ever related such wonders of his infant prodigy, as Kit never wearied
of telling Barbara in the evening time, concerning little Jacob? Was
there ever such a mother as Kit's mother, on her son's showing; or was
there ever such comfort in poverty as in the poverty of Kit's family,
if any correct judgment might be arrived at, from his own glowing
account!

And let me linger in this place, for an instant, to remark that if ever
household affections and loves are graceful things, they are graceful
in the poor. The ties that bind the wealthy and the proud to home may
be forged on earth, but those which link the poor man to his humble
hearth are of the truer metal and bear the stamp of Heaven. The man of
high descent may love the halls and lands of his inheritance as part of
himself: as trophies of his birth and power; his associations with them
are associations of pride and wealth and triumph; the poor man's
attachment to the tenements he holds, which strangers have held before,
and may to-morrow occupy again, has a worthier root, struck deep into a
purer soil. His household gods are of flesh and blood, with no alloy
of silver, gold, or precious stone; he has no property but in the
affections of his own heart; and when they endear bare floors and
walls, despite of rags and toil and scanty fare, that man has his love
of home from God, and his rude hut becomes a solemn place.

Oh! if those who rule the destinies of nations would but remember
this--if they would but think how hard it is for the very poor to have
engendered in their hearts, that love of home from which all domestic
virtues spring, when they live in dense and squalid masses where social
decency is lost, or rather never found--if they would but turn aside
from the wide thoroughfares and great houses, and strive to improve the
wretched dwellings in bye-ways where only Poverty may walk--many low
roofs would point more truly to the sky, than the loftiest steeple that
now rears proudly up from the midst of guilt, and crime, and horrible
disease, to mock them by its contrast. In hollow voices from
Workhouse, Hospital, and jail, this truth is preached from day to day,
and has been proclaimed for years. It is no light matter--no outcry
from the working vulgar--no mere question of the people's health and
comforts that may be whistled down on Wednesday nights. In love of
home, the love of country has its rise; and who are the truer patriots
or the better in time of