The privations suffered by the poor old woman, in consequence of this failure of her ordinary means of subsistence, were very great,--greater, indeed, than was suspected; for she uttered no complaint, and sought no relief. A few acres of ground had been added to the hovel, given to her by the elder Gilbert. The title was not, indeed, thought to be very strong, and as it lay in the very centre of Colonel Falconer's domains, a true _regnum in regno_, it was sometimes wondered he made no attempt to dispossess her, and thus complete her ruin. From these worn-out fields, had she been able to retain any one about her to cultivate them, she might have gleaned a scanty yet sufficient subsistence. But neither son nor kinsman of any degree, had the poor widow left in the wide world; and when men began to doubt, suspect, and shun her, she was no longer able to procure the assistance even of hirelings; and her fields lay fallow and overgrown with brambles. Her situation grew hopelessly distressed and desolate; in vain she exposed her slender stores of gingerbread in the window, and her bottles of spruce-beer in the cool brook, to tempt the wayfarer to turn aside for such refreshments. If the stranger did feel for a moment urged to exchange the scorching road, on a July day, for the shadowy porch, he cast his eye upon the garden, at the road-side, now the last dependence of the miserable widow, and beholding her uninviting and squalid appearance, passed on, without thinking how much real charity might have been conferred by the disbursement of a few pence at that abode of poverty.