“Through a mistake of our good friend Ireland, dear Mr. Glascott came here the day after I arrived from Yorkshire. He stayed only one day. This stripling will throw down Goliath. I blessed that cross and accident which brought me acquainted with a young soldier that made me so ashamed of myself. Mr. Hill[141] is gone to Brighton, where I hope he will be as useful as he is in Shropshire. Captain Scott set out last Monday for York, after making a great stir for good in Shrewsbury. “I am loth to trouble Lady Anne with a request of a line, to know how your ladyship does, yet I know not well how to give up the hope that she will once more steal two minutes for it. “I am, with peculiar thanks to Lady Anne for her letter, and to your ladyship for numberless favours, my lady, your most indebted and obliged servant, “J. FLETCHER.”[142] Footnote 140: “Life and Times of the Countess of Huntingdon,” vol. i., pp. 290, 291. Footnote 141: Afterwards Sir Richard Hill, Bart., one of Fletcher’s antagonists in the Calvinian controversy. Footnote 142: “Life and Times of the Countess of Huntingdon,” vol. i., p. 296. No further reference to the illness of the Countess of Huntingdon is needed; but a few lines may be added concerning Mr. Glascott, whom Mr. Ireland had sent to Madeley to officiate during Fletcher’s supposed absence. This young clergyman had been ordained at Oxford in 1765. For two years, he had served the curacy of Cheveley, in Berkshire, and had been recently dismissed. He was now introduced to Lady Huntingdon, became her assistant chaplain, and laboured in her connexion till 1781. Mr. Ireland then presented him to the vicarage of Hatherleigh, in Devonshire. Here he prayed and preached for nearly fifty years; and here he died, in the full triumph of the faith of Christ, on the 18th of August, 1830.[143] Footnote 143: _Ibid_, vol. ii., p. 464. For years past, Fletcher and Whitefield had been sympathizing and warm-hearted friends, but, up to the present, Whitefield had not been to Madeley. After Fletcher’s departure from Yorkshire, Whitefield succeeded him in that county, and glorious were the seasons which Lady Huntingdon and the great evangelist enjoyed at Kippax, Huddersfield, Leeds, and other places. Fletcher urged Whitefield to call at Madeley on his way to what he called his “winter quarters” in London; but Whitefield found it impracticable to comply with his friend’s request.[144] Thus was lost an opportunity that did not recur. Whitefield never preached in Madeley church. He died in 1770. Footnote 144: _Ibid_, vol. i., p. 299.