Imperfections of mortality.

Our dear sister. We are waiting with impatience the return of the courier; but we suppose we have also offered our last prayers for her, and that she is now free from all the imperfections of mortality. In addition to the exposure of all the others, my own family are also compromised, as I received several letters from brother Dwight without fumigating them, not having any suspicion at first of its being the plague. The Farmans were also down on a visit to San Stephano after Mrs. Dwight and John were attacked. So there is not a missionary here, not even the travellers, who may not be considered as compromised fully. How many of us, or who of us, may be alive after another week no man can tell! But you will lift up your heart in prayer to God for the remnant that may be left.

Your Brother,

W. GOODELL.

Some extracts from his journal, written during the preva-lence of the disease, show that he was walking in the midst of death: —

“ May 20, 1837. Heard to-day of the death of an interesting young man, Tchelebi Diamond, from Broosa. He was a friend of our missionary brethren and sisters there. They had conversed with him, read the Scriptures with him, prayed with him, wept over him, and sometimes thought him not far from the kingdom of God. He brought from Broosa a parcel and a letter for me, which, on his arrival here, he sent to me, with the message that he was too ill to call himself.

Thousand exposures which never come to our knowledge

The next day he died. It was the plague. As I took the parcel and the letter without fumigating them, I was of course compromised. Indeed, in one way and another we are often much exposed. This is the second with me within a few days, to say nothing of the thousand exposures which never come to our knowledge. Thus by an unseen hand we are preserved from dangers seen and unseen. Some risks seem unavoidable, if we would not shut ourselves up entirely. Our Greek girls’ school is now stopped on account of the whole school having been most fully compromised by a case of plague in the adjoining house, where several of the girls of the school were lodging.

“July 21. I read the burial-service at the grave of the only son of Sir P. Malcolm, who died of the plague at Mr. Cartwright’s, the English consul-general. He was on his way from India to England, and arrived sick from Trebizond on the 16th inst. Mr. Cartwright’s house adjoins my own, and the unfortunate gentleman occupied a room which corners on our own bedchamber. We have placed chlorine in all the rooms that were particularly exposed; but we are certainly ‘ in deaths oft,’ and are made to feel that, i except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain.’