The daily national Whig. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1847-1849, 1847-08-26
any time for consideration. can promise

any time for consideration. can promise
| that"
"The second, that you will allow me
sometimes say every Monday morning, at
nine o'clock-habit again-I must be bust
ness like" said the gentleman, with whim-
seal inclination to quarrel with himself on
that head, sin walking past, to see you al
the door or window. don't ask TO come
in, as your Iother will be gone out at that
hour. don'tas to speak to you lmere-
y ask to see, for the satisfaction Of my own
mind, that you are well, and without ntru-
sion to remind you, by the sight Of me
that you have friend--an elderly friend,
gray haired already, and fast growing gray
er-whom you may ever command.
The cordial face looked up in his; conf
ded init; and promised.
! 81 understand, as before,n said the gen
tleman, rising, "that you purpose not 10
mention my visit to John Carter, lest he
should be at all distressed by my acquain-
lance with his history. am glad of it, for
II out oil the ordinary course Of things
and-habitp said the gentleman, checking
himself, "as if there were no better course
then the ordinary course!n .,
! With. that he turned to go, and walking,
| bare headed, to the outside of the little porch
took leave OF her with such happy mix
lure of unconstained respect and unaffected
.tnierest, as no breeding could have taught,
no truth mistrn7tod, and nothing but pure
and single heart expressed
Many lt-forgotten emotions were
awakened in the sisters mind by this visit.
1t was SO very long since any other visiter
had crossed their thresholds; il was SO very
long since any voice of sympathy had made
sad music in her ears; that the strangers
figure remained present 10 her, hours alier-
ward, when she sat at the window, plying
Ner needle; and lis words seemed newly
spoken, again and again. lie had touched
the spring that opened her whole life: and
| if she lost him for short space, it.
was only among the many shapes of the one
great recollection Of which TINT life was
made. ...t .."
Musing and working by turns; now con-
straining herselfto be steady at her needle
for long time together, aud now letting
her work fall, unregarded on her lap, and
straying wheresoever her buster thoughts led
Harriet Carker found the hours glide by her,
and the day steal on. The morning which
had been bright and clear, gradually became
overcast; sharp wind set in, the rain fell
heavily; and a dark mist, dropping over the
distant town, hid it from the view.
She often looked with compassion at
such time, upon the stragglers who came.
wandering into London, by the great high
way hard by, and who, foot sore and weary,
and gazing fearfully at the huge town be-
fore them, as if foreboding that their misery
there would be but as drop Of water in
the sea, or as grain of sand on the shore,
went shrinking OIL, covering before the
angry weather, and looking as if the very
elements rejected them. Day after day
such travellers crept past, but always, as she
thought, in one drecton-always toward
the town. Swallowed up in one phase or
other Of its immensely, towards which they
seemed impelled by desperate fascination,
they never returned. Food for the hospi-
tails, the churchyards, the prisons, the river,
fever, madness, vice and dealh-they pass
ed on to the monster, roaring in the dis
lance, and were lost
The chill wind was bowling, and the
rain was falling, and the day was darken-
ing modify, when Harriet, raising her eyes
from the work on which she had long since
been engaged with unremi,tjng consistency,
saw one Of these travellers approaching.
A woman. A solitary woman of some
years Of age; tall; well.formed; hand
some miserably dressed the soil Of many
country roads in varied weather - dust,
chalk, clay, gravel-clotted on her gray
cloak by the streaming wet; no bonnet on
her head, nothing to defend her rich black
hair from the rain, but torn handkerchief +;
with the futtering ends of which and with
her hair, the wind blinded her, so that she
often stopped to push them back, and look
upon the way she was going.
She was in the act of doing so, when
Harriet observed her. As her hands, part
ing on her sunburnt forehead, swept across
her face and threw aside the hindrances
that encroached upon it, there was reck-
less and regardless beauty in it; daunless
and depraved Indifference to more than
weather; careessness of what was cast
: upon her bare head from heaven or earth
that, coupled with her misery and loneli-
r ness, touched the heart Of her fellow wo-
/ man. She thought Of all that was debased
and perverted within her, no less than with.
out; of modest graces Of the mind, harden
ed and s;erled, like these attractions Of the
person; of the many gifts Of the Creator
, flung the winds like the wild hair; of all
; the beautiful ruin upon which the storm
, was beating and the night was coming
, Thinking of this, she did not turn away
with delicate Indignation many o.
+ her own compar iouatc and tender sex toe
often do-but plued her.
/ Her fallen sister came on, looking fal
: before her, trying with her eager eyes te
, pierce the mist in which the city was en-
E shrouded, and glancing, now and then, from
side 10 side, with the bewildered and uncer
2 tain aspect Of a stranger. Though her treat
a was bold and courageous, she was fatigued
and after moment of irresolulion, Sal dowr
unon haap If stones SerkIDp no shelter