“They looked surprised to see me, and came straight up to me. I don’t know how it was, but when the time came I did not seem so timid as I thought I should. I remembered how poor I was, and it could not be no object to any body to rob me; and I knew I was doing my duty in going to my husband, and I thought God would protect me. I sat quite still, and did not tremble nor shake. One of them asked me how I came there? So I told him the truth, and spoke quite civil, and yet, as it were, bold and steady, that I was walking from Halifax to my husband at the far settlement. So another of the men said, quite sharp—‘If you have got a husband, he had better keep a sharper look-out after such a tight lass as you are.’ “The first man said—‘You have got a long journey before you, my girl.’ “And I answered, ‘Yes, sir; but I have got safe through more than half of it, and I hope, with the blessing of God, to get safe through the rest of it to my husband, to nurse him in his illness.’ “‘Oh! he’s ill, that’s it,’ said the second. “‘Well, you can’t be travelling all this way without money,’ says the third, who had not spoken yet. “‘Come, come, poor girl,’ interrupted the first, and gave a wink to the last speaker, ‘we won’t hinder your journey any longer: you had better push on, or you’ll be in the dark.’ And he took the other by the arm, and he seemed to persuade them both to go away; and when I saw them go off into the woods again, I thanked God for his goodness, and thought he was indeed a Father to the fatherless, and that he never did desert them as put their trust in him in the time of their need. “I hugged my baby close, and quite forgot how tired I had been a little while before, and walked and ran till it was nearly dark, when the trees grew thinner, and I thought I could see lights glimmer in the distance. I made all the haste I could, and at last I got to a small settlement of half a dozen log-houses. I stopped at the first door, and I never felt so happy as when I saw a light, and a fire, and a woman’s face again. She had a child in her arms too, and I felt quite safe. “Next day I was very tired, and the woman at the little inn wished me to stay all day, and rest myself; but when I was walking and toiling, I did not feel so much about John: the moment I was still, I thought how ill he might be, and I could not bear to keep quiet. Besides, the woman’s husband was going part of the same road, to make a bargain about some furs; so he kept me company through the rest of the forest, and he begged the fur-merchants, as he came to speak to, that they would see me safe to the village where I was to stop that night. This day my baby began to grow fretful, and no wonder; for, though I did the best I could for it, ’twas next to impossible to get any thing fit for a baby at the places I stopped at, and I lived so hard myself that I made but a poor nurse.