ould you have had me do? I was obliged to endure what I
could not avoid. So long as there remained an article that would fetch
money did my husband sell it, even to the frock of my little girl, and
then repair to the alehouse with his mistress."

"But why did you give him your daily earnings?--you should have hid them
from him."

"So I did; but he beat me so dreadfully that I was obliged to give them
to him. I cared less for the blows he gave me than because I dreaded his
doing me some bodily injury, such as breaking my arm and dislocating my
wrist, that would have hindered me from working; and then, what would
have become of my poor children? Suppose I had been compelled to go to a
hospital, they must have perished with hunger. So, you see, brother, I
thought it was better to give up my earnings to my husband than run the
risk of being lamed by him."

"Poor woman! People talk of martyrs, but what martyrdom can exceed what
you have endured?"

"And yet I can truly say I never injured a living creature, and my only
desire was to work hard and do my duty to my husband and children. But
it is no use thinking about it; there are fortunate and unfortunate
persons, just the same as there are good people and bad people in the
world!"

"True; and it is a beautiful sight to see how happy and prosperous the
good always are,--aren't they, sister? And do you now believe yourself
for ever freed from your scoundrel of a husband?"

"I trust so. He staid till he had sold even my bedstead and the cradle
in which my youngest child lay. But when I think that, even more than
that, he wished--"

"What did he wish?"

"When I say he, I ought rather to tell you that it was rather that
wicked woman who urged him on. One day he said to me, 'I tell you what,
when folks have a pretty girl of fifteen belonging to them, they are
cursed fools if they do not turn her to good account.'"

"Oh, to be sure! When he had sold the poor girl's clothes, he was
willing to sell her also."

"When I heard him say those dreadful words I lost all command over
myself, and, I promise you, I did not spare him all the reproaches he
merited. And when his vile paramour took upon herself to interfere, and
say that my husband had a right to do what he liked with his own child,
I could contain myself no longer; but I fell with all my fury on the
wretched creature. This obtained for me a severe beating from my
husband, who then left me; and I have never seen him s