THE Compiler feels it necessary to apologize to his respected Relatives and Friends, for the causes which have prevented so long the publication of the following Narrative. It was written, nearly as now printed, at the date it bears; but unavoidable absence from Gloucester, for several months, suspended the necessary alterations and additions; and inability, through business and other causes, to give the due superintendance to the progress of the Press, has added to the delay.

the measure itself, it is sufficient that it was demanded by your affection, and urged by circumstances.

To those who happen to take into their hands this circumscribed account, without knowing the reasons of its appearance in a printed form, it may be needful to say, the principal inducement for the use of type was the prevention of the labour of transcribing, in order to satisfy the wishes of numerous connections. Yet, if the assignment of the wish of friends, as a reason for printing, must appear suspicious because it is common-place--it

HARVARD COLLEGE LIBRARY FROM.

THE BEQUEST OF

EVERT JANSEN WENDELL

1914

PREFATORY ADDRESS.

To the Relatives,

And Personal Friends

Of the Deceased.

OF all the motives for putting

these Memorials into the continuity of a Narrative, only One Being can be the Judge;-to His unerring decision those motives are commended; to justify the measure itself, it is sufficient that it was demanded by your affection, and urged by circumstances.

To those who happen to take into their hands this circumscribed account, without knowing the reasons of its appearance in a printed form, it may be needful to say, the principal inducement for the use of type was the prevention of the labour of transcribing, in order to satisfy the wishes of numerous connections. Yet, if the assignment of the wish of friends, as a reason for printing, must appear suspicious because it is common-place-it

should be recollected that the commonest maxims are the most frequently exemplified, and the very incident that serves to remind us of a trite observation, serves at the same time to illustrate it.

Those sheets which shun the popular gaze, and seek not the profit of extended circulation, are not the legitimate subjects for minute examination. While it may be expected, that what a man writes for his friends he will try to write well-there must be in a Narrative, intended to illustrate particularly the close of a life,-and that life of a Young Person --a preciseness of description, and a particularity of detail, very unsuited to public taste-but which will be highly gratifying to those who have reasons to be interested in them. For the painting presented to general inspection, and designed to attract universal admiration, the labours of art,—and the ornaments of taste,-and all the foils of representation,—may be justly required, and fairly employed; but of the miniature intended to lie concealed in the bosom of friendship, the chief commendation must ever be-fidelity.

Some expressions in the correspondence with him who was afterward the husband of Mrs. Barber, may arrest the attention of the supercilious, only to make them force out a smile:-He cannot regret yielding them the opportunity, since a minute's reflection will serve to apprise them-how gratuitously a smile may be raised at the expense of what

does its subject honour;-and how very confiding affection may become, even previous to marriage, when freed by 'pure religion' from the fetters and trammels which confine and oppress the frigid connections of merely temporal interests;-and how hallowed too, under the sacred influence of piety, may be the warmest effusions of a soul, glowing with an early and ardent attachment.

But, urged by more important and pressing thoughts, I gladly turn to the chief objects of this address. For your pleasure and benefit, my endeared relatives and friends, the following delineation of the character of one, whom we agreed to love as we agree to lament her, is sketched outand to you the appeal of the circumstances described, must come with a force peculiarly affecting.

When exactly six months from the day on which she died, I received the Amiable Relative whom we have lost, to behold, as we then saw her and loved her-no more, for ever, the events which have since transpired were no more to be calculated upon, than the lessons those events suggest would then have been deemed unintrusive and appropriate; for then I received her in all the freshness of health, -and in all the vigour of youth,-and in all the bloom of a comeliness that might have quickened the pulse of vanity, and flattered the heart into feelings of high exultation.

It is true DEATH might even then have been