ther
thoughts--thoughts which he had, but the very day before the nursing so
suddenly closed, communicated to his mother, and she had said,

"I think you are quite right, John. Imprudent marriages are, in most
cases, very wrong things--a mere tempting of Providence: and, that no
blessing follows such tempting, we know from the best authority: but
this is a most pious, benevolent, and very rational attempt to save a
fellow-creature upon the brink of destruction, and I think it would be a
want of faith, as well as a want of common humanity, in either of us to
hesitate; I am very glad she seems such a sweet, innocent, pretty
creature, for your sake, my darling John; I hope she will bring a
blessing into your dwelling and repay you for your goodness to me; I am
sorry she must come and live with your old mother, for young wives don't
like that--but I promise you I will do my very best to be as amiable as
an old woman can; and, moreover, I will neither be cross nor
disappointed if she is not always as amiable as a young woman ought to
be. Will that do? Yes, yes; fetch her away from that sink of iniquity,
and we'll all get along somehow or other, never fear."

And so Lucy Miles, blushing like a rose, and, as her young and delighted
husband thought, more beauteous than an angel of light, was in a few
weeks married to John Fisher, and she went home to the old lady.

"Amid the smoke of cities did you pass
The time of early youth, and there you learnt
From years of quiet industry to love
The living beings of your own fire-side."

The eloquent tongue of Fisher had over and over again related with deep
feeling the history of all he owed to his mother, and Lucy, far from
feeling inclined to be jealous of the devoted affection he felt for her,
like a good loving girl as she was, extended the ardent attachment she
felt toward her husband to every thing that belonged to him.

She had lost her own parents, whom she had loved exceedingly, though
they were quite ordinary people. She soon almost worshiped old Mrs.
Fisher.

Lucy had been little improved by those who had the rearing of her; she
was a girl of excellent dispositions, but her education had been
commonplace. In the society of the old lady her good gifts, both of head
and heart, expanded rapidly. The passionate desire she felt to render
herself worthy of her husband, whom she adored almost as some superior
being, made her an apt and docile pupil.

A few ye