Page:Sketch of Connecticut, Forty Years Since.djvu/159

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FORTY YEARS SINCE.
147

sha-ant fare so well as others in my house. That's right an't it Tim, to larn ye to be industrious?"

"Yes Father," said the boy, eating his dry pudding without complaint, and with the air of one who intended to profit by the justice which he acknowledged. The meal was accompanied by a few questions from the parents, to which the younger members returned brief answers; but refrained from holding light conversation among themelves, with far greater sense of propriety, than is always witnessed at the tables of the professedly polite. At the close of the repast, the Father, bowing his head, uttered brief but hearty thanks to the Giver of all Mercies, during which even the youngest children stood as if in an act of devotion. They had been taught that the food of each day, however homely, was a favour; that it was both a duty and pleasure to thank Him who bestowed it; and that it was sinful to do this with a light, irreverent deportment. Madam L——, touched at this scene of domestic order, harmony and devotion, thought that the careless, the proud, or the epicure, who would scorn these humble inmates, might still receive from them a salutary lesson. Perchance, in her mind was a train of thought, similar to what inspired the ploughman-poet, when he exclaimed—

"From scenes like these, old Scotia's grandeur springs.
Which makes her lov'd at home, rever'd abroad—
Princes and lords are but the breath of kings,
An honest man's the noblest work of God."

As she came forward from the apartment, where she had remained unobserved, she was received with the most