er he did not or would not perceive
it, and he sailed without showing me any preference. In six months he
returned, and whether it was that he was told of by others, or at last
perceived, my feelings toward him, he joined the crowd of suitors, made
a proposal in his offhand manner, as if he was indifferent as to my
reply, and was accepted. My father, to whom he communicated the
intelligence as carelessly as if he were talking about freight, did not
approve of the match. 'Very well,' replied he, 'I shall say no more; as
long as a man has a ship he does not want a wife.' He returned and
stated what had passed, and my father also spoke to me. I was
self-willed and determined, and my father yielded. We were married, and
I certainly had no reason to complain of my husband, who was very kind
to me. But I was jealous of--what do you think? Of his ship! For he
cared more for it than he did for me; and three months after our
marriage, notwithstanding all my tears and entreaties, and the
expostulations of my father, he would sail again. He offered to take me
with him, and I would gladly have gone, but my father would not listen
to it. He sailed, and I never saw him again; his vessel, with all hands,
foundered, with many others, in a heavy gale. The news did not arrive
until many months afterward, and I had not been a mother more than six
weeks when I found that I was a widow. I have passed all this over
quickly, Jack, because it is of less moment--my trials had not
commenced.

"The loss of my husband, as may be supposed, only endeared my child the
more to me, and I wept over him as he smiled upon me in his cradle. My
father had reverses in his business, but those I cared little for. He
did, however: he had been the richest man in the town, he was now
comparatively poor; his pride was crushed, it broke his heart, and he
died; the whole of his assets at the winding up of his affairs not
exceeding ten thousand pounds. This was, however, quite enough, and more
than enough, for me. I thought but of one object--it was my darling boy;
he represented to me all I had lost; in him I saw my husband, father,
and everything. I lived but for him. He was my idolatry, Jack. I
worshiped the creature instead of the Creator.

"As he grew up I indulged him in everything; he never was checked; I
worried myself day and night to please him, and yet he never was
pleased. He was so spoiled that he did not know what he wanted. He was a
misery to himself