join him there, which she did in January, 1799, being in her twenty-second year. Her mother had already died, Jan. 19, 1792, after a semi-widowhood of near sixteen years. Her husband bade her adieu in Woburn, Oct. 13, 1775, when he set out for Narragansett Bay and the British frigate, then in the harbor of Newport. Frequent letters show that he had the heart of a man for the wife of his youth.

Already had he been made a major by Gov. Wentworth of New Hampshire. On his arrival in England he was soon employed as under secretary to Lord George Germaine, and then became by royal appointment a colonel of his Majesty's forces. In such official capacity he returned to this country, near the close of the war, and then back to England; was allowed half pay as pension for his services to the king, and subsequently was knighted by his royal master. This put him in comfortable circumstances as to income. But, in the mean time, his goods and property in this country had been forfeited; even his personal effects, which he had invoked the Rev. Samuel Parker of Trinity Church, Boston, to protect, including his most valuable papers, which, as he says, were of "the greatest consequence" to him, were saved only by the efforts of that gentleman. We have Major Thompson's imploring letter to him, but not the reply of Rev. Mr. Parker. This clergyman was afterward known as the Rev. Dr. Parker, and father of the wife of Rev. Dr. Edson of Lowell, Mass.

Leopold II., reigned as vicar. And in 1797 the Elector received his daughter Sarah as a countess of the empire, and allowed her to receive one-half of her father's pension, with permission to reside wherever she might choose. The half pension was worth a thousand dollars annually: so that to the daughter her title was not an empty sound, but the reward conferred upon her father for his merits and talents. He had labored assiduously for the good of mankind: in the preparation of foods, soups, and various cooking; in the use of fuel and lamps, baths, and chimneys; in heating-appliances of fire and steam; for the comfort of soldiers in camp and in barracks, giving them employment, better food, and better pay; in houses of industry and instruction for preventing mendicity, and furnishing work to the idle; in schemes of humanity and economy for improving the condition of the poor; in founding prizes for the encouragement of scientific research, one in England and one in Harvard. His bequests to the latter college now amount to more than fifty thousand dollars in value. Americans may be proud to remember that the Royal Institution of Great Britain (1799) was founded, and for some time managed, by a son of Massachusetts, Benjamin Thompson, Count Rumford, who assumed that name because it was the ancient name of the town where his wife and daughter were born. In consideration of plans and endeavors for benefiting the poorer classes, Rumford was largely in advance of his age. While Rumford prizes and professorships will ever be remembered, the Rumford memorials at Munich, and the Rolfe and Rumford Asylum at Concord, will never be forgotten. Both and all are of lasting benefit to mankind, on both sides

In 1791 Sir Benjamin Thompson was raised to the dignity of Count of the Holy Roman Empire by his friend and patron the Elector, who, during the interval between the death of the Emperor Joseph and the coronation of

the ocean, to illustrate the broad sympathies of the man who founded them.

The count died at Auteuil, near Paris, Aug. 21, 1814, in his sixty-second year, where his remains are entombed. His first wife died the year after he received his high title, and was buried in Concord by the side of her first husband, Col. Rolfe. Their graves adjoin the plat which contains the ashes of Sarah, Countess of Rumford, but there is no tombstone erected to their memory. During the life of her grandmother, the countess often visited the birthplace of her father, and quite a portion of her childhood was passed in North Woburn. The house in which the count first saw the light of day still stands, and is now the property of the Rumford Historical Society. Very noteworthy is it that the man himself, not his inherited wealth, - for he never enjoyed it, is entitled to all the praise of his achievements, honors, and money gains.

The first passage of the countess across the Atlantic, in 1796, occupied nearly as many weeks as her last contemplated trip (in 1852) would have taken days. When she joined her father in London, he and all his friends gave her a cordial welcome; though he and they were in person strangers to her, knowing them only by name and correspondence. But her father had access to the best society, and was literally famous for his deeds and writings. In Munich she found a Bavarian marble and freestone memorial erected to his honor in the English Gardens he had planned, and that the hearts of thousands pulsed with joy on his return. His public reception was a triumph. Even the inmates of the workhouses praised him, as well as the soldiers, for the improvements he had

made for them. Thus the countess soon learned to love the Germans for their admiration of her father; to respect the English for the honor they had done him, and for the generous pension which they regularly paid; and she thoroughly enjoyed "the graceful good-humor of the French: " hence the years she passed in Paris, and her protracted visits to London. With her father she "did" the Continent and visited Italy. Like him, also, she early became interested in devising generous things for the poor. In March, 1797, writes the count, "My daughter, desirous of celebrating my birthday in a manner which she thought would be pleasing to me, went privately to the House of Industry, and choosing out half a dozen of the most industrious little boys of eight and ten years of age, and as many girls, dressed them new from hand to foot, in the uniform of that public establishment, at her own expense, and dressing herself in white, early in the morning of my birthday led them into my room and presented them to me, when I was at breakfast. I was so much affected by this proof of her affection for me, and by the lively pleasure that she enjoyed in it, that I resolved it should not be forgotten." Immediately he formed a plan for perpetuating the remembrance of this incident, and for renewing the pleasure that it gave. He made his daughter a present of two thousand dollars in American stocks, in order that she might forever repeat a like benefaction on behalf of the poor children of her native town, Concord. Thus commenced the foundation of the fund for the Rolfe and Rumford Asylum in that city, to which other endowments were subsequently made. And no good deed which the count and his daughter ever did

has produced more unmixed pleasure. Their several gifts have created no jealousy nor ambition of management, nor sinister purpose in any trustee to rule or ruin the charity. All rejoice at its judicious management, its gentlemanly trustees, its kind and competent officers, its thirteen happy, industrious, and improving children. Its system of home training and education, of dress and pastimes, of alternate work and play, and of inculcating and applying Christian principles to the practical needs of daily duty, is essentially the same as that which had governed and had been happily illustrated in a similar institution of the city of New York. Long, long may it be before any one shall arise to disturb its harmony, or lessen its prosperity!

dollars; to the Fatherless and Widows' Society, Boston, two thousand dollars. And she left ten thousand dollars to the son of her half brother, Joseph Amedie Lefevre, and provided that her legacy of fifteen thousand dollars to found the asylum should revert to him if the city of Concord failed to assume the trust. All the remaining real estate of Col. Rolfe was devised to the Institution. This was duly incorporated by special statute in July, 1872; but the asylum itself was not opened for the reception of beneficiaries till the fifteenth day of January, 1880.

The house of the countess's mother, inherited from her first husband, Col. Rolfe, and from his son Paul, who died childless, has been enlarged and converted into the Rolfe and Rumford Asylum, "for the poor and needy, particularly young females without mothers, natives of Concord." The entire bequests, with their accumulations, now amount to more than fifty thousand dollars, and are taken in trust by the city. The countess also bequeathed fifteen thousand dollars to the NewHampshire Asylum for the Insane; to the Concord Female Charitable Society, two thousand dollars; to the Boston Children's Friend Society, two thousand

After the count's death, the countess seems to have divided her time between residence in London and her house at Brompton, protracted visits to Paris of two and three years' duration, and to residence in Concord. From July, 1844, she occupied the house and chamber in which she was born. After an eventful life, and while preparing for another visit to France, where she had vested funds, she was taken with the illness of which she died, Dec. 2, 1852, in her seventy-ninth year. Her only companion, and the solace of her declining years, was a young lady, Miss Emma G., a native of Birmingham, whom she had adopted when a child, at Brompton, and who has married Mr. John Burgum of Concord. Thus in family and institutional life, her charity has immortalized the COUNTESS of Rumford.

CHAPTER I.

ONE evening in the spring of 1776, in a small town of one of the early Colonies, a young couple were saying their sad farewell.

John Pendexter had enlisted, and the next morning would find him well on his way to join his regiment. At this time he had come to have his last talk with Susanna Carwin, his affianced. Long had they been sitting before the open fireplace, many plans had they laid for the future; and, when the shadows began to gather in the corners of the low-posted, spacious room, John remembered the numerous arrangements he had to make before leaving his mother, already widowed by the war.

Turning to Susanna, in whose black eyes a world of sorrow was expressed, he took her hand, now cold and damp, in his broad palm, and led her to one of the deep windows in the room facing eastward.

Susanna leaned her head against the edge of the sliding shutter, and mustered all her will-power to keep back the bitter tears.

John said, "Susanna, I want you to wear this little ring until I return. I will put it on your finger, with a wish for our future happiness and the freedom of our country." He slipped the tiny circlet on her finger, saying, "My love for you is like this ring, without end." Susanna said, "My heart is too full of woe to-night, John, to say half that I want to. I feel a cloud of sadness settling over me. How can I live without you? How can I let you go?" sobbed forth the poor girl.

"Susanna, we have talked this over many times; and to-morrow you will feel about the matter as you have felt in times past. Dear girl, I must go! Keep up good heart, and remember our happy home in the future, God willing."

He put his arm around her, and drew her towards him, as he walked out into the great hall for his hat.

Susanna picked up a small leatherbound Bible from a half-round table standing in the hall, and gave it to him, saying, "Take this with you, John: it was mother's, and I have always used it."

With a misty look in his frank blue eyes, John Pendexter took the book, and carefully put it in the pocket of his home-spun coat. For a few minutes he seemed to try to smooth his rough hat, as if his whole attention was given to the trivial matter. At once he thrust the hat onto his head, put his arms around the tearful girl, kissed her many times, bade her good-by, and, without waiting to hear her trembling words, swung open the great door, and walked with long, strengthful strides down the walk to the road.

Susanna stood by the heavy stairpost, much like a lily beaten by the wind. At last she went into the room again, and stood by the window watching the tall, stalwart form stalking along the sloppy road, in the gloaming of a dull spring day: she saw him turn the corner by the meeting-house, and then he passed out of her sight. Susanna felt that her heart, her life, had gone with him.