Viewing page 13 of 607

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

3

Sunday June 17" 1883. 

I went over to the cemetery this morning. They had covered Maurices grave with evergreens and Mrs. Davis and Sara went there yesterday and arranged some flowers upon it. I am going to cover it with morning glories. Have written to Mrs. Sawyer and to Mary Gifford. Pa read at the dinner table with a broken voice "If I should die tonight" so many things in it seemed fitting to poor Maurice. Sara has just shown me a book in which he copied favorite poems, a book Gertrude gave him. The last one, yet uncopied seemed most fitting to his own case. He had a tender spot in his heart and I grieve that I could not have got nearer to him. In what sharp contrast are all my feelings toward him now to what I have so often said of him and written in my diary when he was so severely trying our patience. Mary and Downing went to N   .Y. by the six o'clk train to meet Booth and Edwina who are expected daily now. We were all sorry to have them go. John and Nannie came up and spent the evening. It is always pleasant to have them here.

Monday 18". I went over to the cemetery after breakfast and transplanted a number of morning glories on Maurices grave. Victor Quilliard who seemed to be superintending the putting up the great monument on Capt. Andersons lot, came over and talked with me. He told me the cemetery association had bought 17 acres adjoining on the Post farm for $1700. The morning was gray and promised rain. I drove down to Rondout to do some errands and before I got back it began to rain and has rained gently nearly all day. Sara has been arranging poor Maurices room for Downing taking Maurices things out and putting away his clothes. I helped her look over his trunk. It is very trying to go over the belongings of the departed; to see the little trifles that remain is but to bring afresh before one the dead. Maurice maintained a Spartan simplicity in his room and his surroundings and never collected much. His room seemed his castle and so vividly suggested his presence in the order in which he kept everything. I cant help thinking of him constantly. After dinner I took a photograph of him which was made several years ago and went over to my studio and painted in a little sketch of him which I think looks like him. I wish I could make a picture of him as he looked at his best and as he ought to look. I thought today in the loneliness that seems to haunt me here what companions we could have been had he been different and what a comfort we might have been to each other; but brothers seldom are companionable. Sara had a letter this evening from Uncle Patricks daughter Gertrude Perrin telling him how shocked she was to see a notice of Maurices death in a Buffalo paper. She was going to write to him that day of the death of Aunt Mary, Uncle Patricks widow, who died very quietly on Sunday June 10". It has been so cool today that we have found a fire very comfortable.

Tuesday 19. I painted in umber & white another and larger head of Maurice this forenoon which is better. Marion sat to me this afternoon but I dont get on very well. Mr. Magee called. Downing telegraphed yesterday that Ruth and Edwina had arrived. Sara had a letter from Janette which I answered telling her all about Maurices death. 

Transcription Notes:
. ---------- Reopened for Editing 2023-05-05 17:42:44