Page:Life and transactions of Mrs. Jane Shore (2).pdf/15

 15 career; and two sons had shared a fate somewhat simi- lar-the elder having been killed in Spain, and the younger having been taken prisoner, with many others in the expedition to Moscow, and thence conveyed to the wilds of Siberia, to labour there, with little hope of release. The daughter, Mariette, therefore, was all that remained to comfort the widowed mother. At the time Barclay took up his residence in the house of the widow, Mariette was just beginning to open into a beautiful and interesting girl. Her age was only thirteen, although her stature, and sometimes the look of her eye, seemed to belong to matured years. She had generally, however, the appearance of the girl ; and it was only occasionally, when her spirits were ex- cited, that the spectator could look upon her in any other light. When our soldier first introduced himself he had every reason to believe that he was an unwelcome and disagreeable intruder. The circumstances, that he belonged to the enemy under which a husband and a son-a father and a brother-had suffered, and that, independent of this, he would be a burden upon them for several weeks, were sufficient to sour the kindest hearts, and render his reception cold and repulsive. But he conducted himself with such affability and good grace, that the widow and her daughter soon began to hold him in esteem--to love his company--and at length to find that he added much to their social enjoyment. So soon, indeed, did he gain their affections, that at the expira- tion of the billet, when he found that thenceforth he must provide other quarters from his daily pay, he was prevailed upon to continue his abode in the cottage, in the character of a lodger. There was at the time nothing to employ the British soldiery in France; and Allan, therefore, became quite domesticated in the cottage. When the weather per- mitted, lie most commonly worked during the day in a little plot of ground which surrounded and belonged to the house; and in the evening he employed himself in teaching young Mariette the English language, and in