Like lambs, they shall still in my bosom be borne.”
The eventful life of this aged blacksmith, together with his vivid remembrance of bygone days, renders an hour spent in his company very pleasant.
’Tis true, his name is unknown both to fortune and to fame; for but few stop, in this cold world of ours, to pay the deserved meed of praise to humble, unpretending merit.
“Far from the madd’ning crowd’s ignoble strife,
His sober wishes never learned to stray—
Along the cool sequestered vale of life
He kept the noiseless tenor of his way.”
But to return to our first intention. Gilbert Hunt was born in the county of King William, (Va.,) about the year 1780; came to the city of Richmond when seventeen years of age; learned the trade of a carriage-maker, at which he worked for a considerable length of time, and by constant industry and close economy laid by a sufficient amount of money to purchase his freedom of his master. In 1832, he determined to emigrate to Liberia; and in February of that year, left Virginia. He remained in Africa eight months, and having travelled some five hundred miles into the interior, returned to the coast and embarked for home. His reception, on arriving at Richmond, was one which would have done honor to any conqueror or statesman, so highly was he respected by the citizens. “When I reached Richmond,” to use his own language, “the wharves were crowded with all classes and conditions of people; I was invited to ride up town in a very fine carriage, but preferred a plainer style, and came up in a Jersey wagon, seated on my trunk.” Since that time, nothing of special interest has transpired in the life of this truly remarkable man. “Toiling, rejoicing, sorrowing,” he has followed with unpretending simplicity of character his accustomed labor. Success seems not to make him proud, nor failure to discourage him. He has made a sufficient amount of money to enable him to spend the evening of his life in quiet retirement, but his place at his shop is seldom, if ever, vacant.
For more than half a century he has been a consistent member of the Baptist Church; thus teaching us, would we have the needed blessings of life added to us, we should seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness.