"What vexes me, my poor Emmy, is not my misfortune, but yours," George said. "I don't care for a little poverty; and I think, without vanity, I've talents enough to make my own way."
"That you have," interposed his wife, who thought that war should cease, and her husband should be made a general instantly.
"Yes, I shall make my way as well as another," Osborne went on; "but you, my dear girl, how can I bear your being deprived of the comforts and station in society which my wife had a right to expect? My dearest girl in barracks; the wife of a soldier in a marching regiment; subject to all sorts of annoyance and privation! It makes me miserable."
Emmy, quite at ease, as this was her husband's only cause of disquiet, took his hand, and with a radiant face and smile began to warble that stanza from the favourite song of "Wapping Old Stairs," in which the heroine, after rebuking her Tom for inattention, promises "his trousers to mend, and his grog too to make," if he will be constant and kind, and not forsake her. "Besides," she said, after a pause, during which she looked as pretty and happy as any young woman need, "isn't two thousand pounds an immense deal of money, George?"
George laughed at her naivete; and finally they went down to dinner, Amelia clinging to George's arm, still warbling the tune of "Wapping Old Stairs," and more pleased and light of mind than she had been for some days past.

"What vexes me, my poor Emmy, is not my misfortune, but yours," George said. "I don't care for a little poverty; and I think, without vanity, I've talents enough to make my own way."
"That you have," said his wife, who thought that her husband should be made a general instantly.
"But you, my dear girl, how can I bear your being deprived of the comforts you had a right to expect? My dearest girl, in barracks; the wife of a soldier, subject to all sorts of annoyance! It makes me miserable."
Emmy took his hand, and with a radiant smile began to warble that stanza from the favourite song Wapping Old Stairs in which the heroine promises her Tom "his trousers to mend, and his grog too to make." "Besides," she said, "isn't two thousand pounds an immense deal of money, George?"
George laughed at her naivet; and when they went down to dinner, Amelia still singing, she was lighter of mind than she had been for some days.
