p.

Pawtucket 13 of 8th.mo 1861

My dear friend,

Rachel B. Stevens, as I am fully on the sick
list, a retired pensioner; and pretty likely off the roll of the
King's army; there are many opportunities found, while shut
up in our wn dear home, for a resurvey of scenes once familiar;
and for calling again to mind many of those tenderly remembered.
Ones, with whom it was, often in years past, my lot to be a greatful
sharer of some portion of those priceless blessings which give to society
no small share of its interest and its benefit.

In such engagement, I have remembered Montpelier - and its
place of dear retreat in my frequent passings; when the really unre-
strained revels of the heart in the varied beauties of natural
scenery made that rugged land more delightsome than an
outspread plain. And of that period, few, indeed are the counten-
ances to be now seen. But there are a few, also, who can, more readily
than I, occasionally, turn aside for the moment the veil hanging
over the past; and restore it soon; as we would, after surveying some
effecting wound replace its careful wrapping, that in quiet and
rest all needful healing might go on.

And I now only touch on things of the kind, to let thee know
how fully and how tenderly my heart has often been, and yet is,
dipped into sympathy with thee and thy beloved ones around thee,
earnestly desiring that you may bear in remembrance that the most
Gracious Being who gives [grace?], still, as cared-for ones, a little longer
stay here; and watches for [you?], over the seasons of your conflict as
they pass, rules yet the tempest and controls the storm - He maketh
the clous His chariot, and though, because of darkness, unseen, your
Lord is there.

Sometimes the past and present and the future may
combine to bring upon us a burden of oppression and fear from
which we are powerless to arise. But if we may but carry along
with us the assurance, that, He that was and is and is to come, is
the same yesterday, today and forever; we may; rather I say shall