selfish and unprincipled, in allowing my mind to dwell alone on him who in reality belonged to another? Have I not cherished and encouraged the poison?--have I not yielded to the temptation?--do I wish even now that it was otherwise?--and am I not rightly punished?--have I not suffered less than I deserve?--and yet how miserable I am--how lonely and how despairing!--there is not another being on earth as miserable as I am!” “By your leave, ma’am,” said a rough, coarse voice; and Mary stepped aside to make way on the pavement for a little mournful procession that was winding gloomily along, in strange, chilling contrast to the bustle and liveliness of the street. It was a little child’s funeral. The short black coffin, carried so easily on one man’s shoulder, seemed almost like a plaything for Death. It was touching to think what a tiny body was covered by that scanty pall--how the little thing, once so full of life and laughter, all play and merriment and motion, could be lying stiff and stark in death! It seemed such a contradiction to the whole course of nature--a streamlet turning back towards its source--a rosebud nipped by the frost. Had the grim Reaper no other harvest whitening for his sickle? Was there not age, with its aches and pains and burdens, almost asking for release? Was there not manhood, full of years and honours, its appointed task done on earth, its guerdon fairly earned, itself waiting for the reward? Was there not crime, tainting the atmosphere around it, that to take away would be a mercy to its fellow-men, and a deserved punishment to its own hardened obstinacy, having neglected and set aside every opportunity of repentance and amendment? Was there not virtue willing to go, and misery imploring to be set free? And must he leave all these, and cut off the little creeping tendril that had wound and twisted itself round its mother’s heart? There was the mother first in the slow procession--who had so good a right to be chief mourner as that poor, broken woman? Who can estimate the aching void that shall never be quite filled up in that sobbing, weary breast? She is not thinking of the funeral, nor the passers-by, nor the crape, nor the mourning; she does not hear rough condolences from neighbours, and well-meant injunctions “to keep up,” and “not to give way so,” from those who “are mothers themselves, and know what a mother’s feelings _is_.” She is thinking of her child--her child shut down in that deal box--yet still hers--she has got it still--not till it is consigned to the earth, and the dull clods rattle heavily on the lid, will she feel that she has lost it altogether, when there will come a fearful reaction, and paroxysms of grief that deaden themselves by their own violence; and then the wound will cicatrise, and she will clean her house, and get her husband’s dinner, and sit down to her stitching, and neighbours will think that she has “got over her trouble,” and she will seem contented, and even happy.