Will you go down and say
farewell to the poor child you loved so dearly?"
"No, my good madam," returned Thaddeus, his straying thoughts at once
gathering round this mournful centre; "I will rather retain you here
until the melancholy task be entirely accomplished."
With gentle violence he forced her upon a seat, and in silence
supported her head on his breast, against which she unconsciously
leaned and wept. He listened with a depressed heart to the removal of
the coffin; and at the closing of the street door, which forever shut
the little William from that house in which he had been the source of
its greatest pleasure, a tear trickled down the cheek of Thaddeus;
and the sobbings of the poor grandmother were audible.
The count, incapable of speaking, pressed her hand in his.
"Oh, Mr. Constantine!" cried she, "see how my supports, one after the
other, are taken from me! first my son, and now his infant! To what
shall I be reduced?"
"You have still, my good Mrs. Robson, a friend in Heaven, who will
supply the place of all you have lost on earth."
"True, dear sir! I am a wicked creature to speak as I have done; but
it is hard to suffer: it is hard to lose all we loved in the world!"
"It is," returned the count, greatly affected by her grief. "But God,
who is perfect wisdom as well as perfect love, chooseth rather to
profit us than to please us in his dispensations.
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