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IN MEMORIAM—MRS. MARY E. BRYAN
Charles W. Hubner.
I ———I
Laurel around her bro, But ’tis her dust alone,
The poet’s crown, That sleep has fallen upon,
And, as a sign From which fair flowers shall bloom,
Os peace divine. To brighten her grave’s gloom;
That doth enfold her now BaHk Her soul is—hark! how clear
A lily on her breast, KBBF Upon my faith’s keen ear,
So did we lay her down A voice falls like a star;
■fl
■‘WHO ARE THE BLEST?”
“Who art the blest?
“They .who have kept their sympathies
awake,
And scattered good for more than cus
tom’s sake;
Steadfast and tender in the hour of
need,
Gentle in thought, benevolent in deed;
Whose looks have power to make dis
sension cease,
Whose smiles are pleasant, and whose
words are peace;
They who have lived as harmless as
the dove,
Teachers of truth, and ministers of
love—
Love for all moral power, all mental
grace,
Love for the humblest of the human
race,
Love for that tranquil joy which vir
tue brings,
Love for the Giver of all goodly
things;
True followers of that soul-exalting
plan
Which Christ laid down to bless and
govern man,
They who can calmly linger at the
last,
Survey the future and recall the past,
And with that hope which triumphs
over pain,
Feel well assured they have not lived
in vain,
Then wait in peace their hour of final
rest —
These are the only blest.”
Just such a “Blest spirit” was our
dear “Mother Meb.” Was, did I say?
—yes, for yesterday I stood and look
ed at the sweet stilled face, eased
from all its pain and shadows of suf
fering that it has held for the past
several months, resting from the heart
trials that had so long been hers, and
failed for the first time to catch the
smile of encouragement, to feel the
motherly clasp of the dear hand and
to hear the tender words: “Bless
your dear heart, how are you, and how
is the paper? ’ with which she always
greeted me. And while the dear face
bore only the signs of restful sleep,
I knew by this, my first realized loss
of her, that our self-forgetting “Moth
er Meb” had indeed been called by
her Saviour to himself and to a re
union with the loved companion whose
going away about two years ago sad
dened her lonely heart as nothing else
ever had.
THE HOUSEHOLD
A DEPARTMENT OF EXPRESSION FOR THOSE WHO FEEI» AND THINK.
Department of MRS. MARY E. BRYAN.
“SHE IS JUST AWAY”
Then again, today, June 17th, in com
pany with Dr. Virgil Norcross and other
Atlanta friends who loved and wished
to honor her, I went down to the little
Methodist church at Clarxston, Ga.,
where she had joined several years
ago with her husband, and there we
saw for the last time the beautiful
temple from which her loving spirit
had taken its flight. And when I had
touched the cold brow and smoothed
back the soft hair tipped with the
snows of seventy-four winters and
there was no affectionate responsive
pressure of the flower filled hands,
which were always so ready to grow
tired for others, there came the over
powering realization that my dear
“Lady Bryan,” as I loved to call her,
myloyal, self-sacrificing friend, than
whom I never had a better, truer one,
was GONE, gone to rest from all her
toilings until the Resurrection Morn
ing!
As I looked at the sweet, peaceful
features, so calm after an exceeding
ly storm tossed life under which most
of us would have gone down long ago,
there came to me the sweet lines,
“He is Just Away,” which she gave
me since she was taken sickj, to
gether with numbers of other beauti
ful things which were hidden away
with her clippings and writings of
those (Jgys, when in New York she
drew the largest salary any Southern
woman has ever made with her pen.
How her own glowing nature gleams
at us from each line, and comforts
our stricken hearts now, even though
we know we shall miss her so. We
can but feel she would say, grieve
not, for I too am only “just away.”
He is Just Away.
I cannot say, and I will not say,
That he is dead —he is just away,
With a cherry smile and a wave of
the hand,
He has wandered into tfie unknown
land,
And left us dreaming how very fair
It needs must be since he lingers
there.
And you, oh you, who the wildest
yearn
For the old-time step and the glad re
turn,
Think of him as faring on, as dear
la the love of there as the love of here.
Mild and gentle as he was brave,
When the sweetest love of his life he
gave
To simpler things. When the violets
The Golden Age for June 19, 1913
grew
Pure as the eyes they were likened to.
The touches of his hand have stayed
As reverently as the lips have prayed,
When the little brown thrush that
harshly chirped
Was dear to him as the mockingbird.
And he pitied as much as a man in
pain
A writhing honey bee wet with rain.
Think of him still the same, I say,
He is not dead —he is just away.
Following these beautiful lines in
the clipping comes a tender Easter
tribute, through which we see that
not alone in the latter years was
her faith strong, but between the
lines we ger the answer to the oft
repeated question of those who knew
her tempestuous life. “How did she
face all the trying heartaches she had
to grapple with and yet do the im
mense amount of unsurpassed work
that she did?” I know you who have
loved her so long will appreciate the
rest of the clipping which follows:
“With the Easter glories bursting
once more upon our leafless earth He
seems to say “weep not!” As the
Easter lilies lift their fragrant heads
skyward they seem to respond so
soothingly, “He is not here; he is not
here; He is risen.”
“And you shall shortly know that
lengthened breath
Is not the sweetest thing God sends
His friend,
And that sometimes the sable pall of
death
Concedes the fairest boon His love can
send.
If we would push ajar the gates of
life,
And stand within and all God’s work
ing see,
We could interpret all this doubt and
strife
And for each mystery find a key.”
Bless her heart! The mystery was
all solved for her, and the pain-rack
ed body eased Sunday night at ten
thirty, when her Saviour said: “It
is enough; come up higher.”
The funeral was just such a simple,
tender service as she would have had
I believe, it was conducted by her pres
ent pastor, Rev. Cantrell, and by her
former pastor, Dr. Virgil C. Norcross,
who baptized her into the fellowship
of the Fifth Baptist church more than
thirty-five years ago. The tribute of
each was filled with grateful memor
ies of what her life had held of won-
derful achievements in the literary
world and the brightening cheer and
self-sacrificing, uplifting love for ev
ery one whom she had had the privi
lege of touching.
“Mrs. Bryan, with her pen and with
untiring personal effort always made
things glow and gleam with an in
tensely helpful enthusiasm,” said Dr.
Norcross, “which was an immediate
inspiration to the best that was in us
while her own personnality as the
moving influence was modestly hidden
behind the ‘greatness of the cause’ for
which she worked.”
And as I listened and thought of
how in just this way she had contin
ually upheld me these five years of
anxious work for the paper, by her
devotion to The Golden Age and its
purposes, her confidence in its ulti
mate victory for good and her sweet,
motherly praise of my inexperienced
eflorts, since I first came into
the work, I felt I wanted right
there in the presence of the worn tem
ple of her sweet spirit to testify to
all she had been to me. Yes, and of
what she had meant to The Golden
Age. But as I could not carry out the
throbbing desire of my heart there,
then here on her own House Hold page
that she loved so much I wanted to say
at least some of the things my heart
felt for her. It would be impossible
to say them all —impossible even in
my own heart to realize what her en
couragement, her willing and unselfish
service has meant when the untried
way has so often been dark, toilsome
and rough. But I do know that I have
lost a friend and adviser who never
failed me, who was never so pressed
with her own duties but that she re
membered not only to offer, but to
take the time to help in so many
ways that I would never have asked
of her because her own work in no
way demanded it.
If she found me blue or unusually
tired, she was ready always with the
comfort and strength that comes to
iis when we know that some one else
has walked “that way” and been sus
tained. Hers was never the long faced,
exacting, friendship of
Christianity we often see, but' a joy
ous, cheering faith both in those she
loved and in what the Lord could do
for them.
I remember so gladly how, soon af
ter she faced the trial of putting
away her life companion and her dear
old heart, although fighting with its
accustomed bravery, was torn by its
love and loneliness as it had never
been before, she came in one day,
hungry, it seemed x o talk of things
spiritual. Taking my hand in her own
tender way she said: “Dear child, I
joined the Fifth Baptist, church a good
many years ago, and later the Metho
dist church because it seemed best I
should but I was lead off into scientific
questionings and doubts until for a
long time I lost the joy I might have
known, but I know the Lord has stood
by and helped me and I have come
back to trust Christ with it all.”
Then as we talked her faith seemed
to brighten until she left me with
happy tears of resignation and trust
in her eyes, and never again did she
seem to lack the sustaining strength
of her Saviour. Only a few days be
fore she went away her faithful daugh
ter, Mrs. C. A. Wilcox, of St. Louis,
(Continued on page 15.)