Miriam Berry Whitcher Speaks Her Mind [ 45 ] William has been for several Sundays, & still is, delivering a course of lectures on church history. Hereafter he will have them in the evening. They have been listened to with great interest, & created quite a commotion among the methodists, baptists, &c, many of whom come often to church. They are the same that he tried to deliver at Whitesboro' & did not succeed in getting anyone to come hear him. We have a pleasant Sunday school. William takes supervision, & the teachers meet once a week at our house. . The meetings are very interesting. I do not teach.40 Not only did William attempt to broaden the intellectual scope of his adult parishioners, but he also worked hard on improving himself. On June 8,1848, Miriam wrote that "William is taking lessons in elocution. His teacher, a pompous little man with a shiny wig, comes every morning & gives him a lesson. The noises they make are perfectly alarming. They 'explode the vowels' a la Henderson!'47 Of the couple, William was the more amenable and outgoing, but nevertheless he took strong stands on issues and, on one occasion, became enmeshed in a difficult situation resulting from his solemn sermon on Advent Sunday, 1848. It was a sermon calculated to make people thoughtful, but there was one man who was peculiarly affected by it. He has a pretty wife, whose character unfortunately needs a great deal of defending. He has always before been friendly to William. But on Monday morning he came up here in a furious passion—to whip William for preaching about his wife. William of course was thunderstruck, but with christian calmness he endeavored to convince the man of his error. He assured him that he did not mean his wife. . . . He left the house somewhat cooled down—at least enough so to defer the flogging, but still declaring that he'd whip somebody before he let it drop. Characteristic of William's level-headedness, he went directly to the couple's house to patch things up. The pretty wife had been having an affair with a certain captain, and her husband had taken William's sermon on adultery personally. William, however, managed to pacify the triangle and to restore good feelings. Miriam wrote in the same letter that "Mrs T. (the aggrieved lady) & her champions have been to church, & unusually attentive today. I feel very much relieved that the affair has terminated so amicably!'48 *s Ibid. *i M. Whitcher to sister, June 8,1848. 43 M. Whitcher to sister, December 8,1848.