sefulness a little
longer, and so 1885 closed, and we find him still with his family,
receiving many tokens of love from them and from brethren far away.
Spring comes, and birds and flowers; the bright sunshine beams into his
chamber, and now and then he is barely able to walk out to see and feel
his Father's goodness bathing all things in quiet beauty. He repines
not, knowing that "our light affliction, which is but for a moment,
worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory."

He continues to write, and with the rest the preceding chapter of
"Reflections on his Fiftieth Birthday." He commits it, his diary, and
other writings to me, with the request that I do with them as I think
best, for now he is sure that this unequal contest with mortality can
not last much longer.

Summer comes, and with it increasing weakness, but no diminution of his
trust in God. He wishes to visit Eminence once more, and to see his two
younger daughters graduate from the college that had helped himself in
former years. He attends, and then, unable to walk without help, he
comes on to Lexington, to spend commencement week among his friends and
brethren; this done, he returns to his beloved Mt. Byrd, to leave it no
more till he goes to stand with the redeemed on the Mount of God.

During the fall of this year hardly a week passed that several of his
relatives and Christian brethren were not found at his home; and did
not the limit of this chapter forbid, we would like to record their
names, for in love they came to testify their admiration for him and
their sympathy with his sorrowing family. For one and all he had a word
of cheer, and none came away without being deeply impressed with the
conviction that he had been with one of the purest and best of men--one
who lived in daily communion with his Maker. His one theme of
conversation was religion, and if we may judge from his increasing
delight in it, to no one was death a more gentle transition from faith
to sight. Narrow, indeed, to him was the bourn that divides the seen
from the unseen, the temporal from the eternal, and the labors of earth
from the felicities of heaven. He daily lived upon the boundary of two
worlds.

In October, Bro. J. K. P. South held a meeting with the Mt. Byrd
church, and, though feeble beyond measure, Bro. Allen made out to
attend a few times, and even to take part in prayer and exhortation,
sitting in his chair. Only twice after this was he abl