daughter."

Tom embraced his mother, and followed me to the boat; we pulled up
against the tide, and were soon at Putney.

"Tom, you had better stay in the boat. I will either come or send for
you."

It was very unwillingly that Tom consented, but I overruled his
entreaties, and he remained. I walked to Mary's house and entered. She
was up in the little parlour, dressed in deep mourning; when I entered
she was looking out upon the river; she turned her head, and perceiving
me, rose to meet me.

"You do not come to upbraid me, Jacob, I am sure," said she, in a
melancholy voice; "you are too kind-hearted for that."

"No, no, Mary; I come to comfort you, if possible."

"That is not possible. Look at me, Jacob. Is there not a worm--a
canker--that gnaws within?"

The hollow cheek and wild flaring eye, once so beautiful, but too
plainly told the truth.

"Mary," said I, "sit down; you know what the Bible says--`It is good for
us to be afflicted.'"

"Yes, yes," sobbed Mary, "I deserve all I suffer; and I bow in humility.
But am I not too much punished, Jacob? Not that I would repine; but is
it not too much for me to bear, when I think that I am the destroyer of
one who loved me so?"

"You have not been the destroyer, Mary."

"Yes, yes; my heart tells me that I have."

"But--I tell you that you have not. Say, Mary, dreadful as the
punishment has been, would you not kiss the rod with thankfulness, if it
cured you of your unfortunate disposition, and prepared you to make a
good wife?"

"That it has cured me, Jacob, I can safely assert; but it has also
killed me as well as him. But I wish not to live; and I trust, in a few
short months, to repose by his side."

"I hope you will have your wish, Mary, very soon, but not in death."

"Merciful heavens! what do you mean, Jacob?"

"I said you were not the destroyer of poor Tom--you have not been; he
has not _yet_ suffered; there was an informality, which has induced them
to revise the sentence."

"Jacob," replied Mary, "it is cruelty to raise my hopes only to crush
them again. If not yet dead, he is still to die. I wish you had not
told me so," continued she, bursting into tears; "what a state of agony
and suspense must he have been in all this time, and I--I have caused
his sufferings! I trusted he had long been released from this cruel,
heartless world."

The flood of tears which followed assured me that I could safely impart
the glad intelligence.