found it to be a delightful task.
All this time she was diligent in study, and in the intellectual culture
of her own mind, as we find from her Journal.

"I had a good lesson of French this morning, and read much in
Epictetus." Later on, we find her intent on the books of Dr. Isaac
Watts, his _Logic_ especially, which Dr. Johnson had commended strongly
to all who sought the "improvement of the mind."

IV.

AT COLEBROOK DALE, AND ON A JOURNEY TO WALES.

In the summer of 1798, John Gurney took the whole of his seven daughters
an excursion through parts of England and Wales. At Colebrook Dale,
where they saw several relatives, members of the Society of Friends,
Elizabeth Gurney received the deepest impressions. She was especially
struck with the veteran philanthropist, Richard Reynolds, who having
made a large fortune in his well-managed iron-works, spent his money and
time in seeking the moral good of the working people. At Colebrook Dale
also she spent some days with an elderly cousin, Priscilla Hannah
Gurney, cousin to the Earlham Gurneys by both father and mother, her
father being Joseph Gurney and her mother Christiana Barclay. Being left
by her father alone for some days with this cousin, the influence of the
visit was very powerful on her. "She was exactly the person to attract
the young; she possessed singular beauty, and elegance of manner. She
was of the old school; her costume partook of this, and her long
retention of the black hood gave much character to her appearance. She
had early renounced the world and its fascinations; left Bath, where her
mother and sister Christiana Gurney resided; became eventually a
minister among Friends; and found a congenial retreat for many years at
Colebrook Dale."

The travelling party went on to make a tour in Wales and to attend the
gathering of Friends at the Welsh half-yearly meeting. Most of the
Colebrook Dale Friends were present, and further converse with Priscilla
Gurney induced her niece to resolve openly to conform to Quaker customs,
though at what precise time she became professedly a Friend we are not
told. As to the costume, she was very slow in adopting it--not till some
time after returning to Norwich.

In this early Welsh journey a singular prediction was given in an
address by an aged Friend, Deborah Darby, who said of her that "she
would be a light to the blind, speech to the dumb, and feet to the
lame." "Can it be? She seems as if she thought I