It
must have been with the heavy crying she had had in her day, for she was
but a young creature at this time, and as pretty a young woman, I have
heard people say, as any on the country side. She took it sadly to heart
that she could no longer gain anything towards the keep of herself and
her child. My aunt Fanny would fain have persuaded her that she had
enough to do in managing their cottage and minding Gregory; but my mother
knew that they were pinched, and that aunt Fanny herself had not as much
to eat, even of the commonest kind of food, as she could have done with;
and as for Gregory, he was not a strong lad, and needed, not more
food--for he always had enough, whoever went short--but better
nourishment, and more flesh-meat. One day--it was aunt Fanny who told me
all this about my poor mother, long after her death--as the sisters were
sitting together, aunt Fanny working, and my mother hushing Gregory to
sleep, William Preston, who was afterwards my father, came in. He was
reckoned an old bachelor; I suppose he was long past forty, and he was
one of the wealthiest farmers thereabouts, and had known my grandfather
well, and my mother and my aunt in their more prosperous days.
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