Fletcher of Madeley | Page 9

hall, remarking casually to Mary as she
passed by :--
"If you will, the coach, when it has set us down, may carry you home to
your lodgings."
"And we shall be glad to see you to dinner on Sunday," added her
father.
Mary choked and could not reply, but she quickly recovered
sufficiently to order her trunk downstairs, and, when cloaked and
hooded, she passed down the staircase, she found all the servants
assembled in a row to bid her farewell with tears.
The two rooms she had taken were fireless, dark, and unfurnished. A
table and candlestick were quickly borrowed, and Mary sat down upon
a broad window-seat to ponder what was to her a strange situation.
By the time her maid arrived, and invited her to a fire, and a sumptuous
supper of bread, rank salt butter, and water, God had so comforted her
and assured her of His favour and presence that she was filled with

thankfulness and peace; the empty room and sparse, candle- lit meal
seemed to her part of "a little heaven."
No beds could be put up at so late an hour; blinds and curtains were not
in evidence. Mary Bosanquet lay that night upon the bare floor, and the
pure, clear moonlight shone coldly upon her as she lay, but the fire of
Divine love burned warm within her heart; she communed with her
God in utter content.
CHAPTER VIII.
THE TERN HALL TUTOR.

For three years after his ordination Fletcher received no church
appointment. He remained as tutor at Tern Hall, and preached wherever
he could find an opening, either in French or in English.
Amongst ordinary church-goers his decided utterances made him far
from popular, but the warm hearts of the Methodist people bade him
hearty welcome, and these he learned to love truly and well. They
introduced him to "many honourable women," several of whom
became his friends and correspondents; none of them, however,
impressed him as did Mary Bosanquet.
In writing to her brother nearly twenty-five years later he said of this
meeting: "It was soon after my ordination that I saw Miss Mary
Bosanquet. I had resolved not to marry, but the sweetness of her temper
and her devotedness to God made me think that if ever I broke through
my resolution it would be to cast my lot with one like her."
One may judge of the quiet but strong influence Fletcher exerted in his
neighbourhood by an incident which happened during that autumn. To
Tern Hall one night came a messenger from Salop, asking urgently for
"the tutor." The letter he delivered bore no name, but it begged Mr.
Fletcher to hasten at once to a certain inn, where he might find a soul
who wanted God. Without a question the tutor set out on his five- mile

walk, not knowing whether beggar or duke demanded his help. He
found the eldest son of a baronet, whom God's Spirit had rendered so
strangely wretched on account of sin that he could neither eat nor sleep.
Doctors had done their best to remove this remarkable malady, but the
one remedy lay in the touch of the hand of the Great Physician, and,
almost in despair, his soul cried, "Oh, that I knew where I might find
Him!"
The visit of that October night resulted in correspondence which was
blessed to Sir Richard Hill's conversion, although the young man
became in later years one of Fletcher's most active opponents in a
doctrinal controversy.
This time of waiting for God to show his future sphere of work was
much blessed to Fletcher in spiritually preparing him for it. Through an
incident in which he was much misunderstood by many, he learned the
all-important lesson to a preacher, that a sermon full of the most
vigorous ideas is as nothing if not inspired by the living Spirit.
His own account of the matter is brief but instructive:--
"Just as I was going to resume my daily course of business I was called
to preach in a church at Salop, and was obliged to compose a sermon in
the moments I should have spent in prayer. Hurry and the want of a
single eye drew a veil between the prize and my soul. In the meantime
Sunday came, and God rejected my impure service and abhorred the
labour of my polluted soul; and while others imputed my not preaching
to the fear of the minister who had invited me to his pulpit, and to the
threatenings of a mob, I saw the wisdom and holiness of God, and
rejoiced in that providence which does all without the assistance of
hurrying Uzzah."
During the holidays Fletcher would betake himself to London, giving
all his time to service in connection with a