r? or who, in this worn and woe-stricken woman, would have known
the beautiful, brilliant, and accomplished Augusta? Yet such changes are
not fancy, as many a bitter and broken heart can testify.

Augusta had followed her guilty husband through many a change and many a
weary wandering. All hope of reformation had gradually faded away. Her
own eyes had seen, her ears had heard, all those disgusting details, too
revolting to be portrayed; for in drunkenness there is no royal road--no
salvo for greatness of mind, refinement of taste, or tenderness of
feeling. All alike are merged in the corruption of a moral death.

The traveller, who met Edward reeling by the roadside, was sometimes
startled to hear the fragments of classical lore, or wild bursts of
half-remembered poetry, mixing strangely with the imbecile merriment of
intoxication. But when he stopped to gaze, there was no further mark on
his face or in his eye by which he could be distinguished from the
loathsome and lowest drunkard.

Augusta had come with her husband to a city where they were wholly
unknown, that she might at least escape the degradation of their lot in
the presence of those who had known them in better days. The long and
dreadful struggle that annihilated the hopes of this life had raised her
feelings to rest upon the next, and the habit of communion with God,
induced by sorrows which nothing else could console, had given a tender
dignity to her character such as nothing else could bestow.

It is true, she deeply loved her children; but it was with a holy,
chastened love, such as inspired the sentiment once breathed by Him "who
was made perfect through sufferings."

"For their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also may be sanctified."

Poverty, deep poverty, had followed their steps, but yet she had not
fainted. Talents which in her happier days had been nourished merely as
luxuries, were now stretched to the utmost to furnish a support; while
from the resources of her own reading she drew that which laid the
foundation for early mental culture in her children.

Augusta had been here but a few weeks before her footsteps were traced
by her only brother, who had lately discovered her situation, and urged
her to forsake her unworthy husband and find refuge with him.

"Augusta, my sister, I have found you!" he exclaimed, as he suddenly
entered one day, while she was busied with the work of her family.

"Henry, my dear brother!" There was a momen