e if as how you can pay your rent, because as how we hear
Captain Montable is gone away, and it's fifty to one if he b'ant killed
afore he comes back again; an then, Miss, or Ma'am, or whatever you may
be, as I was saying to my husband, where are we to look for our money."

This was a stroke altogether unexpected by Charlotte: she knew so little
of the ways of the world that she had never bestowed a thought on the
payment for the rent of the house; she knew indeed that she owed a
good deal, but this was never reckoned among the others: she was
thunder-struck; she hardly knew what answer to make, yet it was
absolutely necessary that she should say something; and judging of the
gentleness of every female disposition by her own, she thought the best
way to interest the woman in her favour would be to tell her candidly to
what a situation she was reduced, and how little probability there was
of her ever paying any body.

Alas poor Charlotte, how confined was her knowledge of human nature, or
she would have been convinced that the only way to insure the friendship
and assistance of your surrounding acquaintance is to convince them you
do not require it, for when once the petrifying aspect of distress and
penury appear, whose qualities, like Medusa's head, can change to stone
all that look upon it; when once this Gorgon claims acquaintance with
us, the phantom of friendship, that before courted our notice, will
vanish into unsubstantial air, and the whole world before us appear a
barren waste. Pardon me, ye dear spirits of benevolence, whose benign
smiles and cheerful-giving hand have strewed sweet flowers on many a
thorny path through which my wayward fate forced me to pass; think not,
that, in condemning the unfeeling texture of the human heart, I forget
the spring from whence flow an the comforts I enjoy: oh no! I look up
to you as to bright constellations, gathering new splendours from the
surrounding darkness; but ah! whilst I adore the benignant rays that
cheered and illumined my heart, I mourn that their influence cannot
extend to all the sons and daughters of affliction.

"Indeed, Madam," said poor Charlotte in a tremulous accent, "I am at a
loss what to do. Montraville placed me here, and promised to defray all
my expenses: but he has forgot his promise, he has forsaken me, and I
have no friend who has either power or will to relieve me. Let me hope,
as you see my unhappy situation, your charity--"

"Charity," cri