nd the frequent
straits to which we were brought, we never really suffered for the want
of money, though frequently for want of provisions, which were not
procurable. Here at this place my personal bodily sufferings commenced.
While your brother was confined in the city prison, I had been allowed
to remain in our house, in which I had many conveniences left, and my
health continued good beyond all expectations. But now I had not a
single article of convenience--not even a chair or seat of any kind,
excepting a bamboo floor. The very morning after my arrival, Mary
Hasseltine was taken with the small pox, the natural way. She, though
very young, was the only assistant I had in taking care of little Maria.
But she now required all the time I could spare from Mr. Judson, whose
fever still continued in prison, and whose feet were so dreadfully
mangled, that for several days he was unable to move. I knew not what to
do, for I could procure no assistance from the neighbourhood, or
medicine for the sufferers, but was all day long going backwards and
forwards from the house to the prison, with little Maria in my arms.
Sometimes I was greatly relieved by leaving her, for an hour, when
asleep, by the side of her father, while I returned to the house to look
after Mary, whose fever ran so high as to produce delirium. She was so
completely covered with the small pox, that there was no distinction in
the pustules. As she was in the same little room with myself, I knew
Maria would take it; I therefore inoculated her from another child,
before Mary's had arrived at such a state as to be infectious. At the
same time, I inoculated Abby, and the jailer's children, who all had it
so lightly as hardly to interrupt their play. But the inoculation in the
arm of my poor little Maria did not take--she caught it of Mary, and had
it the natural way. She was then only three months and a half old, and
had been a most healthy child; but it was above three months before she
perfectly recovered from the effects of this dreadful disorder.

"You will recollect I never had the small pox, but was vaccinated
previously to leaving America. In consequence of being for so long a
time constantly exposed, I had nearly a hundred pustules formed, though
no previous symptoms of fever, &c. The jailer's children having had the
small pox so lightly, in consequence of inoculation, my fame was spread
all over the village, and every child, young and old, who had not
pre