When about four years of age, she began to attend the district school near her father’s house. Here for some ten or twelve years she pursued the studies usually taught in country schools. Though by no means a prodigy, she had next to no labour in acquiring the art of reading; and easily outstripped others of the same age, and won the place of honour in her class. On the 12th of July, 1831, Fidelia made a public profession of her faith in Christ, and became a member of the Congregational church at Shelburne. In 1839, Miss Fiske entered the middle class in Mount Holyoke seminary. This institution enjoyed a high reputation for its educational and religious tone. Miss Lyon, who presided over it, was a most gifted, fascinating, and holy woman. Early impressed by religious truth, Fidelia here found herself in a thoroughly congenial element. The diligence and thoroughness of study required suited her mental habits; while the prominence given to religious instruction and religious duties met the wants of her rapidly-developing religious life. As might have been expected, she soon formed an attachment for Miss Lyon, which was reciprocated, and which time only intensified. At the close of her first year, a malignant form of typhoid fever appeared in the academy. Miss Fiske returned home to her parents. Two days after, she was seized with the disorder, and for many days lay at the gate of death. During that season of sickness she learned, for the first time, the real feelings of the sick and dying, and how to care for them. Nor were these the only lessons she learnt. The malady passed from her to her father, who went through the gate that seemed to have opened for his daughter. Her younger sister also, who had been converted in answer to her prayers, followed her father into the land of the immortals. The autumn of the following year found her again at Mount Holyoke, a member of the senior class. After graduating, she became a teacher. Although high culture marked in a distinguishing degree this seminary, it was unlike many of the schools in England for ladies, where the tinsel of accomplishments is preferred to the ennobling influence of piety.
We have now reached the great crisis in her history. At the meeting of the American Board at Norwich, Connecticut, in the autumn of 1842, Miss Lyon was very anxious that her seminary should be more thoroughly pervaded with the missionary spirit. Calling a meeting of such as were present, she told them that the institution had been founded to advance the missionary cause, and that she “sometimes felt that its walls had been built from the funds of missionary boards.” Miss Fiske little knew how much that meeting would cost her. While she and others were earnestly pleading for the heathen, the Lord’s messenger was approaching her with a call to become a missionary herself. Dr. Perkins came to Mount Holyoke, and made a request for a young lady to go with him to Persia. Miss Fiske sent a note to him with these brief words, “If counted worthy, I should be willing to go.” On her decision becoming known at the seminary, Miss Lyon said, “If such are your feelings, we will go and see your mother and sisters;” and in an hour they were on their way. A thirty miles’ ride, on a cold wintry Saturday, through snow-drifts in which they were several times upset, brought them to the Shelburne hills. The family were aroused from their slumbers to receive unexpected guests, and to hold an unexpected consultation. Prayers and tears mingled with the solemn and tender discussions of the hour. Before the Sabbath closed, her mother was enabled cheerfully to say, “Go, my child, go.” Other friends could not withhold their consent, and the great question was definitely decided.
On Wednesday, March 1st, 1843, Miss Fiske, with others destined for the same general field, embarked on board the Emma Isadora. At half-past four o’clock p.m. the barque left her wharf, and moving down the harbour was soon out of sight. The voyage was pleasant. A storm overtook them, but no fear disturbed Miss Fiske; despite the anxious countenance of the captain, and the need for vigilance on the part of the crew, she writes: “I look out from my cabin window to trace a Father’s hand in this wild commotion.” She did not wait until she arrived in Persia, but began her ministry of love by taking under her special care the young daughter of Dr. and Mrs. Perkins, guiding her studies and leading her to the Saviour. On the 8th of April, the ship anchored before Smyrna. After a week’s rest the Austrian steamer left, and in thirty-eight hours reached Constantinople. The perils and hardships of the sea were past, but seven or eight hundred miles still lay between our missionary friends and their Persian home. However, under the skilful guidance of Dr. Perkins, they passed safely to Urumiyah, their destined field of labour.
According to English gazetteers, Urumiyah is a walled town, and contains upwards of 20,000 inhabitants, of whom about 10,000 are Nestorians, 2000 Jews, and the rest Mohammedans. It claims to be the birthplace of Zoroaster, and in the vicinity are several mounds supposed to be the hills of the ancient fire-worshippers. The Nestorians derive their name from Nestorius, a heretic of the fifth century, who taught that Christ was divided into two persons. Nestorius acquired so much distinction by his learning, pulpit eloquence, and purity of life, that, in 428, he was elevated to the patriarchate of Constantinople. But fourteen centuries had wrought terrible degradation in Persia. There was little of Christianity, except the name, when the American Board of Commissioners established a mission and educational agency in 1834. The language of the Nestorians contained no words corresponding to home and wife, the nearest approach to them being house and woman. To a person of refinement and delicacy, like Miss Fiske, it must have been shocking to see women treated by men as drudges and slaves: wives beaten often and severely by their husband; yea, a whole village of these coarse and passionate creatures engaged in a quarrel among themselves, their hair all loose and flying in the wind. Miss Fiske’s chief solicitudes were given to the educational agency. By great tact she effected considerable reformation in the schools, and corrected the prevalent habits of lying and stealing among her pupils. She also found time to visit the Nestorian women, to pray with them, and read the Scriptures. In 1844, her labours and plans were suddenly interrupted by a storm of persecution which burst upon the mission. When the missionaries had most reason to fear expulsion, Miss Fiske thus wrote:—“I knew not before that my affections had become so closely entwined around this poor people, nor how severely I should feel a removal from them.” In the providence of God their enemies were thwarted; and they were permitted to remain and go on with their work, though not without great opposition. Towards the end of the year, Miss Fiske resumed her duties. How hard she laboured; with what holy fire her bosom burned; how earnestly she longed for a brighter day to dawn on the wretched Persian women; with what success she enforced upon mothers as well as pupils their relative duties; how brilliantly she illustrated the text, “Dying, and behold we live; unknown, and yet well known; poor, yet making many rich; having nothing, yet possessing all things”! In 1849, the first public examination of the school was held, and about two hundred guests listened with unabated interest to the exercises till the sun went down. The pupils were examined in ancient and modern Syriac, Bible history, geography, and natural philosophy. The following year opened upon them in a new, large, and convenient building. In the autumn of 1856, the Persian government again tried to break up the educational agency. Askar Khan visited the seminary, and explored every part of it. He questioned one of the girls who could speak Turkish, but was baffled by the discreet replies of the pupil; yet in a decided manner he condemned female education, and told the girls that their former condition was the only proper one for them.
When we think of the physical labour, the mental effort, the practical wisdom, the ready discernment of character, the unconquerable perseverance, and the devoted piety necessary for discharging the functions of a female missionary; we do not wonder that sixteen years produced a wearing and exhausting effect upon Miss Fiske’s health. The time had come when change was imperatively demanded; and as Dr. Perkins and Mrs. Stoddard were expecting to leave for America the following summer, it was decided that she should accompany them. During the intervening months she received ample evidence of the permanency of the work of grace that had been wrought in the land of her adoption. On the morning of her departure, about seventy former pupils gathered about her, and asked the privilege of one more prayer—meeting with her in her room, “the little Bethel,” as they called it. Six prayers were offered, all tender and comforting—one particularly so; and this one she had frequent occasion to remember in the course of her long journey, and always felt comforted and encouraged by it.
The population of Nova Scotia is now chiefly composed of a native race, sprung directly or indirectly from the three great families of the United Kingdom. They are situated on the confines of a frozen ocean, but their hearts are not chilled, nor their friendships blunted by its influence. Miss Fiske soon recognised many in the group which surrounded her at the old sanctuary on the first Sunday after her return. During 1860, she visited Boston, to say farewell to a band of missionaries destined for the Nestorian field. Although glad that labourers were being sent forth, she could not repress a pang of regret that she could not go with them. Most extensive and blessed was the work she carried on during her sojourn in America; but amid it all the noble woman turned her face to the East and longed to be among the daughters of Persia. Feebler and fainter, however, became that hope; and soon it was certain that no journey but that to the “beautiful land” lay before Miss Fiske.
For six weeks she was confined almost entirely to her bed. She was able, however, to write many letters of counsel and comfort. One written May 26th, 1864, and addressed to Dr. Wright, on his leaving America for Persia, indicated her never-failing interest in the work to which she had consecrated the best years of her life. The disease, which at first was supposed to be cancerous, proved to be a general inflammation of the lymphatic vessels. For two or three nights she was obliged to remain in a sitting posture. Her last loving message to the teachers and pupils of Mount Holyoke, closed with the words, “Live for Christ; in so doing we shall be blessed in time and in eternity.” On the Sabbath morning she asked to have a number of the tracts entitled “Immanuel’s Land” laid upon her table, so that every person visiting her might carry away one. The Rev. E. Y. Swift called to see her on Tuesday, July 26th. She held out her hand to welcome him, and feebly said, “Will you pray.” These were her last words. As the prayer ascended, her spirit was caught up to learn the strains of the everlasting song of praise.
Not in the land of the Persian, but in her native country—the soil from which spring the children of freedom, the hearts of honesty, and the arms of bravery—was the body let down to the grave, in the full assurance that the soul was in heaven. At the funeral, one who knew her well, said: “God sent her to benighted Persia, that those poor people might have there an image of Jesus, and learn what He was like; not by cold theories, but by a living example. He brought her back to us, that we might see what sanctified human nature can become, and might gain a new view of the power of His grace.” Some old grey heads, more becoming grey, and many bright in manhood and womanhood, breathed the prayer:—
“Then farewell, pure spirit! and oh that on all
Thy mantle of love and devotion might fall!