ed over her features was in a high degree lovely and
interesting. Her countenance was indeed the faithful image of a
mind that was purity itself, and of a heart where compassion and
goodness had fixed their abode. To the sweetest disposition that
ever graced a woman, was joined a sensibility, not the fictitious
creature of the imagination, but the glowing offspring of a pure
and affectionate soul.

'Tenderness, that quality of the heart which gives such a charm to
every female virtue, was hers in an eminent degree. It diffused
itself over every action of her life. Sometimes blended with a
delicate and happy humor, characteristic of her nature, it would
delight the social circle; again, with the most assiduous offices
of affection, it would show itself at the sick couch of a parent, a
relative, or a friend. In this manner the writer of this brief
memorial witnessed those soothing acts of kindness which, under
peculiar circumstances, will ever be dear to his memory. Alas!
little did she then dream that in one short year she herself would
fall a sacrifice to the same disease under which the friend to whom
she so kindly ministered, sunk to the grave.'

This testimony to departed worth bears the impress of deep sincerity,
and its freedom from the fulsome praise, which so often varnishes the
dead, seems to add to its force. Peter Irving, also, pays a tribute to
her character in the following utterance, in a letter to his bereaved
brother: 'May her gentle spirit have found that heaven to which it ever
seemed to appertain. She was too spotless for this contaminated world.'

The biographer states that 'Mr. Irving never alluded to this event, nor
did any of his relatives ever venture in his presence to introduce the
name of Matilda,' 'I have heard,' he adds, 'of but one instance in which
it was ever obtruded upon him, and that was by her father, nearly thirty
years after her death, and at his own house. A granddaughter had been
requested to play for him some favorite piece on the piano, and in
extricating her music from the drawer, she accidentally brought forth a
piece of embroidery with it. 'Washington,' said Mr. Hoffman, picking up
the faded relic, 'this is a piece of poor Matilda's workmanship.' The
effect was electric. He had been conversing in the sprightliest mood
before, but he sunk at once into utter silence, and in a few moments g