Chapter 4: early married life, 1836-1840.
- Professor Stowe's interest in popular education. -- his departure for Europe. -- slavery riots in Cincinnati. -- birth of twin daughters. -- Professor Stowe's return and visit to Columbus. -- domestic trials. -- aiding a fugitive slave. -- authorship under difficulties. -- a Beecher round robin.
The letter to her friend Georgiana May, begun half an hour before her wedding, was not completed until nearly two months after that event. Taking it from her portfolio, she adds:--
Three weeks have passed since writing the above, and my husband and self are now quietly seated by our own fireside, as domestic as any pair of tame fowl you ever saw; he writing to his mother, and I to you. Two days after our marriage we took a wedding excursion, so called, though we would most gladly have been excused this conformity to ordinary custom had not necessity required Mr. Stowe to visit Columbus, and I had too much adhesiveness not to go too. Ohio roads at this season are no joke, I can tell you, though we were, on the whole, wonderfully taken care of, and our expedition included as many pleasures as an expedition at this time of the year ever could.
And now, my dear, perhaps the wonder to you, as to me, is how this momentous crisis in the life of such a wisp of nerve as myself has been transacted so quietly.
