* * * * * “TUNBRIDGE WELLS, _April_ 26_th_, 1870. “I have really been regretting your absence from the feast of fat things which we have lately been enjoying at home, for I consider we have had privileges of a very high order. “Our Passion Week services were most profitable, and following as they did on Mr. Langston’s Lent sermons, they tended, I trust, to put a seal on impressions already formed, though I cannot say I have yet had the joy of discovering any cases of marked conversion as their consequence. I have, however, met with those who I think have been aroused to further progress, and who acknowledge the help given with real thankfulness. “I trust also that our C.M.S. anniversary may be regarded as a token of progress. There has been an amazing amount of interest amongst our younger parishioners on the subject of the African Bishop, {153} so that yesterday the Mission-room was quite full, and again both the Trinity rooms in the evening. There were so many last night that there were several standing by the door of the girls’ room, and a collection of £14, containing an immense amount of copper. I confess I was anxious about our collection in church, especially when I found that we had not exceeded that of last year in the morning, but we picked up nobly in the afternoon and evening. In the evening alone there was £45, so that before we left church the collection reached £120, and there were £11 additional sent on Monday morning. I hope I may regard it as the fruit of all the admirable sermons that we have lately heard, and if so I shall regard it with peculiar thanksgiving, as showing that there has been not merely religious excitement but true religious principle at work amongst the people. And this is what we all want. It is to be living under the combined influence of principle and emotion, of deep feeling produced in the soul by strong conviction of Christian truth. “I have been very much urged to go to Cheltenham, and if I go I should immediately set out for my long journey. But I do so enjoy my quiet work at home that I sometimes think I must never go out again. I ought, however, to be thankful for the privilege of being permitted to do the Lord’s work anywhere.” In the autumn of 1870 Mr. Hoare, accompanied by one of his daughters, crossed the Atlantic, and spent nearly three months in a pleasant tour through the United States. It was a delightful holiday, and was the means of greatly strengthening and refreshing him for work at home. He had many good introductions, and went about seeing all that he could of the people, public institutions, and Church work, but beyond an occasional sermon Mr. Hoare made it a time of rest. No letters appear to have been preserved relating to this tour.