Page:Robert Carter- his life and work. 1807-1889 (IA robertcarterhis00coch).pdf/206

190 here in the College with about forty students; of late years, the names of my students have numbered from one hundred to a hundred and thirty-five.”

Little has been said so far of Mr. Carter’s General Assembly experiences. These formed a very interesting part of his life, and it is a great pity that a full record of them has not been kept. He was seventeen times a delegate, and took part in many important sessions, especially during the Reunion of the Old and New School Presbyterian churches. At one of the earlier meetings which he attended, the subject of ministerial relief was brought up. He arose and told the following story. Some years before, he had heard that a friend of his, minister to one of the poorer congregations in New York City, was ill, and he went to see him. He was evidently consumptive, and told Mr. Carter that his physician had said that he ought to go South, as he could not live through the Northern winter. “Why do you not start at once?” said Mr. Carter; “it is cold weather now.” The sick man requested his wife to leave the room, and said, “Mr. Carter, I have not a dollar in the world. My people can do nothing more for me. The doctor wants me to borrow money to go South as a means of saving my life, but I am not willing to run the risk of leaving my family with a burden of debt, if I am to die after all.” Mr. Carter was a poor man then himself, but he started a subscription, giving all he could, and went about among his friends asking for help. The sympathies of one benevolent lady were so aroused, that she got into her sleigh in the midst of a blinding snow-storm and collected from her relatives, and Mr. Carter went in a few days with five hundred dollars to the poor invalid, and laid the money on the counterpane before him. The good man clasped his hands,