sprung
from her own dear side--portions of her own being--depositories of our
loves--even if we died, it would be comfort to know that they ran man's
accustomed course. But it would not be so; young and blooming as they were,
they would die, and from the hopes of maturity, from the proud name of
attained manhood, they were cut off for ever. Often with maternal affection
she had figured their merits and talents exerted on life's wide stage. Alas
for these latter days! The world had grown old, and all its inmates partook
of the decrepitude. Why talk of infancy, manhood, and old age? We all stood
equal sharers of the last throes of time-worn nature. Arrived at the same
point of the world's age--there was no difference in us; the name of
parent and child had lost their meaning; young boys and girls were level
now with men. This was all true; but it was not less agonizing to take the
admonition home.

Where could we turn, and not find a desolation pregnant with the dire
lesson of example? The fields had been left uncultivated, weeds and gaudy
flowers sprung up,--or where a few wheat-fields shewed signs of the
living hopes of the husbandman, the work had been left halfway, the
ploughman had died beside the plough; the horses had deserted the furrow,
and no seedsman had approached the dead; the cattle unattended wandered
over the fields and through the lanes; the tame inhabitants of the poultry
yard, baulked of their daily food, had become wild--young lambs were
dropt in flower-gardens, and the cow stalled in the hall of pleasure.
Sickly and few, the country people neither went out to sow nor reap; but
sauntered about the meadows, or lay under the hedges, when the inclement
sky did not drive them to take shelter under the nearest roof. Many of
those who remained, secluded themselves; some had laid up stores which
should prevent the necessity of leaving their homes;--some deserted wife
and child, and imagined that they secured their safety in utter solitude.
Such had been Ryland's plan, and he was discovered dead and half-devoured
by insects, in a house many miles from any other, with piles of food laid
up in useless superfluity. Others made long journies to unite themselves to
those they loved, and arrived to find them dead.

London did not contain above a thousand inhabitants; and this number was
continually diminishing. Most of them were country people, come up for the
sake of change; the Londoners had sought the country. Th