Annals of our ancestors; one hundred and fifty years of history in the ...

THE GREEN TREE TAVERN 183
age of sixty-four, having suffered so iiiucli with her eyes that
she went blind. Her wonderful industry, her night vigils
with sick children in her large family, her unceasing care,
make this mild-tempered little grandmother well worthy of
memory even to many generations. It is fitting that we give
Mary Spinning Morris something more than passing notice.
Transplanted early from her peaceful New Jersey home into
the wilderness of Ohio; obliged at first to live in a fort; married
young — what experiences were hers! She was five feet in
height and slightly built, but of such a mind that Uncle John
Hunt was used to say that if the children of Benjamin Morris
displayed any unusual brightness it should be accredited to
his wife. When we recall the toils and hardships incident to
the building up of the great commonwealth of our beloved
Ohio, we should think not only of the fathers, but of the part
such mothers as Mary Morris played in its early development.
You, her great-grandchildren, may rightly be proud of the
work to which she gave her life. She is of a type of which
there are none remaining. We find some of her characteristics
in Proverbs 31 : "She seeketh wool and flax and worketh will-
ingly with her hands. She riseth early while it is yet night
and giveth meat to her household. She openeth her mouth
with wisdom and in her tongue is the law of kindness. Her
candle goeth not out by night. She layeth her hand to the
spindle, her hand holdeth the distaff."
Mary Spinning Morris passed on, but when I was at Green
Tree there was still her daughter, Jerusha Morris Hunt, who
lived near at Red Lion and whom I came to know so well.
In her large family of good children Mary Morris lives with us
still. You who own her little spinning wheels should not for-
get the story of the hands so long folded to rest.
There were in this attic some boxes of things Mr. Morris
had used when he taught school, for he had been a teacher
and a printer in his time. This recalls to me an old book now
in the possession of his grandson, Paul Watkins, called "The
White Pilgrim," which I believe Isaac Morris himself printed.
There were also trunks up there containing, amongst other
things, old clothes, some of them very ancient garments. One