blacksmith, Sam Lawton. He is, however, best entitled to the name of village do-nothing, in which character Mrs. Stowe admirably describes him.

The idol of the boys, the favorite of all the housewives, and the sage and gossip of the tavern, Sam Lawton was not unlike old Rip Van Winkle of the Kaatskills. And like Rip, Sam was well known to have a great aversion to all kinds of profitable labor; though willing at all times to help out his neighbor, or to run errands for the good wives of the village. Being decidedly henpecked by his own good wife, and the constant target of her tongue, Sam was very seldom found at home. He was always on hand to go shooting or "a fishin'" with the boys, and he would spend hours at a time mending for them some broken piece of tackle, or whittling out some wooden toy. But among the boys he was most famous for his yarns. From his infinite stock of legends and tales, he would sit, chewing his old clay pipe, by the hour, and drawl out one after the other of these marvelous tales to his admiring audience.

For a long time there was but one denomination represented among the early inhabitants of Newton and the surrounding towns, the Congregational; and the church and state were here connected until as late as 1830. Congregational churches or meeting houses were formed and managed by the popular voice in town-meeting, and were supported for a long time by general taxation.

There were a good many members of the Church of England or Episcopal Church_among the early inhabitants of the Falls, who attended services in Boston or at Christ Church in Cambridge. Although Christ Church was the nearest house of worship, it was a long distance away, and those who attended there were put to a great inconvenience, having to travel of course at that time all the way on horseback or in their wagons. There were very few conveyances owned in the town at that time. In 1814 there were but three coaches in Newton, and but one stage

to Boston, which started from the Falls and made three trips a week.

the

The Episcopal Church in Massachusetts had a hard struggle after the Revolutionary War. But before the war it had little encouragement, as the early Colonial laws were very rigid against any other kind of worship than that of the Congregational. In the War of Rebellion the English Church in New England suffered considerably, although George Washington and the leading statesmen, including signers of the Declaration of Independence, were members of the Episcopal Church; yet so many of the English rectors of the New England parishes had been loyal to their oaths of allegiance to King George, and some of them so offensive in their toryism, that the daughter church was in ill repute with the general public. A great many of its own members were exceedingly lukewarm. Here was great difficulty, therefore, in reorganizing the colonial parishes, some of whose houses of worship had been put to uses of war by the American troops. Christ Church in Cambridge was used as a cavalry stable until George Washington took command of the army in Cambridge. The building was restored by him and he himself attended worship there.

The first aggressive step taken by the Episcopal the Episcopal Church in the new Commonwealth of Massachusetts, and the first new parish to be started in the state, was at Newton Lower Falls, where on April 7, 1812, was organized St. Mary's Parish. As the nearest place of worship of any kind was some distance away, the introduction of the church was welcome, and there was a general interest in the movement which extended to the Roman Catholics in the community. For more than fifty years St. Mary's Episcopal Church was the only house of worship in Lower Falls, and people of several denominations in all Newton, Needham, and Weston united in its support.

Down to 1830 public worship was under direction of the town or parish, as a political body assembled in town meeting. By the charter granted to

St. Mary's Church by the General Court it was "incorporated into a society or body politic by the name of Episcopal Society of St. Mary's Church in Newton, with all the privileges, powers, and immunities which Parishes do or may enjoy by the laws of the Commonwealth." Furthermore, by the act of incorporation the proprietors of the house of worship to be erected and any other person "who shall enter his or her name or request to become a member, with the Wardens or Vestry or with the clerk of the said Society," became, with their estates, liable to taxation by the said Episcopal Society and were "exempt from all other taxes or assessments for the support of public worship in the Town or Parish where they may respectively reside." A present anomaly under these old charters lies in the fact that the rights of proprietorship in pews survives, but the corresponding obligation to pay taxes

died with the abolishing of all taxation for the support of public worship.

The land was given for St. Mary's Church and burying ground by Mr. Samuel Brown, Esq., of Boston, who had interests at the Falls. The cornerstone of a house of worship was laid there on Sept. 29, 1813, and as was customary in those days, the stone was laid by the Free Masons. So important was this occasion, however, and so influential were the members of the new congregation, that the ceremony was conducted, not by the local lodge, but by the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts. The building was consecrated in 1814 by Bishop A. V. Griswold.

There is no.recorded connection of St. Mary's with Christ Church, Cambridge, but the resemblance of the interiors of the building and the fact that the silver plagon of the communion service was presented by a Mr. Winthrop of Cambridge in 1812, would seen

on each side are lofty arched windows, whose many panes flood the interior with generous daylight. Old-fashioned high box-pews fill up the body of the church. The gallery which in former days was occupied by the village choir, is situated beneath the belfry of the tower. Several years ago the addition of a parish house was added to the further side of the church, but the old building remains the same.

Without, shaded by a noble avenue of elms, lies God's green acre. Among the moss-covered gravestones are to be found the names of the former patriarchs of the village and early residents of the town. Here, 'neath a carved weeping willow, is the grave of mine host of the old Wales tavern, and yonder, resting together in peaceful tranquillity at last, Sam Lawton and his wife, Mehitable, are buried. The cemetery is dotted by the little flags that, fluttering here and there, mark the

graves of soldiers of four wars. The oldest of these graves is that of Ebenezer Stedman, a veteran of the Revolution, who died in 1813. The weather-beaten stone of another Revolutionary soldier, a drummer in the war, relates the fact that his bass drum was perforated by a British bullet in the battle of Bunker Hill.

Let us linger for a while in this. silent and secluded church yard, far from the rush and noise of the great world without. And in gazing about upon the quiet and forgotten mounds of those who have gone before, we are thus inclined to meditate-"Such is the fate of many who have lived their little day in this world, often men of note, and useful in their generation, of whom it was said 'how shall the world be carried on without them,' yet in a little while the tide rolls on, they are gradually missed no more, and finally their memory fades away. But how

interesting is the catalogue, reproducing as it does the names of so many who once tilled these broad acres, and watched over the rising interests of the town, who cleared its forest and marked out its streets, who worshiped in its simple church, and built its earliest dwellings, who lived examples of integrity and honest worth, and have left an inheritance so rich and so beautiful to their posterity."

On Memorial Day each spring the undisturbed quietness of the place is broken by the muffled drums and martial tread of the blue-coated veterans of the Grand Army of the Republic and the young soldiers of the

Spanish War, who come to honor the memory of their dead, and to decorate their graves with the symbols of resurrection and with the colors of their country. The village people then are gathered in the yard to witness the service and to listen to the address by the chaplains. After the ceremonies in the yard, the squad accompanied by the spectators march down to the river bank below. Here a prayer is said in honor of those who fought and were buried at sea. As the chaplain reads appropriate passages from the Scriptures, the comrades toss their bunches of flowers into the stream, which are carried down, borne toward the ocean.