heaved are at
rest in the dust. O, then, my sister, possess your soul in patience,
and seek to make daily advances in holiness."

CHAPTER IX.

ORPHAN ASYLUM SOCIETY--FOREIGN
MISSIONARIES--LETTERS.

On the 15th of March, 1806, the female subscribers to proposals
for providing an asylum for orphan children met at the City Hotel;
Mrs. Graham was called to the chair, a society organized, and a board
of direction chosen, Mrs. Hoffman was elected the first directress of
the Orphan Asylum Society. Mrs. Graham continued in the office of
first directress of the Widows' Society, but took a deep interest in
the success of the Orphan Asylum also; she, or one of her family,
taught the orphans daily, until the funds of the institution were
sufficient to provide a teacher and superintendent. She was a trustee
at the time of her decease. The wish to establish this new society was
occasioned by the pain which it gave the ladies of the Widows' Society
to behold a family of orphans driven, on the decease of a widow, to
seek refuge in the almshouse; no melting heart to feel, no redeeming
hand to rescue them from a situation so unpromising for mental and
moral improvement.

"Among the afflicted of our suffering race," thus speaks the
constitution of the society, "none makes a stronger or more impressive
appeal to humanity than the _destitute orphan_. Crime has not
been the cause of its misery, and future usefulness may yet be the
result of its protection; the reverse is often the case of more aged
objects. God himself has marked the fatherless as the peculiar
subjects of his divine compassion. 'A Father of the fatherless is God
in his holy habitation,' 'When my father and my mother forsake me,
then the Lord will take me up.' To be the blessed instrument of,
divine Providence in making good the promise of God, is a privilege
equally desirable and honorable to the benevolent heart.'"

And truly God has made good his promise towards this benevolent
institution. He has crowned the undertaking with his remarkable
blessing. It was begun by his disciples in faith, and he has
acknowledged them in it. Having for fourteen months occupied a hired
house for an asylum, the ladies entertained the bold idea of building
an asylum on account of the society. They had then about three hundred
and fifty dollars as the commencement of a fund for the building;