The father of Henry Martyn was a workman in the tin mines of Cornwall, in England. As the miners worked very deep in the earth, shut out from the light of the sun, and breathing an unwholesome air, it was their custom to labour four hours, and then to spend the same length of time in resting. During these hours of rest, John Martyn devoted himself to improving his education, which had been very slight; and by his industrious application, he soon became so well acquainted with arithmetic, that he was at length engaged, as clerk, by a merchant in the town of Truro, in the county of Cornwall. The conduct of this man is an example to all persons whose occupations afford them any leisure. There is scarcely any one who is so constantly occupied, as not to have some time in the week, for the improvement of his mind. Had John Martyn made no exertion to supply his want of early instruction, he would probably have wasted his life in the miserable toil of digging ore, in the unwholesome depths of the mines. But by employing his spare time in learning, instead of wasting it in idleness and intemperance, he was soon enabled to maintain his family respectably, and to save his children from the evils of ignorance, by giving them a good education. Henry, his third child, the subject of this volume, was born at Truro, on the 18th of February, 1781, and before he was eight years old, was put under the charge of an excellent schoolmaster. At school he was remarkable for the gentleness of his disposition; yet he was not a general favourite with his school-fellows, as, owing to the mildness of his spirit, he was not inclined to engage in their sports, and was fond of quiet. After spending seven years at this school, his father sent him to the city of Oxford, hoping that he would be admitted as a student in one of the colleges of the celebrated university at that place, and be supported by funds which are raised for that purpose, called scholarships. From the boys who apply for admission on these terms, the most promising scholars are selected; but Henry had not been very studious, and, though some of his examiners were in favour of electing him, he did not succeed. He afterwards considered this failure as a great mercy; for had he been thrown, when not fifteen years of age, into the evil company which he would then have met with at college, he might have become dissolute beyond recovery. He returned to his school, and remained under the same teacher, until he entered St. John’s college, in the university of Cambridge, in October, 1797.