public meetings, that it
was with the utmost difficulty he procured liberty to visit his own
friends.

Twenty years had made great changes in the homes at both Dukinfield and
Inverkeithing. Mary Moffat's aged father was living, but her mother and
a brother had been called away, another brother was in America, and a
third was a missionary in Madras. Robert's parents were still living,
but a brother and two sisters had passed away. Many friends, whose kind
and generous thoughtfulness had often cheered the heart of the faithful
missionary and his faithful wife in their voluntary exile, now gathered
around them, among whom were Mrs. Greaves of Sheffield, the donor of the
Communion Service, and Miss Lees of Manchester.

Of the events connected with this visit to England, want of space
precludes us from giving details. A great wave of missionary enthusiasm
at that time swept over the country, and Moffat found himself hurried
from town to town with but scant opportunities for rest. In May, 1840,
he preached the Anniversary Sermon for the London Missionary Society,
and, at their Annual Meeting, Exeter Hall was packed so densely that
after making his speech in the large upper hall, Moffat had to give it
again in the smaller hall below.

An anecdote related in the course of his speech at the Bible Society's
May Meeting shows the value set by a native woman upon a single Gospel
in the native tongue. "She was a Matabele captive," said Moffat. "Once,
while visiting the sick, as I entered her premises, I found her sitting
weeping, with a portion of the Word of God in her hand. I said, 'My
child what is the cause of your sorrow? Is the baby still unwell?' 'No,'
she replied, 'my baby is well,' 'Your mother-in-law?' I inquired. 'No,
no,' she said, 'it is my own dear mother, who bore me.' Here she again
gave vent to her grief, and, holding out the Gospel of Luke, in a hand
wet with tears, she said, 'My mother will never see this word; she will
never hear this good news! Oh, my mother and my friends, they live in
heathen darkness; and shall they die without seeing the light which has
shone on me, and without tasting that love which I have tasted!' Raising
her eyes to heaven she sighed a prayer, and I heard the words again, 'My
mother, my mother!'"

His hope when he landed had been to get the printing of the Sechwana New
Testament speedily accomplished, and to return to South Africa before
winter; but it was not until January, 1843, t