ossess.

29_th_.--A most awful morning; my dear lamb is no more! She sweetly
fell asleep in the bosom of her Saviour, at one o'clock this morning. The
closing scene was perfect ease and peace. From the first of her illness
she seemed aware how it would terminate, and was perfectly resigned.
During our being at Bentham she has often said it was a place provided by
Providence to afford her that religious retirement she had long desired,
and which she took the most scrupulous care to improve. When in health she
would tell me of late that perhaps she might be taken away in order to set
me more fully at liberty to do the Lord's work.

11 _mo_. 18.--This day two weeks was the solemn ceremony of
committing to the silent dust the remains of my very precious and dearly
beloved Elizabeth. I had dreaded the day very much; but through prayer,
mixed with a degree of faith, which was mercifully granted, I was
wonderfully supported. In the meeting I felt the divine influence so near,
and so to prevail over my spirit, that I was constrained publicly to thank
the Father of mercies for his goodness.

This day I visited, perhaps for the last time, the place which encloses
the cold relics of one so dearly beloved; and as I stood weeping over the
grave, it sprang in my heart, She is not here but (she) is risen. What an
unspeakable consolation to be enabled to leave the dust behind, and hold
sweet communion and converse with the spirit. Ever since her departure it
feels as though her spirit had never left me, but was hovering and
fluttering around me to administer comfort on every afflicting occasion;
and O, saith my spirit, that this precious feeling may remain with me for
ever.

12 _mo_. 20.--I feel to lament the loss of my dear lamb more than
ever, at least so far as I dare. No one but myself knows the comfort which
the late awful event has deprived me of; but I no sooner remember the hand
which administered it than all complaining is hushed into silence, and I
am made to rejoice that she is so safely deposited where trouble cannot
reach.

From this moment John Yeardley felt himself quite free to pursue the path
of duty which had been opened before him, viz., to go and reside in
Germany.

In the Eleventh Month he left Bentham to sojourn awhile with his brother,
and on the 9th of the First Month, 1822, he received a certificate of
removal from Settle Monthly Meeting, addressed to the Friends of Pyrmont
and Minden, which certified