● ● ● around the table and at evening with deeper memories separated!” Although the three sisters were once again together, she felt “the most solemn impression” that before another Thanksgiving they might again be at a distance from each other or among “the quiet dead.”
From this melancholy she is roused to more spirited comment by the next piece of news:
Father is to be married to Mrs. Duncan of Candia N. H. next Thurs week; her best carpets and goods have arrived. Last year a little later than this I went into that cold damp house with Father, helped cleanse and set it in order and lived alone with a little girl and him all winter; in the Spring he told me if George was not sent away he would send him to the Poor House (after abusing him as he did through the winter). Now he comes to me to help arrange the things of his bride; but I will see them in the bottomless pit before doing it. Every thing of our departed Mother’s has to give place to them and Father is as happy as a school boy.88
Mrs. Glover appears not to have realized at first how greatly this change would affect her own life. On December 2, three days before Mark Baker married Mrs. Elizabeth Patterson Duncan at Candia, she wrote a friend cheerfully:
Next week is the time I have anticipated to visit my Uncle and cousins at Boscawen and the latter part of it go to Fisherville. I have little confidence in the scheme of visits when the weather is so cold and changeful. Yet this seems the first opportunity I have had for a year to leave home and if my health remains sufficient I cannot well deny myself the pleasure. I expect to be very busy this winter compiling my stray sketches and think it will at least amuse me and all (who may chance to read them doubtless).89
88 Mary Baker Glover to George Sullivan Baker, 28 November 1850, 1919.001.0024, LMC. This passage refutes the often-repeated statement, stemming from Milmine, that Mark Baker accused his daughter of not being willing to “own” her child. [See Milmine, “Mary Baker G. Eddy,” McClure’s, p. 242.]
↑89 Mary Baker Glover to Priscilla Clement Wheeler, 2 December 1850, 1919.001.0012, LMC.
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