stout and rugged as I was. 'What do you want?' I demanded roughly--for
I was impatient at having been thus unseasonably interrupted while
paying my devotions to the mug of hot rum punch, in front of a rousing
fire. As she made no immediate reply, I was about to bid her begone
and shut the door, when she said, in a faint, yet earnest tone--'Oh,
sir, for God's sake, as you hope for mercy yourself hereafter, let me
come in for a moment--only a moment--that I may warm my benumbed and
freezing limbs!' I paused a moment; I am not naturally hard-hearted,
unless there is something to be gained by it; and besides, I felt a
kind of curiosity to see what sort of a creature it was who wandered
the streets that awful night, destitute and houseless; so I bade her
come in, and with difficulty she followed me into the tap-room;
placing a seat for her near the fire, I resumed my own, and while
leisurely sipping my punch, a good opportunity was afforded me to
examine her narrowly. She was probably about twenty years of age, but
much suffering had made her look older. Though her features were worn
and wasted, and though her cheeks were hollow by the pinchings of
want, she was beautiful; her eyes were large, lustrous and eminently
expressive, and two or three stray curls of luxuriant hair peeped from
beneath her old, weather stained bonnet. Her form was tall, and
graceful in its outlines; but what particularly struck me was the
singular whiteness and delicacy of her hands, which plainly indicated
that she had never been accustomed to labor of any kind. Her dress was
wretched in the extreme, and was scarce sufficient to cover her
nakedness, much less shield her from the inclemency of the
weather,--nay, my inquisitive researches soon convinced me that the
miserable gown she wore was, excepting an old shawl, her _only
garment_--no under clothing, not even stockings,--and her feet (I
noticed that they were small and symmetrical,) were only separated
from the cold sidewalk by thin and worn-out shoes.--Yet,
notwithstanding all her poverty and wretchedness, there was about her
a look of subdued pride, which, though in strange contrast with her
garb, well became her general air, and regular handsome features.
Everything about her, excepting her dress, convinced me that she had
fallen from better days, and, somehow, that look of pride struck me as
being strangely familiar; yet I ra