Bereaved of her husband, sons, and brother-in-law by the murderous savages, Mrs. Bledsoe was obliged alone to undertake, not only the charge of her husband’s estate, but the care of the children, and their education and settlement in life.  These duties were discharged with unwavering energy and Christian patience.  Her religion had taught her fortitude under her unexampled distresses; and through all this trying period of her life, she exhibited a decision and firmness of character which bespoke no ordinary powers of intellect.  Her mind, indeed, was of masculine strength, and she was remarkable for independence of thought and opinion.  In person, she was attractive, being neither tall nor large, until advanced in life.  Her hair was brown, her eyes gray and her complexion fair.  Her useful life was closed in the autumn of 1808.  The record of her worth, and of what she did and suffered, is an humble one, and may win little attention from the careless many, who regard not the memory of our “pilgrim mothers:”  but the recollection of her gentle virtues has not yet faded from the hearts of her descendants; and those to whom they tell the story of her life will acknowledge her the worthy companion of those noble men to whom belongs the praise of having originated a new colony and built up a goodly state in the bosom of the forest.  Their patriotic labors, their struggles with the surrounding savages, their efforts in the maintenance of the community they had founded—­sealed, as they finally were, with their own blood, and the blood of their sons and relatives—­will never be forgotten while the apprehension of what is noble, generous, and good survives in the hearts of their countrymen.

[1] Milton A. Haynes, Esq., of Tennessee, has furnished me with this and other accounts.

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MORE GOSSIP ABOUT CHILDREN,

IN A FAMILIAR EPISTLE TO THE EDITOR.

BY LOUIS GAYLORD CLARK.

MY DEAR GODEY:—­

I have not finished my gossip about children.  I have a good deal yet to say touching their sensibilities, their nice discriminating sense, and the treatment which they too frequently receive from those who, although older than themselves, are in very many things not half so wise.

If you will take up Southey’s Autobiography, written by himself (and his son), and recently published by my friends, the brothers Harper, you will find in the portion of Southey’s early history, as recorded by himself, many striking examples of the keen susceptibility of childhood to outward and inward impressions, and of the deep feeling which underlies the apparently unthoughtful career of a young boy.  It is a delightful opening of his whole heart to his reader.  One sees with him the smallest object of nature about the home of his childhood; and it is impossible not to enter into all his feelings of little joys and poignant sorrows.  I am not without the hope, therefore, that, in the few records which I am about to give you; partly of personal experience and partly of personal observation, I shall be able to enlist the attention of your readers; for, after all, each one of us, friend Godey, in our own more mature joys and sorrows, is but an epitome, so to speak, the great mass, who alike rejoice and grieve us.