Clayton - CT3207 .C42 1860

ELIZABETH FRY, which the young wife found herself "the gay, in- stead of the plain and scrupulous one of the family." But Elizabeth was now peacefully happy. "Time slips through quickly," she writes, on the second anniversary of her marriage; " trials and pleasures, before unknown, have indeed been felt by me- trials and joys of many kinds. The love of a husband, the unity experienced, the love of a child, the maternal feelings, when under subordination, are real and great sources of enjoyment." Nine years glided over the united couple, during which time the birth of five children, the death of dear old friends, household cares and anxieties, and various acts of benevolence and charity,, occupied the ever - active Elizabeth Fry. In the spring of 1809, at the death of Mr. Fry's father, the family removed to Plashet in Essex; and this return to the country was delightfully acceptable to one who was so keenly alive to the exquisite beauty of nature. It was a renewal of early tastes and pleasures; and as in the old days at Bramerton-the Eden of her infancy-she tended the garden personally in the quiet evenings. Surrounded by her little ones, and attended by her Norfolk nurse and Irish gardener, she would, basket and trowel in hand, enter the plantations, and deck every bank and nook with primroses and violets. With beaming love, she would gather her little flock round her, and expatiate on " the wonders of the heavenly bodies, the structure of an insect, or the growth and beauty of a flower." 20

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