and, saddest and greatest of all, a solemn service following the
assassination of Abraham Lincoln. We were led through these shadows of
death by the radiant light of a truly Christian faith, which our pastor
ever held before us. Among the many who stood by him in his labors of
love was a lady possessed of rare taste in the disposition of floral and
other decorations. We came at last to confer on her the title of the
Flower Saint. On the occasion last mentioned, when we entered the
building, full of hopeless sorrow, we saw pulpit and altar adorned with
a rich violet pall, on which, at intervals, hung wreaths of white
lilies. So something of the pomp of victory was mingled with our bitter
sense of loss. The nation's chief was gone, but with the noble army of
martyrs we now beheld him, crowned with the unfading glory of his work.

Mr. Clarke's life possesses an especial interest from the fact of its
having been one of those rare lives which start in youth with an ideal,
and follow it through manhood to old age; parting from it only at the
last breath, and bequeathing it to posterity in its full growth and
beauty. This ideal appeared to him in the guise of a free church, whose
pews should not be sold, whose seats should be open to all, with no
cumbrous encounter of cross-interests,--a church of true worship and
earnest interpretation, which should be held together by the bond of
veritable sympathy. This living church he built out of his own devout
and tender heart. A dream at first, he saw it take shape and grow, and
when he flitted from its sphere he felt that it would stand and endure.

In marriage Mr. Clarke had been most fortunate. He became attached early
in life to a young lady of rare beauty, and of character not less
uncommon, to whom he once wrote some charming lines, beginning,--

"When shall we meet again, dearest and best?
Thou going eastward, and I to the west?"

This attachment probably dated from the period of his theological
studies at Meadville, Pa. In due course of time the two lives became
united in a most happy and helpful partnership. Mrs. Clarke truly
attained the dignity of a mother in Israel. She went hand-in-hand with
her husband in all his church work. She made his home simple in
adornment but exquisite in comfort. She was less social in disposition
than he, less excitable, indeed, so calm of nature that her husband, in
giving her a copy of my first volume of poems, wrote on the fly-leaf,