Page:Hannah More (1887 Charlotte Mary Yonge British).djvu/146

134 heard to pray extempore in private, and one accused him of the heavy sin of having done it on the public nights. . . . My dear friend, I have prayed and struggled earnestly not to be quite subdued to my mind, but I cannot command my nerves, and though pretty well through the bustle of the day, yet I get such disturbed and agitated nights that I could not answer for my lasting if the thing went farther. "How shall I give thee up, Ephraim?" is my frequent exclamation as I walk in my garden and look at the steeple and the village of Blagdon. I know if I had a lively faith I should rejoice to be thought worthy to suffer in the cause of Christ; but I cannot help mourning for our Jerusalem. I mourn to see nothing is thought a crime but what they are pleased to call enthusiasm.

She was even accused of making her schools pray for the French, while she was actually exerting herself in behalf of the Somersetshire volunteers. At Shipham, when there was an alarm of the French landing at Fishguard,—

The rugged miners poured to war from Mendip's sunless caves,

and the male population were actually met marching to the defence of Bristol. The ladies of Barley Wood had even offered their house as a station for the troops if required.

Sir Abraham Elton re-examined the oath-takers, and with such effect that the Lord Chancellor Loughborough advised the bringing an action for libel against the slanderers; but she held fast by the rule she had chosen for herself, "The King's command is, 'Answer him not.'" In point of fact, in five years' time, no less than five of these accusers had been prosecuted for libels against other persons.