Here he turned to the rough trundle bed full of little woolly heads, and
broke fairly down. He leaned over the back of the chair, and covered
his face with his large hands. Sobs, heavy, hoarse and loud, shook the
chair, and great tears fell through his fingers on the floor; just such
tears, sir, as you dropped into the coffin where lay your first-born
son; such tears, woman, as you shed when you heard the cries of your
dying babe. For, sir, he was a man,--and you are but another man. And,
woman, though dressed in silk and jewels, you are but a woman, and, in
life's great straits and mighty griefs, ye feel but one sorrow!

"And now," said Eliza, as she stood in the door, "I saw my husband
only this afternoon, and I little knew then what was to come. They have
pushed him to the very last standing place, and he told me, today, that
he was going to run away. Do try, if you can, to get word to him. Tell
him how I went, and why I went; and tell him I'm going to try and find
Canada. You must give my love to him, and tell him, if I never see him
again," she turned away, and stood with her back to them for a moment,
and then added, in a husky voice, "tell him to be as good as he can, and
try and meet me in the kingdom of heaven."

"Call Bruno in there," she added. "Shut the door on him, poor beast! He
mustn't go with me!"

A few last words and tears, a few simple adieus and blessings, and
clasping her wondering and affrighted child in her arms, she glided
noiselessly away.



CHAPTER VI