ALFRED ROBERTS. 329 



in, and Righter, who knew him, made us acquainted. I 

 can not describe to you the tenderness of the affection 

 which I learned to feel for him in the course of a month, 

 during which I saw him almost daily. 



" He was a man of rare simplicity of character. An in- 

 expressible gentleness pervaded his whole life. 



" A cooper by trade in America, at Mystic, in Connecti- 

 cut, and then in Chenango County, in New York, he had 

 lived to be an old man when he conceived the idea of 

 devoting his life to distributing the Word of God, without 

 note or comment, wherever he could find persons to re- 

 ceive it. He had no property or means, but he declined 

 a connection with any society, or any personal pecuniary 

 aid so long as he was able to work for himself. He ac- 

 cepted money to be used in purchasing Bibles and Testa- 

 ments, but for no other purpose. He worked his passage to 

 Liverpool, thence to Malta, thence to Constantinople, and 

 finally to Jerusalem. The journey was one of some years, 

 and all the way he scattered the Word of God. In Malta, 

 for months, he devoted himself to Italian sailors, and he 

 used to say, truly I doubt not, that he had sent more 

 Bibles into Italy, by fishermen and traders at Malta, than 

 all the Bible and Missionary Societies by any and all 

 other means. In Constantinople the American residents 

 collected money to present him a new suit of clothes. 

 He declined them as soon as he heard the proposal, ac- 

 cepted the donation in Bibles, and wore his gray suit to 

 Jerusalem, and probably never had another. 



" His faith in the simple Word of God was magnificent. 

 It was his whole life. 



"Walking the streets of the Holy City, meeting Greek 

 and Jew, barbarian and Scythian, bond and free, he knew 

 no language but his mother tongue, yet managed to hold 



