tches, whom the imagination
might easily convert into a band of assassins, hastening to conceal the
corpse, and quarrelling about the prey on their way. I know it is of
little consequence how we are consigned to the earth; but I am led by
this brutal insensibility, to what even the animal creation appears
forcibly to feel, to advert to the wretched, deserted manner in which
they died."

"True," rejoined Darnford, "and, till the rich will give more than a
part of their wealth, till they will give time and attention to the
wants of the distressed, never let them boast of charity. Let them
open their hearts, and not their purses, and employ their minds in
the service, if they are really actuated by humanity; or charitable
institutions will always be the prey of the lowest order of knaves."

Jemima returning, seemed in haste to finish her tale. "The overseer
farmed the poor of different parishes, and out of the bowels of poverty
was wrung the money with which he purchased this dwelling, as a private
receptacle for madness. He had been a keeper at a house of the same
description, and conceived that he could make money much more readily
in his old occupation. He is a shrewd--shall I say it?--villain. He
observed something resolute in my manner, and offered to take me with
him, and instruct me how to treat the disturbed minds he meant to
intrust to my care. The offer of forty pounds a year, and to quit a
workhouse, was not to be despised, though the condition of shutting my
eyes and hardening my heart was annexed to it.

"I agreed to accompany him; and four years have I been attendant on many
wretches, and"--she lowered her voice,--"the witness of many enormities.
In solitude my mind seemed to recover its force, and many of the
sentiments which I imbibed in the only tolerable period of my life,
returned with their full force. Still what should induce me to be the
champion for suffering humanity?--Who ever risked any thing for me?--Who
ever acknowledged me to be a fellow-creature?"--

Maria took her hand, and Jemima, more overcome by kindness than she had
ever been by cruelty, hastened out of the room to conceal her emotions.

Darnford soon after heard his summons, and, taking leave of him, Maria
promised to gratify his curiosity, with respect to herself, the first
opportunity.

CHAPTER 6

ACTIVE as love was in the heart of Maria, the story she had just heard
made her thoughts take a wider range. The opening b