In the château at Nyon Jean De La Fléchère was keeping his tenth
birthday (September 12th, 1739). Away in old England the Lord of the
Manor of Leytonstone, Essex, was giving his first caresses to a tiny
baby girl, later to be known as little Mary Bosanquet, and forty years
later still as the wife of the saintly John Fletcher, Vicar of
Madeley.

Mary was but a four-year-old baby when she received her first definite
conviction that God hears and answers prayer. She was a timid little
maiden, and the greatest comfort she had in the world was the fact
that she possessed a real Father in Heaven, strong, mighty, and
willing to protect and help her. Sunday evenings in Forest House--as
the Bosanquet mansion was called--were devoted to the children. On
those occasions Mary's father taught her sister and herself the Church
catechism. At five years old his youngest daughter asked questions
concerning true Christians according to the Word of God, which might
well have encouraged evasion on the part of her parent. She reasoned
out everything told her; but her eager and earnest questions being so
constantly put carelessly by, gave her childish mind the impression
that the Bible did not mean all it said, therefore a sensible person
would make due allowance for its threatenings.

As this thought began to take well hold of Mary, a Methodist girl
entered the household as nurse, whose conversations with the children
were a great enlightenment to them both.

In a year or two the nurse left them, but not before she had implanted
in little Mary's mind the truth that it was not being united to any