e!

My dear young wife, Mary Ann Robson, landed with me on Tanna on the 5th
November 1858, in excellent health and full of all tender and holy
hopes. On the 12th February 1859 God sent to us our first-born son; for
two days or so both mother and child seemed to prosper, and our
island-exile thrilled with joy! But the greatest of sorrows was treading
hard upon the heels of that joy! My darling's strength showed no signs
of rallying. She had an attack of ague and fever a few days before; on
the third day or so thereafter, it returned, and attacked her every
second day with increasing severity for a fortnight. Diarrhea ensued,
and symptoms of pneumonia, with slight delirium at intervals; and then
in a moment, altogether unexpectedly, she died on the 3d March. To crown
my sorrows, and complete my loneliness, the dear baby-boy, whom we had
named after her father, Peter Robert Robson, was taken from me after one
week's sickness, on the 20th March. Let those who have ever passed
through any similar darkness as of midnight feel for me; as for all
others, it would be more than vain to try to paint my sorrows!

I knew then, when too late, that our work had been entered on too near
the beginning of the rainy season. We were both, however, healthy and
hearty; and I daily pushed on with the house, making things hourly more
comfortable, in the hope that long lives were before us both, to be
spent for Jesus in seeking the salvation of the perishing Heathen. In
our mutual inexperience, and with our hearts aglow for the work of our
lives, we incurred this risk which should never have been incurred; and
I only refer to the matter thus, in the hope that others may take
warning.

Stunned by that dreadful loss, in entering upon this field of labor to
which the Lord had Himself so evidently led me, my reason seemed for a
time almost to give way. Ague and fever, too, laid a depressing and
weakening hand upon me, continuously recurring, and reaching oftentimes
the very height of its worst burning stages. But I was never altogether
forsaken. The ever-merciful Lord sustained me, to lay the precious dust
of my beloved Ones in the same quiet grave, dug for them close by at the
end of the house; in all of which last offices my own hands, despite
breaking heart, had to take the principal share! I built the grave round
and round with coral blocks, and covered the top with beautiful white
coral, broken small as gravel; and that spot became my sacred