There lived, at about the distance of a mile from Mrs. Melvin's house, a widow lady, with her daughter, a charming little girl of thirteen years of age, on whose education (so very limited was her fortune) she had never had it in her power to be at the smallest expense: indeed, her income was so narrow, that, without the strictest economy in every respect, she could not have made it suffice to procure them the necessaries of life; and was obliged to content herself with the little instruction she could give to her child, and with encouraging her as much as possible to exert herself, and endeavour to supply, by attention and perseverance, the want of a more able instructor, and to surmount the obstacles she would have to meet with.
