sed her; but there was
unspeakable compensation in their fondness and dependence on her, and
even in the actual services themselves. The only wonder began to be
how she could have ever trusted them in any hands but her own. Her
husband's affection and consideration were sources of joy ever renewed;
and though natural irritability and pressing anxieties might now and
then betray him into a hasty word, his penitence so far surpassed the
momentary pain it might have cost her, that she was obliged to do her
utmost to comfort him. She sometimes found herself awkward or
ignorant, and sometimes flagged from over-exertion; yet throughout,
James's approval, and her own sense that she was striving to do her
best, kept her mind at rest. Above all, the secret of her happiness
was, that the shock of adversity had awakened her from her previous
deadness and sluggishness of soul, and made her alive to a feeling of
trust and support, a frame of mind ever repenting, ever striving
onwards. Thus she went bravely through the very class of trials that
she would once have thought merely lowering, inglorious, and devoid of
poetry. What would have been in itself sordid, gained a sweetness from
the light of love and duty, and never in all her dreamy ease had she
been as cheerful and lighthearted as in the midst of hardship and rigid
economy. Her equable temper and calm composure came to her aid; and
where a more nervous and excitable woman would have preyed upon
herself, and sunk under imaginary troubles, she was always ready to
soothe and sustain the anxious and sensitive nature of her husband.
After all, hers was the lightest share of the trial. To her, the call
was to act, and to undergo misfortunes occasioned by no fault of hers;
to him, the call was the one most galling to an active and eager
man--namely, to endure, and worse, to see endured, the penalty of his
own errors. In vain did he seek for employment. A curacy, without a
fair emolument, would have been greater poverty than their present
condition, as long as the house was unlet; and, though he answered
advertisements and made applications, the only eligible situations
failed; and he knew, among so many candidates, the last to be chosen
would be a person of violent temper, unable to bear rebuke.
Disappointment came upon disappointment, and the literary work, with
which, through Louis's exertions, he had been supplied, was not likely
to bring in any speedy return.

All that he