Could she bear to be so uprooted?
"Sir," she said one evening, when Mr. Chantrey, worn out with the
conflict of his own parting with his people, was sitting depressed and
silent by her fireside, "Mr. Chantrey, are you thinking of taking out a
servant with you?"
"No," he answered; "the cost would be too much. You forget we are going
to be poor folks out yonder, Ann. Don't you remember telling me it might
have been better for my wife if she had had to work hard for Charlie and
me?"
"That was long ago," she replied; "it's different now. Who's to mind you
if you are ill? and who's to see Master Charlie kept nice, like a
gentleman's son? I've been thinking it would break my heart to sit at
home thinking of you all. There is nothing to keep me here, now my poor
brother's gone. Take me with you, sir."
"No, no!" he exclaimed, vehemently--so vehemently that she knew how his
heart leaped at the thought of it; "you must not sacrifice yourself for
us. What! give up this pleasant home of yours, and all your old
friends?! No; it cannot be."
"There'd be trouble in it," she said; "but it would be a harder trouble
to think of you in foreign parts, with none but savages about you, and
no roof over your head, and wild beasts marauding about.
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