uld not keep it from my mother, he took her hand, and said,
after he had acquainted her with it, "Come, my dear, let us take
comfort, that we did for the best. We left the issue to Providence,
as we ought, and that has turned it as it pleased; and we must be
content, though not favoured as we wished.--All the business is, our
lot is not cast for this life. Let us resign ourselves to the Divine
will, and continue to do our duty, and this short life will soon be
past. Our troubles will be quickly overblown; and we shall be happy in
a better, I make no doubt."

Then my dear mother threw her arms about his neck, and said, with
tears, "God's will be done, my dear love! All cannot be rich and
happy. I am contented, and had rather say, I have a poor honest
husband, than a guilty rich one. What signifies repining: let the
world go as it will, we shall have our length and our breadth at last.
And Providence, I doubt not, will be a better friend to our good
girl here, because she is good, than we could be, if this had not
happened," pointing to me, who, then about eleven years old (for it
was before my lady took me), sat weeping in the chimney corner, over a
few dying embers of a fire, at their moving expressions.

I arose, and kissing both their hands, and blessing them, said, "And
this length and breadth, my dear parents, will be, one day, all that
the rich and the great can possess; and, it may be, their ungracious
heirs will trample upon their ashes, and rejoice they are gone: while
such a poor girl as I, am honouring the memories of mine, who, in
their good names, and good lessons, will have left me the best of
portions."

And then they both hugged me to their fond bosoms, by turns; and all
three were filled with comfort in one another.

For a farther proof that _honest poverty_ is not such a deplorable
thing as some people imagine, let me ask, what pleasure can those
over-happy persons know, who, from the luxury of their tastes, and
their affluent circumstances, always eat before they are hungry, and
drink before they are thirsty? This may be illustrated by the instance
of a certain eastern monarch, who, as I have read, marching at the
head of a vast army, through a wide extended desert, which afforded
neither river nor spring, for the first time, found himself (in common
with his soldiers) overtaken by a craving thirst, which made him pant
after a cup of water. And when, after diligent search, one of his
soldiers foun