Page:Maria Edgeworth (Zimmern 1883).djvu/225

Rh was Orlandino, a tale for children, relating the fortunes and reformation of a graceless truant. It was the last work she published, her literary career thus ending, as it began, with a tale to give gladness to childhood. She had her reward in a great pleasure that came to her from America. The children of Boston, hearing what pains their kind friend in Ireland was taking for her unhappy compatriots, as a recognition of their love for her and her writings, organised a subscription. At the end of a few weeks, they were able to send her 150 barrels of flour and rice. They came with the simple address, worth more to her than many phrases, "To Miss Edgeworth, for her poor." She was deeply touched and grateful. It touched her also that the porters, who carried the grain down to the shore, refused to be paid; and, with her own hands, she knitted a woollen comforter for each man, and sent them to a friend for distribution. Before they reached their destination, the hands that had worked them were cold, and the beating of that warm, kind heart stilled for ever.

For scarcely was the famine over, and before Miss Edgeworth's over-taxed strength had time to recoup, another and yet heavier blow was to befall her. Indeed, many deaths and sorrows as she had known, in some respects this was the severest that had for some years come upon her. It was natural to see the old go before her, but not so the young, and when in 1848 her favourite sister Fanny died rather suddenly, Miss Edgeworth felt that the dearest living object of her love had gone.

The shock did not apparently tell on her health, as she continued to employ herself with her usual interest and sympathy in all the weal and woe of her family