by an accidental
death in some place where his body could not be discovered--whether he
had been murdered, or kidnapped, were dreadful contingencies that wrung
the mother's soul with agony. But as habits of endurance give to the
body stronger powers of resistance, so does time by degrees strengthen
the mind against the influence of sorrow. A blameless life, therefore,
varied only by its unobtrusive charities, together with a firm trust in
the goodness of God, took much of the sting from affliction, but could
not wholly eradicate it. Had her child died in her arms--had she closed
its innocent eyes with her own hands, and given the mother's last kiss
to those pale lips on which the smile of affection was never more to
sit--had she been able to go, and, in the fulness of her childless
heart, pour her sorrow over his grave--she would have felt that his
death, compared with the darkness and uncertainty by which she was
enveloped, would have been comparatively a mitigated dispensation, for
which the heart ought to feel almost thankful.

The death of Corbet, her steward, found her in that mournful apathy
under which she had labored for year's. Indeed she resembled a certain
class of invalids who are afflicted with some secret ailment, which is
not much felt unless when an unexpected pressure, or sudden change of
posture, causes them to feel the pang which it inflicts. From the moment
that the words of the dying man shed the serenity of hope over her
mind, and revived in her heart all those tender aspirations of maternal
affection which, as associated with the recovery of her child, had
nearly perished out of it--from that moment, we say, the extreme
bitterness of her affliction had departed.

She had already suffered too much, however, to allow herself to
be carried beyond unreasonable bounds by sanguine and imprudent
expectations. Her rule of heart and of conduct was simple, but true--she
trusted in God and in the justice of his providence.

On hearing the stranger's want of success, she felt more affected by
that than by the faint consolation which he endeavored to hold out to
her, and a few bitter tears ran slowly down her cheeks.

"Hope had altogether gone," said she, "and with hope that power in the
heart to cherish the sorrow which it sustains; and the certainty of his
death had thrown me into that apathy, which qualifies but cannot destroy
the painful consequences of reflection. That which presses upon me now,
is th