She knew that she was the cause of her husband’s utter ruin; and she strung herself to bear the consequences. The reproaches which agony extorted; or worse, cureless, uncomplaining depression, when his mind was sunk in a torpor, not the less painful because it was silent and moveless. She reproached herself with the crime of his death; guilt and its punishments appeared to surround her; in vain she endeavoured to allay remorse by the memory of her real integrity; the rest of the world, and she among them, judged of her actions, by their consequences. She prayed for her husband’s soul; she conjured the Supreme to place on her head the crime of his self-destruction—she vowed to live to expiate his fault.
In the midst of such wretchedness as must soon have destroyed her, one thought only was
