"This is a busy week with us; yesterday being Exhibition, to-day Valedictory, to-morrow the Theological Exhibition in the morning and a public meeting of the Philanthropic Society in the afternoon. We shall have an open house, and hope to have as many friends with us as we had last year." An open house, filled with friends, all welcomed and in some way entertained by the lady of the house, who is not able to walk across the room without pain! We doubt not there are hundreds of such cases, some it may be, more trying and more remarkable; but it does not alter the fact, nor make it less worthy of notice in a woman who did all that Mrs. Ware did.
It was a feature of Mrs. Ware's domestic character, that the throng of cares and conflict of duties seldom _worried_ her. Many are they who are as diligent and faithful, but yet live in a perpetual hurry and fret. She knew the danger, and brought all her power and principle to withstand it, even in the smallest matters. Often have we heard her lamenting the necessity of spending so much of life in mere drudgery, ministering to the perishing but never-satisfied _body_; a necessity and service that devolve upon many women, and take from them the opportunity of high mental and spiritual culture, unless they carry into these daily duties and petty cares a calm spirit and a cheerful tone, with an elevated and steadfast purpose. Such was Mary's habitual endeavor. The difficulty, and the frequent failure, none were more ready to own. She never satisfied herself, but she never flagged. She never worried. Sudden interruptions, culinary disappointments, "shoals of visitors" with little of preparation, were not allowed to chill her welcome or cloud their enjoyment. There were no apologies at that table. If unexpected guests were not always filled, they were never annoyed, nor suffered to think much about it. A clergyman, who visited the house often as a student, says of Mrs. Ware: "I remember the wonder I felt at her humility and dignity in welcoming to her table on some occasion a troop of accidental guests, when she had almost nothing to offer but her hospitality. The absence of all apologies and of all mortification, the ease and cheerfulness of the conversation, which became the only feast, gave me a lesson never forgotten, although never learned."