Blair Collection > Rhys Lewis, minister of Bethel

HHYS LEWIS. 129
" It would be very difficult for me to believe," my mother
added, "that Bob was not a Christian. If he is not in the
house, he belongs to the family, I am pretty certain, and per-
adventure it is from the far-off country of the prison that the
yearning will arise in him for his Father. How did he look, tell
me ? Middling well ? Yes ? It's wonderful how he can take
everything so composedly. I know what is uppermost in his
mind, and that is, what'll become of us both, how are we to live,
because there never was a lad who thought more of his mother,
my poor darling ! "
Upon this she burst out crying, a proceeding at which I
helped. After quieting, she said : —
"Do they have a Bible in jail, tell me? They have? I'm
glad to hear it ; but, for that matter, Bob knows enough of the
Bible to chew the cud upon, for two months, anyhow. "What
vexes me most is that I never had a look at him. It seemed a bit
cold of me that I did not go to the Hall, but I could not for the
life of me set out, somehow. Do you think he'd get a letter if
we were to write? You do? "Well then, I'U not sleep to-night
until you've sent him a word. I'm glad you're a bit of a
scholar, because I don't want all the world to know our affairs."
I was then obliged to set to and write a letter. At my
mother's suggestion, I wrote it first on the unused leaf of a
copy book, " For fear," she said, " we might want to alter it."
The original is still in my possession, and perhaps I can't do
better than finish this chapter with a transcript. There is nothing
particular in its contents, what makes it precious to me being
the proof it affords of my mother's acquaintance with the Bible.
I give it exactly as she dictated it, with the exception of a few
changes in the colloquialisms where the meaning is not quite
clear.
"Dear Son, — I write you these few lines hoping you are
quite well as it leaves us at present. I feel mixed and
moithered very much, and I know you're the same. My com-
plaint to-day is bitter — Job twenty third and second. But who
is he that saith and it cometh to pass when the Lord com-
mandeth it not— Lamentations, thii-d and thirty seventh. I
know very well you'll be troubling your mind about us as we
are about you ; but I hope you know where to turn, as you said