My letter is so sad and melancholy that I cannot let it go without something more cheerful, so I will add a line to brighten and cheer it up a little.  For life, with all the bitterness it contains, has also much that is agreeable and affords much enjoyment; for there is a wonderful elasticity in the human mind which enables it, when sanctified by divine grace, to bear up under present ills.  So with all my griefs and ills, I have been able to enjoy myself too sometimes this winter.  I have lately attended two Concerts, one here, given by the Prussian Sisters, for the benefit of the new Orphanage, “Talitha Kumi,” at Jerusalem, lately erected by the Prussian Sisters there—­and one given by the “Sisters of Charity,” for the benefit of the orphans and poor of this town.  Daood Pasha most generously gave up the large hall in his mansion for the occasion, as well as honoring it by his attendance.  The Concert in our Institution was entirely musical, vocal and instrumental.  All the Missionaries came.  We had nearly three hundred tickets sold at five francs apiece, so that there was a nice little sum added to the Orphan’s Fund at Jerusalem.

Ever your affectionate

Melita.

Saada Gregory was engaged in teaching at different times in Tripoli, Aleppo, Hasbeiya and Egypt.  Her school in Tripoli was eminently successful, and her labors in Alexandria were characterized by great energy and perseverance.  She kept up a large school even when suffering from great bodily pain.  She is now in the United States in enfeebled health.

                                  American Mission House, Alexandria,
          
                                        November 8, 1867.

My Dear Mrs. Whiting,

I know you will be expecting a letter from me soon, partly in answer to yours sent by Mrs. Van Dyck, and especially because it is the day on which you expect all your children to remember you.  I never do forget this day, but this time there are special reasons for my remembering it.  Whenever the day has come around, I have felt more forcibly than at others, how utterly alone I have been, for since dear Mr. Whiting was taken away from us, it has seemed as though we were made doubly orphans, but this time it has not been so.  I think I have been made to realize that I have a loving Father in heaven who loves and watches over and cares for me more than ever you or Mr. Whiting did.  I do really feel now that God has given me friends, so this day has not been so sad a one to me as it usually is.  Another source of thankfulness to-day is, that I have been raised up from a bed of pain and suffering from which neither I nor any of my friends thought I ever would rise.  Weary days and nights of pain, when it was torture to move and almost impossible to lie still, and when it seemed at times that death would be only a relief, and yet here I