Death touches the spring of our common humanity. This woman had been
despised, scoffed at, and angrily denounced by nearly every man,
woman, and child in the village; but now, as the fact of, her death
was passed from lip to lip, in subdued tones, pity took the place of
anger, and sorrow of denunciation. Neighbors went hastily to the old
tumble-down hut, in which she had secured little more than a place
of shelter from summer heats and winter cold: some with
grave-clothes for a decent interment of the body; and some with food
for the half-starving children, three in number. Of these, John, the
oldest, a boy of twelve, was a stout lad, able to earn his living
with any farmer. Kate, between ten and eleven, was bright, active
girl, out of whom something clever might be made, if in good hands;
but poor little Maggie, the youngest, was hopelessly diseased. Two
years before a fall from a window had injured her spine, and she had
not been able to leave her bed since, except when lifted in the arms
of her mother.
"What is to be done with the children?" That was the chief question
now. The dead mother would go underground, and be forever beyond all
care or concern of the villagers.
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