company. But I consider that, in a few winters and summers more, all our endeared hours will be as though they had never been; but the effects and consequences of our temporary connexion will abide for ever.

N. B. When I returned to Liverpool, and was upon the point of sailing in the Bee, it pleased God to stop me by illness. By the advice of the physicians, I resigned the command of the ship; and was thus unexpectedly freed from the disagreeable and (as I now see it) the abominable employment and traffic in which I had been engaged. So that my marine correspondence ends here.

My first attack was a violent fit, which threatened immediate death, and left me no signs of life but breathing, for about an hour. I soon grew better; but the sudden stroke made such an impression upon my dear wife, that it cost her more than a twelvemonth's severe illness. My friend, Mr. M******, procured me a place in the Custom-house; and when I was constrained to return to take possession of my office, she had been but a few days a little revived from a state in which the physicians had given up all hope of her recovery. The second series of my letters were written while I was tidesurveyor of the port of Liverpool.

LETTERS TO A
TO A WIFE.

WRITTEN IN ENGLAND,

FROM 1755 to 1785.

Thou dost but take the dying lamp away,
To bless me with thine own unclouded day.

MRS. ROWE.

Behold, I take away from thee the desire of thine eyes, with a stroke; yet neither shalt thou mourn nor weep, neither shall thy tears run down.

LETTERS TO A WIFE.

1755.

WHILE RESIDENT AT LIVERPOOL.

My Dearest;

Towcester, August 12.

BEFORE this reaches you, your brother will have told you how easy and composed he left me. Indeed, I wonder at myself. But the Lord has been very gracious to me, and fulfils his promise of giving me strength according to my day. My mind is not distressed. My companions in the coach are civil and agreeable in their way; but I had rather have been alone; for to commune with God and my own heart, would be much more pleasing than the empty, amusing chit-chat I am engaged in at present.

I was enabled this morning to commend you to the Lord's blessing, with much comfort. And I have a cheerful hope that He will raise you up in due time; and that we shall again have a happy and thankful meeting. Till then, let us attend to present duty, and keep close to him by humble prayer, and a renewed dependence upon the blood of Jesus. Let us, while the rod is upon us, inquire into the meaning of it, and hear his voice by it; let us bow to his chastisement, and acknowledge that we have rebelled against Him, and that he afflicts us