Page:Groves - Memoir of Anthony Norris Groves, 3rd edition.djvu/225



Mr. Groves having kept no journal of the events which transpired in Bagdad from the time of the plague to that of his departure in 1833 for India, his eldest son, who remained in Bagdad till 1834, has supplied the following facts in a letter to the Editor:—

“I will endeavour as briefly as possible to communicate to you some of my recollections of the period between 1832 and 1833; that is, the time between the conclusion of my father’s printed journal and that of his departure from Bagdad. So many years have passed away, that I fear I may not put all things in their due order; but the events of that eventful period are so indelibly written on my mind that they cannot be obliterated; for it was during the plague, the famine, and the bloodshed, which in the year 1831 brought such untold misery on all around us, that the gracious Spirit of God commenced that work in my heart, which, although at the time it seemed unfruitful, yet after many struggles in 1832 brought me to the foot of the cross. It was this, perhaps, which, together with the hardships we had endured, and the sad familiarity into which I had been brought with misery and death, that enabled me, beyond my years, to enter into the circumstances which surrounded me, and gives me now so vivid a recollection of some of those incidents, which, in connection with my father’s