The Prince George's enquirer and southern Maryland advertiser. (Upper Marlborough, Md.) 1882-1925, 1909-07-09

criminals), it will be henceforth I'M
possible for you to feel pain upon
my account. I cannot ask you to for
get me, because every hour must
bring to you some bitter reminder
of the wrong 1 have done you; but
think of me as dead, as having died
years ago, when your Robert was my
playfellow. Alas! what evil may 1
not have done to him also-sundered
him, perhaps, from his promised
bride; destroyed his prospects! 1t is
terrible to think that not only here
at home am I justly condemned and
despised, but that across the ocean,
thousands of miles away, my name
must needs be held in adherence.
Oh, if could be once again as I was
when Robert left you! There is
nothing, alas! the same with me now;
even my love for you, though it will
cease but with my latest breath, is
something different. feel unworthy
to entertain it. 1t seems blasphemy
to take your name within my lips
even in my prayers.
"You will wonder perhaps when
you have read the record Of my life
that such one as should dare to
pray. But then, dear guardian, there
is little Willie; when I sit by her
bedside with her thin, small hand in
mine, I still seem to have some link
with Heaven. 1t is scarcely credible,
considering her tender years, but
there is nothing her mother can teach
which my little darling cannot under
stand. I say it is scarcely credible,
but she has been made aware that
she has been the pretext for her god
fathers ruin. She clings to her fra
gile life, and believes that she will
live to put things right. She has
questioned me a hundred times, and
when 1 come of age she says (Which
she will never live to do, and If she
did, it would be too late), I will pay
all their money back to godpapa and
Aunt Maria When DR.. Newton came
to see her, her chief anxiety was to
learn whether she would live to be
twenty-one. I suppose the good doc
tor thought the dear child's mind was
wandering, but it was as bright and
clear as it is pure. We have no Sc
crets from one another, Willie and I.
l have told you one of the reasons
for my writing to you, but the chief
is after all a selfish one-to bespeak,
should anything happen to me, your
sympathies for my innocent child. l
knoWyou will never visit upon her
even in your thoughts the sins Of her
parent, but I beseech you to try to
love her for her own sake; she is as
worthy of your love as her mother
has proved herself unworthy. What
higher eulogium, alas! can l pass up
on her? Henry will take care OF her,
l know, if permitted to do so. But
the law-there is no one, alas! who
has better cause to know it than
yourself-is hard and cruel. Dear
guardian, I would rather see Willie
dead ct my feet than trust her to the
hands in which the law would place
her. 1 will say no more upon this
matter, for that way madness lies,
only if anything should happen which
should sink me still lower in your
disesteem, do not judge me too hast
lily. I am in such straits as you can
not guess.
"You will show to Aunt Maria
what 1 have written; do not ask you
to plead with her for me. I trust to
that tender heart of hers, whose trust
l have so shamefully abused, for
charity and pardon.
Your Loving and Penitent Ward. -