Besides, he
has never been in India, and knows nothing of the proper sit of a
turban."
"Have you been in India?" said I, rather astonished.
"Oh, yes! many a year, ma'am. Sam was a sergeant in the 31st; and
when the regiment was ordered to India, I drew a lot to go, and I
was more thankful than I can tell; for it seemed as if it would
only be a slow death to me to part from my husband. But, indeed,
ma'am, if I had known all, I don't know whether I would not rather
have died there and then than gone through what I have done since.
To be sure, I've been able to comfort Sam, and to be with him; but,
ma'am, I've lost six children," said she, looking up at me with
those strange eyes that I've never noticed but in mothers of dead
children--with a kind of wild look in them, as if seeking for what
they never more might find. "Yes! Six children died off, like
little buds nipped untimely, in that cruel India. I thought, as
each died, I never could--I never would--love a child again; and
when the next came, it had not only its own love, but the deeper
love that came from the thoughts of its little dead brothers and
sisters. And when Phoebe was coming, I said to my husband, 'Sam,
when the child is born, and I am strong, I shall leave you; it will
cut my heart cruel; but if this baby dies too, I shall go mad; the
madness is in me now; but if you let me go down to Calcutta,
carrying my baby step by step, it will, maybe, work itself off; and
I will save, and I will hoard, and I will beg--and I will die, to
get a passage home to England, where our baby may live?' God bless
him! he said I might go; and he saved up his pay, and I saved every
pice I could get for washing or any way; and when Phoebe came, and
I grew strong again, I set off.
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