THE WORxER IN CHRIST'S VINEYARD. In her letters we plainly see the difficulties which opposed her retirement from the world ; and her ardent desires to obtain a better knowledge of religion. In one breath she says, May, 1783, " I am tired of writing several letters,-and of reading the ` Lives of the Reformers,'-and of trimming a fine gauze handkerchief; and now I am going to close the day with a thick quarto of Dr. Beattie's ` Metaphysics.' " Hannah More's principles of benevolence were somewhat severely tried in the autumn of 1793. Their cook informing the sisters that a poor woman in the neighbourhood was, with her husband and children, absolutely perishing from hunger, they hastened, compassionately, to the rescue of the poor creatures. They discovered that the woman - Mrs. Yearsley - although perfectly uncultivated, had singular poetic genius, and had produced fragments of original verse which evinced grace and power. It occurred to Hannah More that this talent might be the means of raising a fund for their protégée ; and, after teaching her some common rules of writing, spelling, and composition, she exerted herself so much through her friends that she speedily raised a sub- scription of six hundred pounds, which was invested in the Funds. For thirteen months she laboured un- ceasingly ; but Mrs. Yearsley, on finding that she was not to have the money placed directly in her own hands, expressed, in the coarsest terms, her rage and disappointment, spreading among other 28
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