which the descriptions were wrapped, was a herculean task which I failed to accomplish.
A woman, whose husband had posted her in the newspapers, with the accustomed threat of paying no debts in future of her contracting, came in person, with an earnest supplication for an article which should set forth his shortcomings, I being wholly ignorant of the facts, and unacquainted with the parties. She said she supposed I did all sorts of writing, and she had got so nervous she could not execute this quite as well as myself; and so great was her perseverance, that it was difficult to make any of the common forms of refusal available.
Applications of a somewhat similar nature still occasionally occur, though I have ceased to take the trouble of recording them.
A short time since, a letter from a stranger announced the death of a young man in the war, who, from her expressions of sorrow, I supposed to be a brother, and desiring a tribute to his memory. Believing that I might thus comfort a bereaved mourner, I complied, though at some inconvenience, studying the verses after I had retired to bed. Thanks were returned, with the information that she was not his bereaved sister, but an aunt—that she was much obliged for my doing the work with so much promptness, and his mother was quite pleased with my having written so prettily about her son.
