During her last sickness she said, “I believe this is not death, but it is as passing through the valley of the shadow of death, and perhaps with more suffering, from more sensitiveness; but the ’rock is here’; the distress is awful, but He has been with me.”

The last morning came, Oct. 13, 1845.  About nine o’clock, one of her daughters, sitting by her bedside, read from Isaiah:  “I, the Lord thy God, will hold thy right hand, saying unto thee, Fear not, thou worm of Jacob, and ye men of Israel, I will help thee, saith the Lord, and thy Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel.”  The mother said slowly, “Oh! my dear Lord, help and keep thy servant!” and never spoke afterward.

She was buried in the Friends’ burying-ground at Barking, by the side of her little Elizabeth, a deep silence prevailing among the multitudes gathered there, broken only by the solemn prayer of her brother, Joseph John Gurney.

Thus closed one of the most beautiful lives among women.  To the last she was doing good deeds.  When she was wheeled along the beach in her chair, she gave books and counsel to the passers-by.  When she stayed at hotels, she usually arranged a meeting for the servants.  She was sent for, from far and near, to pray with the sick, and comfort the dying, who often begged to kiss her hand; no home was too desolate for her lovely and cheerful presence.  No wonder Alexander of Russia called her “one of the wonders of the age.”

Her only surviving son gives this interesting testimony of her home life:  “I never recollect seeing her out of temper or hearing her speak a harsh word, yet still her word was law, but always the law of love.”

Naturally timid, always in frail health, sometimes misunderstood, even with the highest motives, she lived a heroic life in the best sense, and died the death of a Christian.  What grander sphere for woman than such philanthropy as this!  And the needs of humanity are as great as ever, waiting for the ministration of such noble souls.

ELIZABETH THOMPSON BUTLER.

While woman has not achieved such brilliant success in art, perhaps, as in literature, many names stand high on the lists.  Early history has its noted women:  Propersia di Rossi, of Bologna, whose romantic history Mrs. Hemans has immortalized; Elisabetta Sirani, painter, sculptor, and engraver on copper, herself called a “miracle of art,” the honored of popes and princes, dying at twenty-six; Marietta Tintoretta, who was invited to be the artist at the courts of emperors and kings, dying at thirty, leaving her father inconsolable; Sophonisba Lomellini, invited by Philip II. of Spain to Madrid, to paint his portrait, and that of the Queen, concerning whom, though blind, Vandyck said he had received more instruction from a blind woman than from all his study of the old masters; and many more.