In the early years of her great loss, while at first overwhelmed in spirit, she yet resolves, in submission to the will of God, to bear her calamities with patience and courage.  “My yet disordered thoughts,” she writes to Dr. Fitzwilliam, “can offer me no other than such words as express the deepest sorrows, and confused as my yet amazed mind is.  You, that knew us both, and how we lived, must allow I have just cause to bewail my loss.  Who can but shrink at such a blow, till, by the mighty aid of His Holy Spirit, we will let the gift of God, which He hath put into our hearts, interpose.  That reason which sets a measure to our souls in prosperity, will then suggest many things which we have seen and heard to moderate us in such sad circumstances as mine.”  “Can I regret his quitting a lesser good for a bigger?  Oh! if I did steadfastly believe, I could not be dejected; for I will not injure myself to say I offer to my mind any infirm consolation to supply this loss.  No, I most willingly forsake this world, this vexatious troublesome world, in which I have no other business but to rid my soul from sin; secure by faith and a good conscience my eternal interests with patience and courage bear my eminent misfortunes; and ever after be above the smiles and frowns of it.  And when I have done the remnant of the work appointed me on earth, then joyfully wait for the heavenly perfection, in God’s good time, when by His infinite mercy I may be accounted worthy to enter into the same place of rest and repose where he is gone, for whom only I grieve.”

Many letters in similar strain are preserved, to Dr. Burnet, Dr. Patrick and other pious friends who like Dr. Fitzwilliam had sent messages of sympathy and consolation.  She often refers to the refreshment and satisfaction she had in “endeavouring to do that part towards her children, which their most dear and tender father would not have omitted.  These labours, if successful, though early made unfortunate, may conduce to their happiness for the time to come and hereafter.”  Attendance to these children, through childhood till they were settled in life, she ever reckoned, “her first and chief business,” but she gradually undertook various matters of business for relatives and friends, many of whom had recourse to one so wise, unselfish, and sympathetic.

[Illustration:  RACHEL, LADY RUSSELL.]

As an example of the interest she took in passing affairs, part of a letter to Dr. Fitzwilliam, in 1689, may be quoted.  After replying to some inquiries about the Cambridgeshire clergy, which she could not learn from Lord Bedford, “the parliament houses being so exacting of time,” she says:  “You hear all the new honours, I suppose:  not many new creations, but all are stepping higher; as Lord Winchester is Duke of Bolton; Lord Montague an Earl, still Montague; Falconbridge, who married Mary, daughter of Oliver Cromwell, an Earl called the same; Mordaunt, Earl of Monmouth (afterwards Earl of Peterborough);