er father,
George Hinsdale, who died in her early childhood, must have been a man
of good abilities and religious feeling, being the reputed composer of
the psalm-tune, "Hinsdale," found in some long-ago collections.

Left an orphan at two years of age, Phebe "fell into the hands of a
relative who kept the county jail," and her childhood knew little but
the bitter fare and ceaseless drudgery of domestic slavery. She grew up
with a crushed spirit, and was a timid, shrinking woman as long as she
lived. She married Timothy H. Brown, a house-painter of Ellington, Ct.,
and passed her days there and in Monson, Mass., where she lived some
twenty-five years.

In her humble home in the former town her children were born, and it was
while caring for her own little family of four, and a sick sister, that
the incident occurred (August 1818), which called forth her tender hymn.
She was a devout Christian, and in pleasant weather, whenever she could
find the leisure, she would "steal away" at sunset from her burdens a
little while, to rest and commune with God. Her favorite place was a
wealthy neighbor's large and beautiful flower garden. A servant reported
her visits there to the mistress of the house, who called the "intruder"
to account.

"If you want anything, why don't you come in?" was the rude question,
followed by a plain hint that no stealthy person was welcome.

Wounded by the ill-natured rebuff, the sensitive woman sat down the next
evening with her baby in her lap, and half-blinded by her tears, wrote
"An Apology for my Twilight Rambles," in the verses that have made her
celebrated.

She sent the manuscript (nine stanzas) to her captious neighbor--with
what result has never been told.

Crude and simple as the little rhyme was, it contained a germ of lyric
beauty and life. The Rev. Dr. Charles Hyde of Ellington, who was a
neighbor of Mrs. Brown, procured a copy. He was assisting Dr. Nettleton
to compile the _Village Hymns_, and the humble bit of devotional verse
was at once judged worthy of a place in the new book. Dr. Hyde and his
daughter Emeline giving it some kind touches of rhythmic amendment,

I love to steal awhile away
From little ones and care,

--became,--

I love to steal awhile away
From _every cumb'ring_ care.

In the last line of this stanza--

In gratitude and prayer

--was changed to--

In humble, grateful prayer,

--and the few other defects in syllabic smoot