strangers can CONFIDENTLY BELIEVE
that God will visit this land with gospel light, and that those gilded
fanes which now glisten in the morning and evening sun, on every
hill-top, will fall, and those poor idolaters will say, "What have we to
do any more with idols?" "our trust is in the name of the Lord that made
heaven and earth."

In one of the last paragraphs of her private journal which has been
preserved, dated Oct. 8th of the same year, she says: "To-day I have
been into the town, and I was surprised at the multitude of people with
which the streets are filled. Their countenances are intelligent; and
they appear to be capable under the influence of the Gospel, of
becoming a valuable and respectable people. But at present their
situation is truly deplorable, for they are given to every sin. Lying is
so universal among them that they say, 'we cannot live without telling
lies.' They believe the most absurd notions imaginable. My teacher told
me the other day, that when he died he would go to my country; I shook
my head, and told him he would not; but he laughed, and said he would. I
did not understand the language sufficiently to tell him where he would
go, or how he could be saved. Oh thou Light of the world, dissipate the
thick darkness that covers Burmah. Display thy grace and power among the
Burmans--subdue them to thyself, and make them thy chosen people."

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 2: The war had almost produced a famine.]

CHAPTER VI.

LEARNING THE LANGUAGE.--MRS. JUDSON VISITS THE WIFE OF THE VICEROY.--HER
SICKNESS.--HER VOYAGE TO MADRAS.--HER RETURN TO RANGOON.--BIRTH OF A
SON.

Those who have acquired a modern European language with the aid of
grammars, dictionaries, and other suitable books, can scarcely estimate
the labor of learning without such aids, such a language as the Burman.
In fact Mr. Judson thinks more progress can be made in the _French_ in a
few months, than in the Burman in two years. Mrs. Judson took the whole
management of family affairs on herself, in order to leave her husband
at liberty to prosecute his studies and the consequence was, that being
obliged constantly to use all the Burman she knew, in her intercourse
with servants, traders, and others, her progress was more rapid than
his.

One cause of difficulty in learning their language was that their books
were made of palm-leaves, marked or engraved with an iron style or pen,
_without ink_. We who are accustomed to cle