I beg your pardon for the interruption,
Ready."
"No need, Mr. Seagrave; we never should lose an opportunity of teaching
the young. Well, how far the assertion of Mr. Masterman was correct or
not, it was impossible at the time to say; but I do know that everybody
cried out `shame', and that if he did deprive the widow, he had much to
answer for; for the Bible says, `Pure religion is to visit the
fatherless and the widows in their affliction, and to keep yourself
unspotted in the world'. The consequence was, that my mother had little
or nothing to live upon; but she found friends who assisted her, and
she worked embroidery, and contrived to get on somehow until I was
eight or nine years of age."
"But did not your godfather come forward to the assistance of your
mother?" inquired Mr. Seagrave.
"No, sir, strange to say, he did not; and that made people talk the
more. I believe it was the abuse of him, which he did not fail to hear,
and which he ascribed to my mother, which turned him away from us;
perhaps it was his own conscience, for we always dislike those we have
injured."
"Unfortunately, there is great truth in that remark of yours, Ready,"
observed Mr.
Pages:
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
181
182
183
184
185
186
187
188