THE FURZE-BUSH. 31 



had ; and was lold in reply, that she was one of 

 the most zealous papists in the parish. 



We met occasionally in the street, and always 

 spoke ; but I was prevented by other engagements 

 from visiting her. After a long time, 1 learned 

 that she had been very near death ; that her new- 

 born infant, like herself, had narrowly escaped it, 

 and that Mary was then sinking into a very painful 

 and dangerous disease — an internal cancer form- 

 ing, which menaced her life. To this were added 

 distressing testimonies as to the determined manner 

 in which she rejected all religious instruction, not 

 administered by her own priest ; excepting that 

 she listened patiently and respectfully to one pious 

 clergyman, who occasionally visited all the cotta- 

 ges ; and who was so universally beloved among 

 the poor, that no one ever refused him a reveren- 

 tial and affectionate reception. 



I was pricked to the heart, when told of the in- 

 creasing sufferings of poor Mary, whose personal 

 industry had been the main support of her family ; 

 and who began to feel the miseries of abject poverty 

 aggravating her bodily torments. I determined 

 to visit her, and that too for the express purpose 

 of trying whether I could not, as a weak instrument 

 in an x^lmighty hand, bring her forth from her dar- 

 ling delusions, into the beams of the day-spring 

 from on high. I was told that such an attempt 

 would subject me to insult ; if not from her, from 



