in place
of one only a few weeks older, which she had buried two days previous,
and resisted all urgency of the few friends she had to send it to the
almshouse.

My mother had long known Mrs. Varick. She regarded her with great
interest, and had frequently visited the family, watching the progress
of her husband's decline, and sympathizing with her in her incessant
labor as a seamstress. Varick did nothing but drink,--she did nothing
but work. The trials, the sufferings, the absolute privations which she
underwent for two years, it would be difficult to describe. Her domestic
labors, with the care of a sick husband, watching him by night as well
as by day, left her little time or energy to devote to the needle. Yet
she toiled unceasingly for the shops. Scanty indeed were their prices,
scantier were her earnings, and scantier still the daily fare which the
poor needle-woman was able to set before her children. Many times they
cried themselves to sleep with hunger. I doubt not that the dying
husband shared in these privations, as well as suffered for want of many
comforts which his situation demanded. Strangely enough, in the midst of
this accumulated misery, the woman's heart went out with an
unconquerable sympathy for the foundling so unexpectedly left at her
door. So far from proving an additional incumbrance, it seemed to be a
positive comfort.

Hearing of the circumstance, my mother went immediately to see the
family, taking me with her. They were quartered in a single large room
of an old frame-house which was crowded with tenants of all
descriptions. We found Varick on his bed, evidently very near his end.
But, alas! the unhappy man, expressed the utmost horror of dying. He
made no request for spiritual aid or counsel,--no mention of religion,
no reference to eternity. The Saviour's name, or any allusion to the
salvation which came by him, never passed his lips. Every thought was of
the earth,--how to live, not how to die. I shuddered as I saw and heard
him. At intervals he reached out his hand impatiently for a vial of
medicine, then inquired when the doctor would come. His whole dependence
was on the arm of flesh. Neither wife nor visitor ventured to direct his
attention to the fact of his rapidly approaching end; for he was
stubborn and repulsive. The door seemed to be shut, no more to be
opened,--we could do nothing for him.

Yet while this horrible scene was passing before us, there were loud
noises in the