31_st_.—­Attended Mad’lle Berthom’s Scripture class, at the Institution for the Destitute.  There are eighteen girls in the house to bed and hoard; it has been established about six years.  M.B.’s method of examining the children is the most simple and spiritual of any that I have seen; she has an extraordinary gift for the purpose.

9 mo. 2.—­Attended the Monthly Meeting in the missionary room.  Many of the company were peasants from some distance.  The singing excepted, it resembled a Monthly Meeting for worship in our Society; for all had liberty to speak one after the other, five or six speaking by way of testimony:  the doctrine was sound, and the way in which they coupled this with their Christian experience was really excellent.  I had much unity with the concluding prayer by Pastor Merley.

2_nd_.—­The evening was spent at Mad’e W.’s, with a pretty large company. ——­ proposed for a few verses to be sung; afterwards he read a chapter, and gave a long exposition, somewhat dry.  When this and a prayer were gone through, it was late; neither my M.Y., nor myself, were able to express what was on our minds.  Some uneasiness and disappointment were expressed by several; and two of these dear friends came to our lodgings the next day, with whom we had a precious time.  My M.Y. had to speak a few words to the particular state of M.B., and at the close she acknowledged, in brokenness of spirit, that it was the truth.

There is a remarkable awakening in the town and canton of Berne, both among those of the higher walks of life and the peasants; but there is not strength enough to come out of the forms.  There are thirty females to one man among those who are lately become serious.

From Berne, J. and M.Y. proceeded to Zurich, arriving there on the 5th of the Ninth Month.  They spent three days in the city, chiefly in the company of the Gessner-Lavater family, and renewed with the various members of it the intimate friendship of former years.  A short passage descriptive of this sojourn is hero appended.

9 mo. 7.—­We attended the worship of the National Church, and heard the pious Gessner.  What he said was excellent, but I never enter these places without feeling regret that good Christians can be so bound by book-worship; it certainly damps the life of religion in the assemblies.  How much we ought to rejoice in being delivered from the forms.

I was instructed yesterday evening by hearing a reply of one of the first missionaries of the Moravians [?].  He had labored diligently for twenty-five years, and when asked how many souls had been turned to the Lord by his means, he modestly answered, Seven.  The person expressing surprise at the smallness of the number in so many years, he replied, How happy shall I be to stand in the Lord’s presence at the last day, and to say, Lord, here am I and the seven children whom thou hast given me.  We ought to labor in faith, and not expect to see fruit.