Towards the close of July, 1851, Mr. Stocking and family, with Misses Fiske and Rice, and several native helpers, spent the vacation in Gawar. Mr. Coan accompanied them on his way to regions beyond. Wandering from place to place, like the patriarchs of old, they pitched their tents at first near the village of Memikan. A sketch of these tents is here presented. The women there were frequent visitors, and few went away without some idea of the truth as it is in Jesus. The pious natives were unwearied in labor, and sometimes woke the missionaries in the morning with prayer for the people round about them. On the Sabbath, there was preaching in as many as five different villages, and after morning service in Memikan, the women came to the tents to receive more particular instruction from their own sex. In the evening, a mother who had buried her son in February--then a very promising member of the Seminary at Seir[1]--brought her youngest daughter, about six years of age, saying, "We give her to you in the place of Guwergis. He has gone to a blessed place. You led him there. We thank you, and now intrust to you our little daughter." Eshoo, the father, spoke of his departed son with much feeling, but most sweet submission. He said to Miss Fiske, as the big tears glistened in the moonlight, "I shall not be here long. I shall soon rejoin him. My hope in Jesus grows stronger every day." The death of that dear son was not only a great spiritual blessing to him, but the mere mention of his name at once secured the attention of the villagers to any thing the missionaries had to say about his Saviour. [Footnote 1: Nestorian Biography, p. 127.] On Monday, they left for a visit to the Alpine district of Ishtazin. Unable to take horses along those frightful paths, they rode on hardy mules. In a subsequent journey over the same road, the fastenings of Miss Fiske's saddle gave way, and she fell, but providentially without injury. Sometimes they climbed, or, more hazardous still, descended, a long, steep stairway of rock, or they were hid in the clouds that hung around the higher peaks of the mountain. Now the path led them under huge, detached rocks, that seemed asking leave to overwhelm them, and now under the solid cliffs, that suggested the more grateful idea of the shadow of a great rock in a weary land. Down in the valley were pleasant waterfalls, little fields rescued by much labor from the surrounding waste, choice fruits, and such a variety of flowers, that it seemed as if spring, summer, and autumn had combined to supply them. Then, in looking up, the eye rested on silver threads apparently hanging down from far-off summits, but really foaming streams dashing headlong down the rocks, yet so distant that no sound came to the ear from their roaring waters.