Page:Robert Carter- his life and work. 1807-1889 (IA robertcarterhis00coch).pdf/88

72 deeply affected me. I returned to my friend, and watched by him all night. I committed that psalm to memory that night, and felt that plague and pestilence were no more to be dreaded.’

“Among those whom I met shortly after I came to New York were two brothers, R. L. and Alexander Stuart, the one older, the other younger, than myself. They began to give small subscriptions to benevolent work, which increased with increasing prosperity. They first gave hundreds, then thousands, then tens of thousands, and at last hundreds of thousands. For many years the elder brother spent the Monday mornings with me at the Mission House. He and Mr. Lenox were most conscientious in their attendance there, and they were the most liberal contributors. I watched their course from year to year, and it was onward and upward. It was no small privilege to me to witness how readily they gave their time and their money to send the Gospel to the ends of the earth. I was often tempted to exclaim,

When Mr. Carter was nearly eighty years of age, he called one day on Mrs. R. L. Stuart, and she drew from a desk an old document which she handed to him. It was a call for the first meeting to discuss the propriety of forming a Board of Foreign Missions, and was signed by some of the most prominent clergymen and laymen of the church in New York, not one of whom is now living. Mrs. Stuart said that her husband had gone to that meeting, and in the enthusiasm of his heart had pledged himself to give five hundred dollars to the cause. When he came home, his mother and his brother Alexander were full of consternation, and asked him if