They arrived at their destination on the third day, and found awaiting
them nearly a hundred natives, more than half of whom were applicants
for baptism. The place prepared for the accommodation of Mr. and Mrs.
Boardman and their little boy, was a room five feet wide and ten feet
long, so low that Mrs. Boardman could not stand upright in it, and so
insufficiently inclosed as not to shelter the sufferer from the cold and
damp of the night air, or the scorching rays of the sun by day. Those
who have known what it is to watch beside dying loved ones, witnessing
suffering that they were powerless to relieve, can imagine the anguish
that Mrs. Boardman endured in seeing her husband so near his end in that
miserable place, destitute of the little comforts so needful in
sickness. But with heroic determination she repressed her own sorrow,
lest it might incapacitate her for assisting him while rallying his
expiring energies for one more effort in his Master's cause. The poor
worn body, though, was found unequal to the task assigned it by the
zealous spirit, and he was forced to admit that his work was done.
Mrs. Boardman, speaking of their return journey, in which they were
accompanied by large numbers of the sorrowing native converts, says:
"But at four o'clock in the afternoon, we were overtaken by a violent
shower of rain, accompanied by lightning and thunder.
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