ht not be in utter
darkness. One of these was stuck against the wall, for they had no
candlestick; and oh, what a pitiable and melancholy spectacle did
its dim and feeble light present! There she sat, the young, virtuous,
charitable, and lovely Margaret of the early portion of our narrative,
surrounded by her almost naked children--herself with such thin and
scanty covering as would wring any heart but to know it. Where now was
her beauty? Where her mirth, cheerfulness, and all her lightness of
heart? Where? Let her ask that husband who once loved her so well, but
who loved his own vile excesses and headlong propensities better. There,
however, she sat, with a tattered cap on, through the rents of which her
raven hair, once so beautiful and glossy, came out in matted elf-locks,
and hung down about her thin and wasted neck. Her face was pale and
ghastly as death; her eyes were without fire--full of languor--full
of sorrow; and alas, beneath one of them, was too visible, by its
discoloration, the foul mark of her husband's brutality. To this had
their love, their tenderness, their affection come; and by what? Alas!
by the curse of liquor--the demon of drunkenness--and want of manly
resolution. She sat, as we have said, upon the little hassock, while
shivering on her bosom was a sickly-looking child, about a year old, to
whom she was vainly endeavoring to communicate some of her own natural
warmth. The others, three in number, were grouped together for the
same reason; for poor little Atty--who, though so very young, was his
mother's only support, and hope, and consolation--sat with an arm about
each, in order, as well as he could, to keep off the cold--the night
being stormy and bitter. Margaret sat rocking herself to and fro, as
those do who indulge in sorrow, and crooning for her infant the sweet
old air of "_Tha ma cullha's na dhuska me_," or "I am asleep and don't
waken me!"--a tender but melancholy air, which had something peculiarly
touching in it on the occasion in question.

"Ah," she said, "I am asleep and don't waken me; if it wasn't for your
sakes, darlins, it's I that long to be in that sleep that we will
never waken from; but sure, lost in misery as we are, what could yez do
without me still?"

"What do you mane, mammy?" said Atty; "sure doesn't everybody that goes
to sleep waken out of it?"

[Illustration: PAGE AM1019-- There's a sleep that nobody wakens from]

"No, darlin'; there's a sleep that nobo