lls lay a backgammon box,
with which his wife and himself amused themselves for an hour or two
every evening; and fixed in recesses intended for the purpose, Sam
Roberts, for such was his name, having built the house himself, were
comfortable cupboards filled with a variety of delft, several curious
and foreign ornaments, an ostrich's egg, a drinking cup made of the
polished shell of a cocoanut, whilst crossed saltier-wise over a
portrait of himself and of his wife, were placed two feathers of the
bird of paradise, constituting, one might imagine, emblems significant
of the happy life they led. But we cannot close our description here.
Upon the good woman's bosom, fastened to her kerchief, was a locket
which contained a portion of beautiful brown hair, taken from the
youthful head of a deceased son, a manly and promising boy, who died at
the age of seventeen, and whose death, although it did not and could
not throw a permanent gloom over two lives so innocent and happy,
occasioned, nevertheless, periodical recollections of profound and
bitter sorrow. Old Sam had his locket also, but it was invisible;
its position being on that heart whose affections more resembled the
enthusiasm of idolatry than the love of a parent. His wife was a placid,
contented looking old woman, with a complexion exceedingly hale and
fresh for her years; a shrewd, clear, benevolent eye, and a general
air which never fails to mark that ease and superiority of manner to
be found only in those who have had an enlarged experience in life,
and seen much of the world. There she sits by the clear fire and clean,
comfortable hearth, knitting a pair of stockings for her husband, who
has gone to Dublin. She is tidily and even, for a woman of her age,
tastefully dressed, but still with a sober decency that showed her good
sense. Her cap is as white as snow, with which a well-fitting brown
stuff gown, that gave her a highly respectable appearance, admirably
contrasted. She wore an apron of somewhat coarse muslin, that seemed,
as it always did, fresh from the iron, and her hands were covered with a
pair of thread mittens that only came half-way down the fingers. Hanging
at one side was a three-cornered pincushion of green silk, a proof
at once of a character remarkable for thrift, neatness, and industry.
Whilst thus employed, she looks from time to time through a window that
commanded a prospect of the road, and seems affected by that complacent
expression of u