n to tell the truth.

My father was a French colonist in the island of Saint Domingo. He died
while I was very young; leaving to my mother and to me just enough to
live on, in the remote part of the island in which our little property
was situated. My mother was an Englishwoman. Her delicate health made it
necessary for her to leave me, for many hours of the day, under the care
of our household slaves. I can never forget their kindness to me; but,
unfortunately, their ignorance equaled their kindness. If we had been
rich enough to send to France or England for a competent governess we
might have done very well. But we were not rich enough. I am ashamed to
say that I was nearly thirteen years old before I had learned to read
and write correctly.

Four more years passed--and then there came a wonderful event in our
lives, which was nothing less than the change from Saint Domingo to
England.

My mother was distantly related to an ancient and wealthy English
family. She seriously offended those proud people by marrying an obscure
foreigner, who had nothing to live on but his morsel of land in the West
Indies. Having no expectations from her relatives, my mother preferred
happiness with the man she loved to every other consideration; and I,
for one, think she was right. From that moment she was cast off by the
head of the family. For eighteen years of her life, as wife, mother,
and widow, no letters came to her from her English home. We had just
celebrated my seventeenth birthday when the first letter came. It
informed my mother that no less than three lives, which stood between
her and the inheritance of certain portions of the family property,
had been swept away by death. The estate and the fortune which I have
already mentioned had fallen to her in due course of law, and her
surviving relatives were magnanimously ready to forgive her at last!

We wound up our affairs at Saint Domingo, and we went to England to take
possession of our new wealth.

At first, the return to her native air seemed to have a beneficial
effect on my mother's health. But it was a temporary improvement only.
Her constitution had been fatally injured by the West Indian climate,
and just as we had engaged a competent person to look after my neglected
education, my constant attendance was needed at my mother's bedside. We
loved each other dearly, and we wanted no strange nurses to come
between us. My aunt (my mother's sister) relieved me of my ca