WHAT WOMEN SUFFER IN POLYGAMY:—THE STORY OF MARY BURTON.  
One bright summer morning, about six months after our arrival in Salt Lake City, I was sitting in the work-room, busy with my girls, when a light tap was heard at the door, and the next instant a lady entered, and, coming straight up to me, was about to kiss me.
I started back a step, held out my hand, looked her full in the face, and in a moment we were in each other’s arms. It was my old friend, Mary Burton!
I could with difficulty find words to express my astonishment when I recognized her, so greatly was she changed in every respect. From the very first, whenever we met after a long separation, I had noticed a more than ordinary alteration in her appearance. But it must be remembered that at the time of our first re-union she had grown out of childhood into womanhood; when I met her again in New York, she had passed through the most interesting phase of a woman’s life—she had forsaken maidenhood for matrimony; and now I met her once more after she had endured those horrors on the Plains—of which the reader has already heard—and she had entered into a life of sorrow worse than any she had known before. No wonder, then, that now, as upon previous occasions, I noticed quite a startling change in her appearance. Her dress was of the coarsest and plainest kind, but neat, as was everything she touched; yet not so carefully arranged as in the old time in England. She used formerly to have a way of adjusting a dress or a bonnet so that it set her off ten times better than it would a girl who had not naturally the same taste; but now, although, as I said, her clothes, if coarse, were neat, she evidently had not taken any pains to set herself off to the best advantage; and in a woman what a story did that simple fact tell! But it was in her features and manners that the change was most remarkable.[260] In looking at her face you would have been puzzled to say in what the alteration consisted. Her cheeks were thinner and sadly pale, but that was not the cause of her appearing as she did. Had she been older, I verily believe the anguish she had passed through would have blanched her hair and left upon her brow deep marks of thought and suffering. As it was, however, though no one feature in particular was very greatly altered, the whole expression of her face was that of one whose heart was utterly crushed and broken; and when her eyes met mine, I could hardly refrain from tears as I saw the mournful look of subdued pain, which told in them the terrific conflict which her heart had endured.
I took her to my own room—poor girl, how my heart bled for her!—and again and again I held her in my arms and tried to comfort her, for she was very weary; and at last she wept. I was glad to see that passionate flood of tears, for I knew it would relieve her, and in that I was not mistaken. She threw her arms round my neck, and, kissing me repeatedly, sobbed out, “Don’t blame me, Sister Stenhouse; don’t blame me very much; I cannot help it.”
“There, there, Mary,” I said; “be calm and you will soon be better. You must tell me all your troubles, and I will do all I can to help and comfort you.”
“There is no help, Sister Stenhouse, no comfort for me; I’m past all that,” she answered.
“Don’t say that, Mary,” I said; “I know that you have passed through a terrible amount of suffering, and have had much trouble in every way; but your husband is still alive, is he not?—and there may be many years of happiness before you.”
“It is the thought of him that makes me so wretched,” she said; “oh! I could have borne death a thousand times rather than this. I would gladly have seen him die rather than see him changed as he is now. You do not know, Sister Stenhouse, how my whole soul was wrapped up in that man, how I almost worshipped him. When we suffered so much together on the Plains, I felt happy in comparison with what I feel now. I remember that terrible night when I believed he was dying—I remember the anguish that I felt; but, oh! I knew then that he loved me and that his heart was all my own. Had I lost him, if I could myself have lived, I should have felt that he had never loved another beside me; I should have known that we would meet together again in heaven and be happy in each other’s love. After all we went through together, I[261] loved him more and more; we seemed to live with one life; we had the same thoughts, and hopes, and pleasures; I leaned upon him, and I loved him—ah, so fondly! and, Sister Stenhouse, I know he loved me then. We were getting over the effects of our sufferings on the Plains, and I was gaining strength and was looking forward to the time when my child should be born. It was then that they came and taught him that devil’s doctrine and led him away from me. Oh dear! I cannot bear it, Sister Stenhouse, I cannot bear it; it will drive me mad!”
She buried her face in her hands, and sobbed again.
“Mary, dear,” I said, “don’t talk like that; he cannot have ceased to love you, I am sure; he used to almost worship you, dear.”
“It is because I know that he did once, that drives me crazy. You do not know what I feel, and what I have to bear!”
I did not utter a word; my own sorrows were hidden in my own heart. The heart knoweth its bitterness, and a stranger intermeddleth not in the matter. “You have been through the Endowments?” she asked. “So have I. We went through, Sister Stenhouse, about three months after we came to Utah, and never since then have I known a moment’s peace. I do not know what they said to my husband, but, whatever it was, it produced a great effect upon his mind, and changed him altogether; he has been an altered man from that very time. I have no doubt that they told them that it was his duty to take another wife, and they would say that no promise made to me before our marriage was binding if it comes in opposition to our religion. You know how devoted he is, how firm his faith is. Why, I do believe that he would obey counsel even if it broke his heart, and cost him his life. Did they say nothing to you or your husband, dear?”
“Certainly they did, Mary; we have heard it daily and hourly, and my husband is constantly being counselled about it. I am wretched, Mary, you know I must be; I feel just as you do, but how can we help ourselves?”
“No, we cannot help ourselves, there is no hope,” she said; “but it is a cruel wrong. You know well enough how determined I was never to marry a man who would take another wife. When I thought that Elder Shrewsbury might be influenced by his religion, I made him go to the Apostle and get counsel, and then he solemnly vowed to me that he never would enter into polygamy without my consent; which, of[262] course, was the same as saying that he never would do so at all. Until we went through our Endowments, he never even hinted at such a thing. But they spoke to him then; and one day, after he had been having a long consultation with the Bishop, he came and spoke to me. He was not unkind in the least. In fact he seemed to be as much pained at all mention of the subject as I was. He said that the Bishop had been urging him to live up to his privileges, and had explained to him how great a loss in the celestial world it would be, both to him and to me, if he did not take more wives. He was told that now while he was young was the time, and that I would soon get over any pain that I might suffer. Yes, they actually said so. Fancy tearing out the very affections of one’s heart, and blasting every hope and happiness in life, and then saying that I should soon ‘get used to it!’ I tell you, Sister Stenhouse, a true woman never can ‘get used’ to this hideous system. If the hearts of some are dead and cold, it is a curse to them and a curse to their husband and children; and if a wife seems careless or callous, as the case may be, it is because love for her husband has first died out in her heart. She feels no jealousy because she has no love; but if a woman has but a spark of love for her husband, she will hate with a deadly hatred any other woman whom that husband loves.”
“But what did Elder Shrewsbury say when they told him to enter into polygamy?” I inquired.
“At first he told them it was utterly impossible,” she replied, “and he mentioned his promise to me, and said we were very happy together, and that he wished for nothing more. But they knew his weakness, and that he would do anything for his religion, and they urged him on that point. It was even a sin against me they said, for if he had no more than one wife he could never exalt me in the celestial kingdom; that I ought to be treated like a child—a very dear, but spoilt child; and if I refused what was for my own and my husband’s benefit and everlasting welfare, he ought to act up to what he knew was right, and leave the consequences with the Lord, who would order all things for the best. My husband told me all this very sadly at first, but I could see that it had an effect upon his mind. They saw it, too, and did not let the subject drop. Every day they spoke to him of it, and at last he gave way—for my sake, he said! This was the cruellest wrong of all. Then one day he told me very firmly and very coldly, as if he had steeled his heart to do so, that he had made up his mind to take another wife.”
[263]
“What!” I exclaimed, “after the solemn oath he swore never to do such a thing? Why, I could not have believed it of Elder Shrewsbury!”
“I reminded him of his promise,” she said, “but he told me that the Revelation justified him in breaking it; that it said in the second clause that ‘All covenants, contracts, and oaths not sealed by him who is appointed on earth to hold this power in the last days are of no force after the resurrection;’ that for this cause we had been married again for eternity, and that now he was free from his oath. I knelt down before him, and I wept and prayed as if for life itself; I entreated him, if no more, to wait and put off all thoughts of another marriage for a few months, until he had time to consider the matter carefully. He had already thoroughly thought it over, he said, and could not go back now, for the Bishop had chosen a wife for him, and had arranged everything. He even told me who it was—a young girl named Wilbur, about fourteen years of age—a mere child. I prayed him if he would be so wicked as to perjure himself and wrong me so foully, at least not to add to his sin by injuring a poor innocent child. He was very indignant with me for that, said that he was doing the child the greatest good he possibly could by marrying her; that he was ensuring her salvation as well as mine; and that he expected to receive the blessing of God.”
“Mary,” I said, “this system is a fearful curse.”
“Curse!” she exclaimed, “curse is a heavenly word to apply to such a system. Why there is nothing in hell so hateful, so vile, so d............