she would endure anything, and give up anything. She was encouraged, and grew, year by year, in these habits of fortitude and self-denial. We have another anecdote illustrative of the same feeling, and recorded in a similar spirit. Her devotedness to reading was only equalled by the readiness with which she acquired whatever she chose to commit to memory, and the accuracy with which she retained whatever she had once learned. Mr. Landon remembers one instance of this quickness. "I had petitioned my father for three shillings, when he offered me, by way of compromise, a new eighteenpenny-piece if I would learn and repeat to him the ballad—
'Gentle river, gentle river,
Lo! thy streams are stained with gore,' &c.
But as this same ballad was some thirty verses long, and the payment inadequate, I struck for the three shillings, and would learn no ballad for less. I was in disgrace accordingly. Without saying a word, my sister went out, came back in a very short time, and repeated the ballad for me—asked for the three shillings—got them, and a kiss or two besides. She then persuaded me to learn it, teaching it me verse by verse. I forget whether I ever said it; but I do not forget that she gave me the three shillings."
The spirit thus manifested found food in the subjects her reading embraced; and even the favorite pastimes of the brother and sister assumed a similar colour, and had their origin in the same associations. We do not allude to those amusements, which were continued, as opportunity offered, long after the brother had made his first appearance at school; amusements calculated to
