Winter, taught at Cas-
A pleasant winter, only

In 1863, Mr. Bliss writes: "Geneseo again. Perkins, Bassini and Zundel. A very good term for me. tile, New York. Boarded at D. Bovee's. my wife, Lou, was at home; so I was only half a man, if half.” The instructors of Mr. Bliss at these Normals all speak in the highest terms of his unusual intelligence and remarkable proficiency. Bassini, at his first Normal, selected him as his most intelligent pupil, and in that and succeeding years took unwonted interest in him, in giving him private lessons upon the use of the voice. Much of his remarkable power in this respect, he felt, was due to the careful and scientific instruction received from Bassini. With a quick apprehension and a thinking mind, Mr. Bliss desired to be intelligent in his profession, and was always wishing to be taught, ever ready to receive, and careful to retain instruction. He never felt that he himself was a master, and ever preferred to be a scholar rather than a teacher.

During this period of his life at Rome, from the proceeds of his singing schools, he saved up a few hundred dollars, and bought a little cottage, to which he removed his parents, and for a time set up housekeeping. The dear old father, who had passed most of his days in humble homes in the backwoods, was now sixty-five years of age. The little cottage in Rome was a better home than he had ever lived in. Many months his children, "Phil" and "Lou," had planned the surprise that awaited him. They had saved in every possible way to buy and plainly furnish the little home. When all was made ready, Father Bliss was sent for. The day of his arrival in Rome, he stopped at Father Young's for dinner. In the afternoon, the happy children took the gentle, laughing, gray-haired old Christian in the wagon, and riding along the one village street, asked him to pick out the house that they had selected to be his home. Two or three times he essayed to express his choice, picking out the humblest, and each time taking a poorer one, until at last he gave up, a little troubled that he might have been too ambitious. When the happy Phil, almost too full to contain himself, turned the team, and driving back up the street, stopped at a pretty little cottage, a neat piazza in front, a large yard filled with blossoming lilacs and budding apple trees, it looked very beautiful; and as the strong man lifted his father from the wagon, it was a very happy hour to him, as he said,

BRINGS HIS FATHER TO ROME.

27

"This is your home, father." The dear old man sat down in a chair placed for him upon the stoop, and, with tears running down his cheeks, said, "Phil, I never expected to have so good a home on earth as this."

Here the last months of the life of the old saint passed away sweetly, peacefully and happily. The remembrance of these, his last days, were always exceedingly precious to Mr. and Mrs. Bliss. The burden of life in some degree rolled away, and he entered more into the sunlight that awaited him in fullness in the life beyond. "The first time I ever saw Father Bliss," Mrs. Bliss once told me, "he reproved me for laughing on Sunday." Brought up by a Puritan father, living in communion with God, drinking daily from the Bible, the only book he ever read, life was to him very solemn, and everything around him was related to God and to eternity. His children all felt this atmosphere in their association with him, and none of them drank in more of the father's sense of the reality of eternal things than did his son. There is a root and stalk for every beautiful flower that blooms, a spring for every flowing stream; and all that has given power on the earth to Philip Bliss' songs finds its root in the Bible of the Hebrews, its stalk in the living characters developed by that Bible among Puritans. The stream of melody that flowed through him, making glad the people of God, had its spring in the intense reality of spiritual things that came down to him from a godly ancestry.

the

During these months with his children, the father laid aside. everything of austerity that had ever associated itself with him, and was like a happy child. Mr. Bliss often thanked God for his goodness in permitting him to have the joy of making his dear father happy, and of being with him in his last days. In January, 1864, after only a few months in the home he thought so much better than he was entitled to, the father died, and was taken to his Heavenly home, to meet the great surprise of knowing what "God hath prepared for them that love Him." There can be no more fitting close to this chapter than the song of Mr. Bliss, written, much of it, from personal recollection, and which he usually prefaced, in singing, by a few remarks about his father, and by saying, very devoutly, "I thank God for a godly ancestry."

MY GRANDFATHER'S BIBLE.

A CENTENNIAL SONG.

The Sabbath day-sweet day of rest-
Was drawing to a close;

The summer breeze went murm'ring by,
To lull me to repose:

I took my father's Bible down

His father's gift to him—

A treasure rare, beyond compare,
Though soiled the page, and dim.

"Old friend," said I, "if thou couldst tell, What would thy mem'ries be?"

And from the Book there seemed to come

This evening reverie :

"Good will to men, Peace be to thee!

My mission aye hath been,

To tell the love of Him who died
To save a world from sin.

"A hundred years ago I sailed,
With those who sail no more,
Through perils dread; by land and sea,
I reached New England's shore;
There, on a soul-worn, faithful band
This soothing psalm did fall:

Lord, Thou hast been our dwelling place,

In generations all.

"Year after year, in temples rude,

Upon the desk I lay,

To teach of Him, the Great High Priest;

The Life, the Truth, the Way.

And multitudes who listened there

To God's life-giving word

Are resting from their labors, now, 'For ever with the Lord.'

"Anon a lowly home I found,

But Love and Peace were there... The children with the father read, And knelt with him in prayer;

CHAPTER III.

MR. BLISS' FIRST MUSICAL COMPOSITION -TWELVE YEARS' SONG WRITING

-GEO. F. ROOT'S RECOLLECTIONS OF HIM-DRAFTED IN THE ARMYMR. BLISS REMOVES TO CHICAGO-HIS LABORS AND HIS FRIENDS IN THE WEST.

HE first composition of Mr. Bliss, so far as is known, was in the year 1864, while in his own house at Rome. He writes in his diary: "1864.-Lived in Rome, Pennsylvania. Worked on farm some; wrote music some; housekeeping some; taught in Nunda, Castile, etc. Saved one hundred dollars this year." Mr. James McGranahan, for years a musical friend of Mr. Bliss, was, during the summer of 1864, a clerk in the country store and post office of Rome. He says: "I well remember Bliss' first published composition. He sent the manuscript to Root & Cady, and after a time he received back a proof in print. He brought in the copy to show me and ask my opinion as to corrections. I had had one or two pieces printed, and knew just how he felt, and we had a very pleasant time over his first piece. It was a great pleasure to him, and yet he had a great deal of wonder that anything he had written was worth publishing. The name of the piece is "Lora Vale," copyrighted by Root & Cady in 1865, and published as sheet music. Before sending to Root & Cady, he had forwarded it to Bradbury, and by him it had been refused, much to Mr. Bliss' disappointment, but he was encouraged by friends to send it to Mr. Root.

LORA VALE.

SONG AND CHORUS BY P. P. BLISS.

Calmly fell the silver moonlight
Over hill and over dale,

As with mournful hearts we lingered

By the couch of Lora Vale.