wife she would never need to do anything, if she chose
to sit with her hands before her; and a boy was a great charge to a
widowed mother; and now there would be a decent steady man to see after
him. So, by-and-by, aunt Fanny seemed to take a brighter view of the
marriage than did my mother herself, who hardly ever looked up, and never
smiled after the day when she promised William Preston to be his wife.
But much as she had loved Gregory before, she seemed to love him more
now. She was continually talking to him when they were alone, though he
was far too young to understand her moaning words, or give her any
comfort, except by his caresses.

At last William Preston and she were wed; and she went to be mistress of
a well-stocked house, not above half-an-hour's walk from where aunt Fanny
lived. I believe she did all that she could to please my father; and a
more dutiful wife, I have heard him himself say, could never have been.
But she did not love him, and he soon found it out. She loved Gregory,
and she did not love him. Perhaps, love would have come in time, if he
had been patient enough to wait; but it just turned him sour to see how
her eye brightened and her colour came at the sight of that little child,
while for him who had given her so much, she had only gentle words as
cold as ice. He got to taunt her with the difference in her manner, as
if that would bring love: and he took a positive dislike to Gregory,--he
was so jealous of the ready love that always gushed out like a spring of
fresh water when he came near. He wanted her to love him more, and
perhaps that was all well and good; but he wanted her to love her child
less, and that was an evil wish. One day, he gave way to his temper, and
cursed and swore at Gregory, who had got into some mischief, as children
will; my mother made some excuse for him; my father said it was hard
enough to have to keep another man's child, without having it perpetually
held up in its naughtiness by his wife, who ought to be always in the
same mind that he was; and so from little they got to more; and the end
of it was, that my mother took to her bed before her time, and I was born
that very day. My father was glad, and proud, and sorry, all in a
breath; glad and proud that a son was born to him; and sorry for his poor
wife's state, and to think how his angry words had brought it on. But he
was a man who liked better to be angry than sorry, so he soon found out
that it