her as she was described to him by those who knew her well. "She had been remarkable, from the period of her first professing herself a disciple of Christ, for the symmetry and early maturity of her piety. This made her the object of attention and attraction among all the more spiritual-minded members of that lovely church. In the domestic circle, she was most useful, and indeed the chief dependence of parents well able to appreciate this inestimable jewel. Their own very limited circumstances and numerous younger children, with the feebleness of her mother's health, threw on her young arms no trifling load. But with that quiet, native energy and perseverance which always characterized her, contrived, after faithfully accomplishing the heavy tasks devolving on her at home, to find time and means for successful mental cultivation." she The editress of the Mother's Journal, in the obituary notice already mentioned, says farther:-"She was of about middle stature, agreeable in her personal appearance, and winning in her manners. The first impression of an observer respecting her, in her youth, at the time of her departure from the country, would be of a gentle, confiding, persuasive being, who would sweeten the cup of life to those who drank it with her. But further acquaintance would develop strength as well as loveliness of character. It would be seen that she could do and endure as well as love and please. Sweetness and strength, gentleness and firmness, were in her character most happily blended. Her mind was both poetical and practical; she had refined taste, and a love for the beautiful as well as the excellent. For some years before she went to India, she had been a contributor to the Christian Watchman and Baptist Magazine, or had written several articles which found their way into these and other publications. Her poetry then had merit. A piece written upon the death of Messrs. Colman and Wheelock, soon after their arrival in Burmah as missionaries, and another upon the death of Catharine Brown, a Cherokee girl, attracted attention, and gave a favourable impression of the writer before she was otherwise known to the public. It may not be amiss to insert in this connection, an Acrostic, (a somewhat fashionable style of compliment in New-England twentyfive years ago,) addressed to the young poetess, previous to her acquaintance with Mr. BoardAs it appeared anonymously in a news man. paper, I cannot give the author's name with any degree of certainty, but I have some strong reasons for suspecting that it would be now no strange sound, in the ear of the readers of popular American literature. 66 SARAH HALL." "Soft and sweet thy numbers flow, What Sarah Hall would have been, if her young mind had not taken the self-denying direction, that prevented the literary development, to which she seemed at first inclined, may be the subject of agreeable conjecture; what she really was, we shall soon learn, by following her across the blue waters to her tropic home. CHAPTER IV. CONTRASTS. "And there are men in uncouth dress, But not a tree on all the strand, Is known in Anna's native land "* NN Hasseltine Judson, as she appeared at Washington during the winter of 1823, is thus described by the Rev. Doct. Babcock : "Rather above the medium female stature, her pleasant, frank, open countenance had still an air of dignity, an ingenuous, unsought loftiness of bearing, which could not fail to inspire profound respect and almost a feeling of awe. Her con *From "Anna's Return,"-a poem addressed to Mrs. Ann H. Judson, by a daughter of J. Butterworth, Mrs. P. Gordon. * * versation partook of the same traits. She was affable and meek, yet was she most emphatically dignified. The whole impression produced by intercourse with her at this period, was that of majestic sweetness." Others have spoken more minutely of a half-oriental style of beauty—a fine oval face, with a profusion of jetty curls around it, rich Spanish complexion, and dark, deep eyes, full of the lofty enthusiasm of character, the latent heroism, afterwards so thrillingly developed. At Salem the two met-the brilliant, accomplished woman, who had studied the human heart, in its various phases, on three continents, and who by her innate loftiness, as well as high-toned devotedness of spirit, could awe both savage and cultivated minds; and young, timid Sarah Hall, an unsunned dew-drop, in her sweet meekness. How strangely interesting this meeting; if any there had but possessed the power to turn a few leaves in the book of human destiny! A little anecdote will serve to illustrate a trait of character in the younger, which was prominent through life. True greatness, after it has once been developed, however unassuming, bears always with it a conscious |