Wellesley College - Legenda Yearbook (Wellesley, MA)

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Dearest Holker : I have but one word to write to you, and that is immortality. It is all I have learned tor a year, and yet the time has been well spent. Henceforward there is nothing to fear in life. It came at the right time. Sick with labor and sorrow, in the cold winter night I stood by the great river, and from the wind among the treetops, and the bright stars, and the ceaseless voice of the waters, I heard the one word that gives life and strength, and from that time there is no need of sorrow or of weariness. But with all his delicate instincts and noble aspirations, Mr. Durant had never yielded his will to God. He now sought escape from sorrow in the rapid rereading of the VVaverley novels, replying to his wife ' s entreaties, You must take yoiu- medicine in your way, and I must take mine in mine. Tlie father and mother, thus bereaved, lavished their love all the more abundantly upon their boy, an exquisite child of rare intellectual promise. Generous-hearted, atVectionate, and fearless, inheriting the beauty and high spirit of his parents, this cherished son, The hyacinthine boy, for whom Morn well might break and April bloom, — The gracious boy, who did adorn The world whereinto he was born, delighted his father ' s pride and stimulated his father ' s ambition, giving impetus to every toil and significance to all the future. He was his mother ' s close companion and daily joy. Before her his childish heart lay as an open volume, white of leaf. A friend wrote: One incident which occurred only a few days before he was taken ill, I recall at this moment. Willie, of whom he was very fond, said, ' Harry, I ' ll tell you something if you wont tell any- body. ' ' I ' ll tell my mamma, ' answered the dear child ; ' I always tell my mamma everything I know. ' In his ninth year Harry suddenly sickened and died, and through that illness and that death the father ' s life was consecrated to God. This was the mother ' s consolation, — a joy even deeper than her unutterable sorrow. Ever sacred to Wellesley College must be the prayer written at this time by Mr. Durant for their use together, antl daily repeated by them for many years : — O Eternal and Holy Jesus, because we humbly lielieve that out of th ' great and tendei mercy toward us thy servants, thou hast not been willing to spare to us the life of our beloved boy, but hast taken him as a little lamb gently up in thine arms to bear him to sweet and sacred pastures in thine own Emmanuel ' s land, therefore we do beseech thee to make this great sorrow to be to us a means of salvation, a fountain of immortal hopes and consolations.

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Love is still a child immortal, And his wings will soon expand, As we near the shadowy portal To that other promised land. Whether born in joy or sorrow, Whether crowned with thorns or flowers, Love looks forward to a morrow In a brighter world than ours. Past the sleep that knows no waking. Past the night that turns to day. There the dawn of love is breaking, There the shadows pass away. Their Boston home was located, first, on the corner of Bowdoin and Allston vStreets. In iS6o they removed to 77 Mt. Vernon Street, and in 1S6S to Mrs. Durant ' s present residence, 30 Marlborough Street. The Wellesley estate was purchased the year after the marriage, and here the summers were spent in what is now known as the farmhouse. The young wife delighted in putting to use her domestic accomplishments. In these first summers at Welles- ley she used herself to skim every pan of milk that came into the house, and make all the preserves and delicacies. She loved the grounds, and knew each tree by name. She was interested in raising fowls, and was so proud of nineteen baby turkeys, of a choice breed from Brandywine, that on a stormy night she and her husband both rose to the rescue of that pre- cious brood. While Mr. Durant groped about in the thunderstorm, and hunted down, by the flashes of lightning, one aflrighted turkevkin after another, until all the nineteen had been caught, Mrs. Durant made a fire in the kitchen stove, and tenderly taking each little gobbler as it was triumphantly presented by its dripping deliverer, put a drop of wine down its throat and deposited it in a basket in the oven, to dream co .ily of Thanksgiving Day until it had recovered from its chill. In the spring of 1855 g ' ' eat joy befell them in the birth of their only son, Henry Fowle Durant, Jr., and in the fall of 1S57 ' I ' ttle Pauline Cazenove gladdened the household for a brief six weeks. The death of this infant was a poignant sorrow to the parents. Added to her maternal mourning was Mrs. Durant ' s keen disappointment that the pain of this loss did not turn her husband ' s heart to the Divine comforter. She had herself united with the Presby- terian church when a schoolgirl, in 1S47, and was as unswerving in her Christian faith as she had ever been untiring in Christian service. Mr. Durant was a man of essentially religious nature. An extract from a letter written soon after his twenty-first birthdav to a college friend is evidence enough of this, although other evidence, as his admiration for the Bible, or his pleasure in the church service, is not wanting. The letter runs : —

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Grant to us, in our luunilitv, the abiding faith that this our son is not dead, but is alive again ; that he hath not been taken away from us, but has gone his way before to the Celestial City, where we, too, may soon enter in to be led bv him to thy feet, if we through our sincere repentance and by thy saving grace may at last win pardon and remission of our sins. We beseech thee, also, O Lord, that it mav not be counted as a sin in us if we, in all humilit3 ' and lowliness of heart, do now in our affliction cherish the faith that this, our dearlv beloved son, has fulfilled the mission given to him bv his Father in Heaven, by teaching to us, his earthly parents, through his death, the worthlessness and vanity of all that this world can give or take away, and, that mission ended, he, innocent and pure, has gone before us to lead us in the way of salvation. We pray thee also, O Lord, that through thy holv blessing we maj ' , each day that we live in this world, cherish alwavs the sweet and precious memorv of this our beloved and only son ; and grant of thv most merciful kindness that our love for him and his love for us, so true and so tender that it never knew any change or shadow of turning, may become a holy and blessed means of leading us from sin, and all the temptations and sorrows Jind vanities of this evil world, to the only life which is eternal and that fadeth not away. O Christ, teach us to say, the Lord gave, and the Lord taketh awav ; blessed be the name ot the Lord. And, oh, Lord Jesus, because thou hast also said, out of the great tenderness of thy divine love, ' Sutler the little children to come unto me, and forbid them not, for of such is the kingdom of God, ' we do, therefore, beseech thee that through thy abiding mercy we may receive the Kingdom of Heaven as little children, and may one day stand at thy feet with this our departed child, all our sins forgiven through our sincere repentance, by the mystery of thy redeeming blood and pardoning grace; there with him, and with our little daughter, who went before, to worship the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, forever and forever. A few months after the child ' s death, Mr. Durant, who, fame and fortune and the highest legal honors at his command, had quitted the bar, and entered, this layman of seraphic speech, into the preaching of the gospel, said to his wife : — Wouldn ' t vou like to consecrate these Welleslev grounds, this place that was to have been Harr ' s home, to some special work for God. ' On such high foundation stands Welleslev College. From such a costly loss arose our gain. We know the story of the deciding, the planning, the building, the ojsening, the or- ganizing, — of all the splendid energies poured into the work by brilliant brain, and fervent heart, and unconquerable will. At last the dream of youth came true. At last the baffled poet wrought his great life poem, but out of materials richer than words. Once a year we are hushed in chapel to hear again the inspiring historv and receive the solemn message of 23