Page:Guy Mannering Vol 1.djvu/96

86 Her first employment, when she became capable of a little work, was to make a small velvet bag for the scheme of nativity which she had obtained from her husband. Her fingers itched to break the seal, but credulity proved stronger than curiosity, and she had the firmness to inclose it, in all its integrity, within two slips of parchment, which she sowed round it, to prevent its being chafed. The whole was then enclosed in the velvet bag aforesaid, and hung as a charm round the neck of the infant, where his mother resolved it should remain until the period for the legitimate satisfaction of her curiosity should arrive.

The father also resolved to do his part by the child, in securing him a good education; and with the view that it should commence with the first dawnings of reason, Dominic Sampson was easily induced to renounce his public profession of parish schoolmaster, make his constant residence at the Place, and, in consideration of a sum