all in distress. Everyone felt free to go to her with their troubles; a reverse of circumstances, a sick child, a bad servant, or turn of sickness, all called forth her ready aid, and her wise, far-seeing judgment. And even in the last months of her life, when, worn out with service and pain, she was slowly going down to the gates of death, her children and grand-children were cut off suddenly by scarlet fever, she bowed resignedly to the Hand which had sent "sorrow upon sorrow." And when she who had been as a tower of strength to all around her, was reduced to the weakness of childhood by intense suffering, the survivors clung yet more closely to her, as if they could not let her go. So, as physical strength declined, she actually grew stronger and brighter in mental and moral power. The deep and painful tribulations which characterised her later years, but refined and purified the gold of her nature.
