endeared herself in a wonderful manner to the heart
of the American people. God bless Queen Victoria! they say with one
voice.--_New York, September_ 24, 1881.

[12] The eldest son of her brother-in-law, Mr. S. S. Prentiss, a youth
of rare promise, and who had especially endeared himself to his Aunt
Abby. He died of fever at Tallahoma, Tennessee, during the war.

CHAPTER VII

THE STRUGGLE WITH ILL-HEALTH.

1861-1865.

I.

At Home again in New York. The Church of the Covenant. Increasing
Ill-health. The Summer of 1861. Death of Louisa Payson Hopkins. Extracts
from her Journal. Summer of 1862. Letters. Despondency.

We come now to a new phase of Mrs. Prentiss' experience as a pastor's
wife. Before her husband resigned his New York charge, during the winter
of 1857-8, the question of holding a service in the upper part of the
city, with the view to another congregation, was earnestly discussed in
the session and among the leading members of the church, but nothing
then came of it. Soon after his return from Europe, however, the project
was revived, and resulted at length in the formation of the Church of
the Covenant. In consequence of the great civil war, which was then
raging, the undertaking encountered difficulties so formidable, that
nothing but extraordinary zeal, liberality, and wise counsel on the part
of his friends and the friends of the movement could overcome them. For
two or three years the new congregation held service in what was then
called Dodworth's Studio Building at the corner of Fifth avenue and
Twenty-sixth street, but in 1864 it entered the chapel on Thirty-fifth
street, and in 1865 occupied the stately edifice on Park avenue. In the
manifold labors, trials, and discouragements connected with this work,
Mrs. Prentiss shared with her husband; and, when finally crowned with
the happiest success, it owed perhaps as much to her as to him. This
brief statement seems needful in order to define and render clear her
position, as a pastor's wife, during the next twelve years.

After spending some weeks in Newark and Portland, she found herself once
more in New York in a home of her own and surrounded by friends, both
old and new. The records of the following four or five years are
somewhat meagre and furnish few incidents of special significance. The
war, with its terrible excitement and anxieties, absorbed all minds
and left little spare time for thought or feeling about anything else.
Dome