quimby in which she said, “I am as much an escaped prisoner as my dear husband was.”

All through the summer she remained at Tilton, active in charitable work; but in the fall her sense of private duty and personal obligation led her to go to Saco, the early home of her husband. Here she visited his brother and was for a time with her husband, whom she endeavored to persuade to return to his practise. His wander-fever was not yet satisfied, but he agreed to make an effort to establish himself, and for this ultimate object went to Lynn, Massachusetts.

Disappointed in his purposeless conduct, Mrs. Patterson felt a spiritual depression overtaking her. It seemed likely that she was going to find it difficult to reconcile her husband to orderly living, just when her improved health made life seem to stretch before her invitingly with many avenues open for usefulness. Her perplexity was so serious that it amounted to anxiety, and now she experienced a return of a number of minor ailments and illnesses which threatened to culminate in a serious renewal of suffering.

Was this cure of hers, so widely proclaimed, to lapse, and was she again to return to the old misery? In the year which had just passed she had been