Best and kindest of
women, though absent in your native land, long, long shall my heart
cherish with affectionate gratitude all your visits of love, and
turn to you as to a sister, tried, and found most faithful, in the
dark hour of adversity, and, amidst the almost total neglect of
those from whom nature claimed a tenderer and holier sympathy.
Great was the joy of Jenny at this accession to our family party;
and after Mrs. S - - was well warmed, and had partaken of tea - the
only refreshment we could offer her - we began to talk over the news
of the place.
"By-the-bye, Jenny," said she, turning to the old servant, who was
undressing the little boy by the fire, "have you heard lately from
poor Mrs. N - -? We have been told that she and the family are in a
dreadful state of destitution. That worthless man has left them for
the States, and it is supposed that he has joined Mackenzie's band
of ruffians on Navy Island; but whether this be true or false, he
has deserted his wife and children, taking his eldest son along with
him (who might have been of some service at home), and leaving them
without money or food."
"The good Lord! What will become of the crathurs?" responded Jenny,
wiping her wrinkled cheek with the back of her hard, brown hand.
"An' thin they have not a sowl to chop and draw them firewood; an'
the weather so oncommon savare. Och, hone! what has not that BASTE
of a man to answer for?"
"I heard," continued Mrs. S - -, "that they have tasted no food but
potatoes for the last nine months, and scarcely enough of them to
keep soul and body together; that they have sold their last cow;
and the poor young lady and her second brother, a lad of only
twelve years old, bring all the wood for the fire from the bush on
a hand sleigh."
"Oh, dear! - oh, dear!" sobbed Jenny; "an' I not there to hilp them!
An' poor Miss Mary, the tinder thing! Oh, 'tis hard, terribly hard
upon the crathurs, an' they not used to the like."
"Can nothing be done for them?" said I.
"That is what we want to know," returned Emilia, "and that was one
of my reasons for coming up to D - -. I wanted to consult you and
Jenny upon the subject. You, who are an officer's wife, and I, who
am both an officer's wife and daughter, ought to devise some plan of
rescuing this poor, unfortunate lady and her family from her present
forlorn situation."
The tears sprang to my eyes, and I thought, in the bitterness of my
heart, upon my own galling poverty, that my pockets did not contain
even a single copper, and that I had scarcely garments enough to
shield me from the inclemency of the weather.
