a concurrence of circumstances of which it was deemed expedient for me to avail myself. My children having reached the ages of ten and twelve, could be safely left, the daughter under the charge of a governess, and the son at a boarding-school in an adjacent township, where the wife of the Principal with whom he was to reside having been an early acquaintance of mine, would extend to him some degree of maternal attention.
So I went. Yet scarcely did I realize either the decision or the separation until I found myself out on the deep, dark waters, like a waif or a spray of sea-weed. The absence of nearly a year gave time and facility for exploration of the more interesting parts of England, Scotland, and France. Then I was much urged to proceed to Italy by my attached friends Hon. Mr. and Mrs. Dixon, who showed me filial attentions in foreign climes, and would have taken the kindest care of me. But an aversion to be so far from my children, lest they might be taken sick, and a desire to rejoin them prevailed, and caused a refusal of the privilege. Did I do wrong? So some said, who were not mothers. But I have never regretted it.
We found very much to interest us in those ancient regions, with whose history we had been long familiar Yet more than ruinous castle, where romance lingered, or royal palace, where pomp abode, or tower, obelisk, or cathedral, or galleries where congregated the world's artistic power, were the sight of the face and sound
