those to whom William will take me, I will share joy and grief, honour and shame, prosperity and adversity. Good Mrs. Trini, yonder sit many a faithful wife, and many a virtuous maiden, with anxious hearts and wet eyes, fixed on that point to which mine are directed. I will pray to God, that when the angel of death spreads his wings over the field of battle, my William may not perish. No, he will not perish. The Almighty will hear my prayer, for I have never offended him.’
“After this reproof, my wife durst never utter another syllable in disparagement of William.
“When, however, accounts arrived of the three bloody days near Waterloo, and no letters reached her from William, the anchor of her faith was broken. Inexpressible anguish drove her to the topmost crags of the rocks, and into the most gloomy abysses: she would not confess that she had lost her confidence in God; and yet her pallid face, her look of settled melancholy, and her predilection for the profoundest solitude, announced that her fortitude was gone. The entreaties of her father, and the consolations which my wife and I offered, were of no avail.
“‘Let me alone,’ said she, with cutting coldness. ‘I shall not be long in your way. That which has life perishes; that which has not, en-
