she must fulfil her apprehended duty, to obtain that peace, which, flowing as a river, amply rewarded such sacrifices. It need scarcely be added, that in these performances, her own will being laid aside, she was instructed so to speak, as seldom, if ever, to offend; and we cannot calculate how much good may have been produced by those alms (if they may be so termed) given in secret.

The manner in which Elizabeth Shackleton was strengthened to perform her duties, is thus described by herself.

"Being sensible of my own inability, my dependence was on Divine help, which I had often experienced in times of need. I was favoured with understanding and knowledge for the business, beyond what I could have thought; my careful, industrious husband assisting in many things belonging to my department as well as his own; so that we were reciprocally helpful one to the other, sympathizing and bearing burdens one for the other, in our arduous calling; and both being near of an age, and favoured, for many years, with a good degree of health, our success in endeavouring to do our duty was an encouragement, and our minds were preserved in a grateful sense of the gracious dealings of the Lord to us. And notwithstanding our close and constant engagements, so that we seldom left home on other occasions, we found it but our reasonable duty to attend the meetings for discipline to which we belonged, as well as Quarterly and Half-yearly Meetings; also to show, by an exemplary life, the efficacy of the principles of Truth we professed to be led by, amongst the numerous acquaintance we had; being employed by many who knew little or nothing of those principles."

An instance of this occurred, when a gentlewoman, on leaving her son, requested of Richard Shackleton that he might be permitted to read the Bible. He, amazed, expressed his surprise that she should place her child where such a request was necessary, assuring her that the Bible was daily read in the family. She asked his excuse, telling him that she understood that George Fox's Journal was substituted instead of it, by those of his profession. At another time, the son of a man of fortune was brought to his school by his mother, who, till she came to Ballitore, had never seen one of the people called Quakers. Elizabeth Shackleton queried why she brought her son among a people who were such strangers to her. She answered, that she had heard a good character of them, although they differed from the Church of England concerning baptism and the supper. This lad spent most of his childhood, and some of his youth at Ballitore, perhaps the happiest part of his life; for when he lay in an American prison, dying of wounds received in a battle

in which the British army (wherein he was an officer) was defeated, and the prison was so crowded as to aggravate the pangs of death, "If I were at Ballitore I should not be thus neglected," were almost the last words he uttered.

One of the pupils, an only child, died of the small-pox; and Elizabeth Shackleton lost her own child, then also an only one, about the same time, of the same distemper. "This," said she, "proved a trial to me, which I hope was of service, believing, that whatever afflictions are permitted to attend us, are for our good, if we make a right use of them, and more and more cast our care on Him who careth for his humble dependent children."

A young man who had become R. S.'s scholar at a very early age, and spent most of his life with his preceptor, when he left school, expecting to pursue his literary studies, his father disappointed his prospects, by allotting to him a station in his counting-house. With a classical education, a superior genius, and knowing himself the only son of a rich man, the youth would not accede to his father's views; and this unwise conduct brought upon him the displeasure of his parents. The consequences of dissatisfaction at home are dangerous. He found them so he sought pleasure elsewhere, and found vanity and vexation of spirit. Yet, though conscious of errors which incurred the disapprobation of his former master, he turned to his house as to a home, and looked up to him as to a forgiving parent; while, through all his aberrations, the strong affection and intimate friendship of R. S. followed him, and seemed the means of preserving him from greater evils, and of bringing him back to that conduct which made him beloved, and even exemplary, in the family. The purity and stability of R. S.'s character fitted him for the Christian duty of winning the wanderers home, inviting and attracting to virtue; and when his parents, becoming more and more obdurate, refused that reconciliation which he humbly and earnestly sought, even when the hand of death lay upon him, he found in the protectors of his childhood and friends of his youth, that care and tenderness which he so much needed. When E. S. was about to leave home, to attend the meeting of Dublin, and her languishing invalid was going to undertake a second journey to Mallow, unable to rise from his chair, he took off his hat, which he wore for warmth, and solemnly bade her a last farewell; adding, "I die with more love to you than to any other woman in the world; and you are more my mother than she who bore me." He died Fifth Month, 1771, at Clonmel, intending for Mallow, aged 24.

The paternal care of R. S. left a lasting impression of gratitude on the minds of his pupils. One of them, now high in political and judicial station, gratuitously furnished his professional services to the son of his preceptor, in the course of a tedious law-suit; and he bore this gratifying testimony to his memory, in a letter to one of his grandsons: "I wish I could have been of more use, being under great obligations to your grandfather, who always treated me, when wanting his care, with kindness and affection."

Thus was kindness extended to the third generation, after a lapse of forty years.

CHAPTER III.

A FURTHER ACCOUNT OF ABRAHAM SHACKLETON-SOME LETTERS OF ROGER SHACKLETON-DEATH OF ABRAHAM SHACKLETON'S WIFE-VARIOUS LETTERS -ILLNESS AND DEATH OF ABRAHAM SHACKLETON.

WE shall now return to Abraham Shackleton. After his release from the duties which he had faithfully performed in an arduous occupation, he found himself more at liberty for the service of that religious Society of which he was a member. The Friends of the Monthly Meeting of Carlow in their testimony of him, given forth the 26th of the Second Month, 1774, say, that "Besides a constant regular attendance of the particular and general meetings to which he more immediately belonged, he paid frequent visits, in company with Friends, to meetings in several parts of this nation; and several times attended the Yearly Meeting in London, even in time of old age, and when natural strength failed, yet his spiritual as well as intellectual faculties witnessed no decay; but many are living witnesses of the awful, reaching manner in which he used to rise and weightily express himself among his brethren, in that great and solemn assembly. He did not appear in the character of a minister; yet, as an elder in the house of God, many times, in religious meetings, in the families of his friends, and among his own household, under the fresh anointing of heavenly dew, his words would drop from him with such sweetness and energy, as carried with them an evidence that they were brought up from the well of life and salvation, ministering grace and quickening virtue to the hearers. Reverent, awful, solemn, and reaching to the thoughtful beholder was his frame and deportment in religious meetings; his humble spirit deeply and patiently waited, (sometimes watched and waited long,) for the resurrection of a Divine life; when this was present, he had all things; when this disappeared, all comfort seemed withdrawn. And, indeed, as he seemed beyond most men to take little satisfaction in any thing but the precious Truth itself, so, we believe, he was beyond most men favoured with the overshadowing of it. Beloved and respected by all who knew him, for his unblemished life and useful labours, he was to the last preserved in deep humility and diffidence; preferring others to himself, walking among his brethren with all lowliness and meekness; and exercising no autho

rity in the church, but in the fresh sense of the power of an endless life. Edifying and instructive, indeed, were his words; but still more so his life and manners.

In the virtue of temperance he was an eminent pattern; being remarkably abstemious in meat, drink, and sleep; and was solicitous to enforce the practice of this virtue. He was much concerned at the practice, which many professing with us had run into, of continuing at the table to sit and drink after meals. This he looked upon as a depravity crept in among us, borrowed from the world, and tending to a dangerous coalition with it, even to an union with its spirit, and conformity to its customs in some of their most pernicious effects; beguiling from the simplicity which is in the Truth, and indisposing the mind for those heavenly refreshments, and that sweet communion, which our ancients were wont to be made partakers of, in seasons which they devoted to inward retirement, not to excess and intemperance, neither to the use of many words, in which there wanteth not sin. This evil was his great burden, and against which he bore a faithful testimony for several years by precept and example, being possessed with a godly jealousy, lest their table should be made a snare to many, and this practice should lay waste the inheritance of succeeding generations in the Truth. He was also much concerned at a custom too prevalent among Friends, of uncovering the head upon entering a room, and was pained when he saw the youth or others in that practice: he used to say, that when he was a young man he durst not balk his testimony in this respect, though the cross occasioned thereby seemed as bitter as death.

His spirit indeed was sorely grieved for the depravity and declining state of the Society; he said that getting in and joining with the spirit of the world, and not dwelling enough in the littleness and lowliness of mind which becomes the followers of a crucified Saviour, was a great hurt to us, and he feared many were hastening back into Babylon. Solid and exemplary in his own deportment, he was grieved when he observed levity of conduct or conversation in others, often saying, There was a fear that would keep the heart clean; and expressed his ardent desires that his successors might be a generation to serve the God of his life in the land of his pilgrimage. By day and by night his travail in spirit was for the prosperity of Sion, he greatly loved to hear any thing good or commendable of his fellow-creatures, and uniformly discouraged all detraction; closely attending to, and practising the counsel of his Great Master, who enjoined that we should in all things do to men as we would that they should do to us. He delighted in retirement, and for that

pur