Well, I
pawned some of my things, my cloak even, and my silk bonnet, to pay
honest; and as I could not do no otherwise, I left them in pawn, and,
with the little money I raised, I set out forwards on my road to Dublin
again, so soon as I thought my boy was able to travel. I reckoned too
much upon his strength. We had got but a few miles from the village when
he dropped, and could not get on; and I was unwilling and ashamed to
turn back, having so little to pay for lodgings. I saw a kind of hut, or
shed, by the side of a hill. There was nobody in it. It was empty of
every thing but some straw, and a few turf, the remains of a fire. I
thought there would be no harm in taking shelter in it for my children
and myself for the night. The people never came back to whom it
belonged, and the next day my poor boy was worse; he had a fever this
time. Then the snow came on. We had some little store of provisions that
had been made up for us for the journey to Dublin, else we must have
perished when we were snowed up. I am sure the people in the village
never know'd that we were in that hut, or they would have come to help
us, for they bees very koind people. There must have been a day and a
night that passed, I think, of which I know nothing. It was all a dream.
When I got up from my illness, I found my boy dead--and the others with
famished looks.
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