, for we
are sadly in need of funds, and all my best dresses are at the
pawnbroker's. Alas, that my beauty should be destroyed--that beauty
which would have captured the hearts and purses of so many rich
admirers! I am almost inclined to rejoice that my eyesight is gone, for
I cannot see my deformity. Am I very hideous, mother?'

'My poor, afflicted child,' said Mrs. Franklin, shedding tears--'do not
question me on that subject. Oh, Josephine, had I, your mother, set you
an example of purity and virtue, and trained you up in the path of
rectitude, we never should have experienced our past and present misery,
and you, my once beautiful child, would not now be deformed and blind.
Alas, I have much to reproach myself for.'

'Tut, mother; you have grown puritanical of late. Let us try to forget
the past, and cherish hope for the future.--How very warm it is!'

She retired from the window to avoid the observation of the passers-by,
and removed her veil. Good God!--Can she be the once lovely Josephine!
Ah, terrible punishment of sin!

Her once radiant countenance was of a ghastly yellow hue, save where
deep purple streaks gave it the appearance of a putrefying corpse. Her
once splendid eyes, that had so oft flashed with indignant scorn, glowed
with the pride of her imperial beauty, or sparkled with the fires of
amorous passion, had been literally burned out of her head! That once
lofty and peerless brow was disfigured by hideous scars, and a wig
supplied the place of her once clustering and luxuriant hair.--She was
as loathsome to look upon as had been her destroyer, the Dead Man. Oh,
it was a pitiful sight to see that talented and accomplished young lady
thus stricken with the curses of deformity and blindness, through her
own wickedness--to see that temple which God had made so beautiful and
fair to look upon, thus shattered and defiled by the ravages of sin!

Evening came, and with it brought Mr. Thurston. Josephine, seated on a
sofa and impenetrably veiled, received him with a courteous
welcome;--and comported herself so admirably and artfully, that the most
critical observer would not have imagined her to be blind, but would
have supposed her to be wearing a veil merely out of caprice, or from
some trifling cause.--When she spoke to her lover, or was addressed by
him, she invariably turned her face towards him, as if unconsciously;
and the gentleman chuckled inwardly, as he thought he saw in that simple
act an evide