alf." "What dost thee
mean?" says she, and blushed, and looked surprised, but did not stir.
She was going to speak again, but I interrupted her, and told her she
should make no more apologies of any kind whatever, for I had better
things than all this to talk to her of; so I went on, and told her, that
as she had been so friendly and kind to us on every occasion, and that
her house was the lucky place where we came together, and that she knew
I was from her own mouth acquainted in part with her circumstances, we
were resolved she should be the better for us as long as she lived. Then
I told what we had resolved to do for her, and that she had nothing more
to do but to consult with me how it should be effectually secured for
her, distinct from any of the effects which were her husband's; and that
if her husband did so supply her that she could live comfortably, and
not want it for bread or other necessaries, she should not make use of
it, but lay up the income of it, and add it every year to the principal,
so to increase the annual payment, which in time, and perhaps before she
might come to want it, might double itself; that we were very willing
whatever she should so lay up should be to herself, and whoever she
thought fit after her; but that the forty pounds a year must return to
our family after her life, which we both wished might be long and happy.

Let no reader wonder at my extraordinary concern for this poor woman, or
at my giving my bounty to her a place in this account. It is not, I
assure you, to make a pageantry of my charity, or to value myself upon
the greatness of my soul, that should give in so profuse a manner as
this, which was above my figure, if my wealth had been twice as much as
it was; but there was another spring from whence all flowed, and 'tis on
that account I speak of it. Was it possible I could think of a poor
desolate woman with four children, and her husband gone from her, and
perhaps good for little if he had stayed--I say, was I, that had tasted
so deep of the sorrows of such a kind of widowhood, able to look on her,
and think of her circumstances, and not be touched in an uncommon
manner? No, no; I never looked on her and her family, though she was not
left so helpless and friendless as I had been, without remembering my
own condition, when Amy was sent out to pawn or sell my pair of stays to
buy a breast of mutton and a bunch of turnips; nor could I look on her
poor children, though not