The wife of Neil Livingstone was Agnes Hunter, a member of a family of the same humble rank and the same estimable character as his own.  Her grandfather, Gavin Hunter, of the parish of Shotts, was a doughty Covenanter, who might have sat for the portrait of David Deans.  His son David (after whom the traveler was named) was a man of the same type, who got his first religious impressions in his eighteenth year, at an open-air service conducted by one of the Secession Erskines.  Snow was falling at the time, and before the end of the sermon the people were standing in snow up to the ankles; but David Hunter used to say he had no feeling of cold that day.  He married Janet Moffat, and lived at first in comfortable circumstances at Airdrie, where he owned a cottage and a croft.  Mrs. Hunter died, when her daughter Agnes, afterward Mrs. Neil Livingstone, was but fifteen.  Agnes was her mother’s only nurse during a long illness, and attended so carefully to her wants that the minister of the family laid his hand on her head, and said, “A blessing will follow you, my lassie, for your duty to your mother.”  Soon after Mrs. Hunter’s death a reverse of fortune overtook her husband, who had been too good-natured in accommodating his neighbors.  He removed to Blantyre, where he worked as a tailor.  Neil Livingstone was apprenticed to him by his father, much against his will; but it was by this means that he became acquainted with Agnes Hunter, his future wife.  David Hunter, whose devout and intelligent character procured for him great respect, died at Blantyre in 1834, at the age of eighty-seven.  He was a great favorite with his grandchildren, to whom he was always kind, and whom he allowed to rummage freely among his books, of which he had a considerable collection, chiefly theological.

Neil Livingstone and Agnes Hunter were married in 1810, and took up house at first in Glasgow.  The furnishing of their house indicated the frugal character and self-respect of the occupants; it included a handsome chest of drawers, and other traditional marks of respectability.  Not liking Glasgow, they returned to Blantyre.  In a humble home there, five sons and two daughters were born.  Two of the sons died in infancy, to the great sorrow of the parents.  Mrs. Livingstone’s family spoke and speak of her as a very loving mother, one who contributed to their home a remarkable element of brightness and serenity.  Active, orderly, and of thorough cleanliness, she trained her family in the same virtues, exemplifying their value in their own home.  She was a delicate little woman, with a wonderful flow of good spirits, and remarkable for the beauty of her eyes, to which those of her son David bore a strong resemblance.  She was most careful of household duties, and attentive to her children.  Her love had no crust to penetrate, but came beaming out freely like the light of the sun.  Her son loved her, and in many ways followed her.  It was the genial, gentle influences that had moved him under his mother’s training that enabled him to move the savages of Africa.