i soon found that two of my children were old enough to pine for something more than physical comfort. they did not propose to live by bread alone. the appealing eyes of our daughter gordon were not to be resisted and, as i have said, she entered the packer institute with her little sisters, entering the senior class, where she soon graduated with the first honors,—and where she nobly taught an advanced class,—relinquishing at eighteen years of age all the pleasures to which she was entitled. theo, i supposed, would learn law in his father's office. but he, too, like goethe, craved "more light." one day as i was returning from church he asked me, with suppressed feeling, if he was ever to go to college.
i was smitten to the heart! when i repeated this to his father, he declared, "he shall!" and within a few months a scholarship at princeton was found and promised, provided the boy could pass a creditable entrance examination.
the little man went up alone early one morning to meet his fate. he returned at night. "and did you enter?" we exclaimed. very calmly he answered: "they were very kind to me at princeton. i was examined at some length, and i shall enter the junior class."
when i packed his small trunk for his collegiate 344life, i found i had little to put into it—little more than my tears! his first report read, "in a class of eighty-three he stands first."
he maintained this standing for two years. the class included bearded men who had been prepared thoroughly in the best preparatory schools. theo had received less than two years at mr. gordon mccabe's school. all the rest of his time he had given to study, alone, and unassisted.
a day came in petersburg when he, perceiving the necessities of his family, had sold his beloved rifle for $40. out of that sum he reserved for himself $2, and returned home with a work on advanced mathematics under his arm.
he was a perfect boy. if he ever thought wrongly, i cannot tell—i know he never did wrong. personally, he was as beautiful as he was good—clear-eyed, serene, with a grand air. "for the future of one of my children," i was wont to say, "i have no fear. theo will always be fortunate." it was said of him by president mccosh that he was "preternaturally gifted mentally." he always acquired knowledge with perfect ease. he studied and read whatever his father studied or read—politics, literature, and even military tactics. in the latter he was so proficient that when a little lad in linen blouses, the regiments at smithfield would mount him on a stand and make him drill the companies.
theodorick bland pryor.
at the end of his collegiate life he wrote: "the professors have been so good as to give me the first honor and also the mathematical scholarship." 345this scholarship required him to study at least one year in an english university. accordingly, in the following autumn he was sent, through president mccosh's advice, to st. peters, cambridge university. he was just nineteen when he graduated.
he was too young and inexperienced to be a good manager, and soon perceived that his $1000 would not carry him through his year. a prize of a cambridge scholarship and $40 was offered. he worked for it and won it—binding wet towels around his tired brain as he worked.
i remember one lovely june afternoon, which melted into a perfect moonlight evening. my little girls, attired in white, listened to the home music,—roger, with his violin, accompanied by his mother on the piano my dear aunt mary had bequeathed to gordon. a hasty ring at the door, a rush of eager steps, and theo was in my arms! we thought him lovely. his father proudly marked his fine air and, with amusement, the delicate hint of a rising inflection in his voice. never were people so glad and proud. once more we were all together.
he decided not to return to england, although his masters at cambridge wrote him assuring him that, although he "could not win a fellowship without becoming a naturalized british subject," yet he would "ultimately take an excellent degree." he entered the columbia law school, that he might fit himself to be his father's partner.
in october he was called to a higher court. one warm evening he walked out "to cool off before sleeping," and we never saw him more! 346 the tides bore his beautiful body to us nine days after we lost him, and his beloved alma mater claimed it. there he lies in the section reserved for the presidents and professors of the university—side by side with the ashes of the edwards and the alexanders that await with him the great awakening. his classmates sent to virginia for a shaft of granite, and upon this stone is inscribed: "in commemoration of his virtues, genius, and scholarship, and in enduring testimony of our love, this monument is erected by his classmates."
of him a great future was expected. "he was," said one of the journals of the time, "one of the most gifted minds that virginia ever produced. america probably had not his superior. only twenty years at the time of his death, his powerful and mature intellect gave assurance of any position his ambition might covet. he was always first, and easily first, in any school, academy, or college that he entered. his powers were indeed marvellous. proud of being a virginian, his loss to the state, to the country indeed, is irreparable. in arms and in statesmanship virginia has nothing to covet,—in letters a new field of glory awaits her. pryor, foremost in that field, would have filled it with the lustre of his fame. oh! what a loss, what a loss!"
there is a peculiar bitterness in the early blighting of such powers. but although the laurel was so soon snatched from his brow, he had already worked nobly and achieved greatly. he had done more in his short life than the most of us during a long life. whether the end came through the 347hand of violence, or from accident, he could approach "the great secret" as did john sterling, "without a thought of fear and with very much of hope." such as he confirm our faith in immortality and make heaven lovelier to our thought.
he was a victim of his father's fallen fortunes. now, surely, nemesis must be satisfied! innocent of crime, we had yet suffered full measure for the crime of the nation. others had been called to give up their first-born sons. we had now given up ours! was it not enough? all the joy of life was forever ended. hereafter one bitter memory intensified every pang, poisoned every pleasure,—so clearly did our great bereavement seem to grow out of our misfortunes,—and all these to be the sequence of cruel, terrible, wicked war.
but why should i ask my readers to listen while i press, "like philomel, my heart against a thorn!" we can change nothing in our lives. we must bear the lot ordained for us! we need not ask others to suffer with us! grosse seelen dulden still!
the story i am telling must end not later than the year 1900—and i find no fitting place for a brief tribute to another brilliant son whom we lost after that year, unless my readers will forgive me for a word just here. i leave the splendid record of his services as a physician and surgeon, where it is safe to live—in the memories of his brethren at home and abroad. "pryor's practice" is still quoted in england and france as the salvation of suffering 348womanhood. but other records are written on the hearts of the poor and humble. "many a night," said one of his hospital confrères, "with the east river full of ice, and snow and sleet pelting straight in his face, dr. william pryor has crossed in a rowboat to see some poor waif at blackwell's island upon whom he had operated,—carrying with him some delicacy the hospital diet-sheet did not afford."
he was most richly endowed, physically and mentally, and he gave to suffering humanity all that god had given him.
i resolved, when i consented to write this book, that i would not intrude my own feelings and emotions upon those who are kind enough to read my story. i know, alas, i am not the only one upon whom the tower of siloam has fallen. we are divinely forbidden to believe ourselves more unworthy than those who escape such disaster.
"the thorny path," a painting by p. stachiewicz, represents women toiling along a perilous path. on one side is a high, barren rock; on the other a ghastly precipice. safety lies only in the narrow path, uneven with slippery stones and thick-set with cruel thorns. two women are central figures in the procession: one, ragged and drunken and cursing her lot, reels unsteadily against the flinty wall; another treads the same path with bent head, and hands clasped in prayer. a white "robe of righteousness" has descended upon the latter, and celestial light surrounds her head, albeit the pilgrim feet are unshod and torn with thorns. 349
william rice pryor.
sometimes a song or picture has taught us more than many sermons. when christine nilsson, standing firm and erect with upward look, sang "i know," we were thrilled and surprised into a vivid faith, which had burned with less fervor under the teaching of the pulpit. we had believed, but now we felt that we knew, that the redeemer lives and will stand in the latter day upon the earth, and feeling this, we were comforted.
