File 3: Hassall family, correspondence, volume 2, pp. 703-1164, 1825-1867: No. 006

consolations & support, being destitute of Christian society & fellowship &c. &c. You will find your present situation very trying on these accounts &c. but the Lord can & will make up to you for it and all other privations you may undergo for his cause sake. You are brought in providence to a place where your labours must be greatly wanted, & I trust it is not a trifle that will make you leave it. Perhaps there is no part of the Colony where you are more wanted. Labour to have a deep & an abiding sense of the importance of your work, the worth & value of immortal souls, and your accountableness to God: these impressed upon your mind will be of great benefit to you in the discharge of your ministry.
Do not confine yourself to writing your sermon but accustom yourself to speak in a free off hand way with only a few notes; and when as soon as you can, leave them aside also. This will be of great benefit to you in your future ministry. I could run on in this way for my heart goes out towards you and your partner too in very tender emotions of affection & esteem, but I must restrain myself.
The state of things here are less favourable at present than formerly. Satan has been struggling very hard to impede the great work of the Lord, and to regain some of the ground he had lost; and because that inequity has more than usually abounded the love of too many seems to have waned cold. We much need the outpouring of the Spirit from on high to restrain Satans rage, & to revive us & his cause. My dear Friend, let us have your prayers! Be assured I do not nor shall not forget you. Since my last to you I have been favoured with another son; thus my family continues to increase altho' I am getting advanced in years; but it is the Lord's will & that is best. I trust your little one is doing well. You will doubtless both find him a great comfort to you in your secluded situation.
Mr. Bleform, whom you know, resides here & a  Mr. Armitage who are to carry on a cotton manufactury by way of inducing the natives to habits of industry. Mr. B. has been lately robed of sundry articles. Robberies were scarcely known here for years past until of late, that a gang of ill disposed fellows have settled near us on a piece of ground belonging to the king, & who are considered as under his protection; but perhaps Mr. B. will [indecipherable].
I am much concerned at your Father in law's declining to have anything further to do with the officers of the mission. His [indecipherable] sermons have been of great benefit to it; and the [indecipherable] are under peculiar obligations to him; and I am glad to see by their publications that they are very sensible of it. I wrote to him lately on the subject. I send you with this a copy of the presented report of these