208 DEATH OF MY WIFE 



I will merely subjoin, that strangles and influenza, to 

 which all horses are subject, are frequently mistaken for 

 this horrible disorder ; there is a similarity certainly in 

 the early stages, but ulcerated nostrils and the nauseous 

 smell of the discharge are always decisive, and as soon as 

 these are evident the animal should be destroyed. No 

 one need wish his neighbour, be he friend or foe, who has 

 anything to do with horses, a greater or more serious evil 

 than the glanders. 



The misfortunes with which I had been visited, thouirh 

 evils of no common occurrence, were such as all men in 

 business are subject to, and from which some have better 

 opportunities of recovering than others, some also can 

 display better judgment in treating them than others : be 

 that as it may, it pleased the Almighty about this time to 

 visit me with a sore and heavy affliction. 



My Avife had now for some time shown symptoms of a 

 complaint, common and so fatal in this climate, that had 

 already carried off" an elder brother and sister. I have 

 every reason to believe her death was accelerated by my 

 reverse of fortune ; but nothing, 1 was well assured, could 

 arrest the enemy that had made such rapid progress in 

 the destruction of all the organs which sustain vitality. 



I shall not dwell upon this sad epoch of my life any 

 more than to say, that after living a little more than four 

 years in connubial felicity, I was left with two children, 

 the younger but eighteen months old ; and after my 

 wife's remains were interred in the vault my father had 

 built, I had ample leisure to contemplate my desolate 

 condition. 



During the period I have been writing of, a very 



