She was a right brave and heroic woman.  She shrunk from no duty, because of feeble nerves.  Although, after her father died, the disappointment of not going to Europe with Miss Martineau and Mrs. Farrar was extreme, and her mother and sister wished her to take her portion of the estate and go; and, on her refusal, entreated the interference of friends to overcome her objections; Margaret would not hear of it, and devoted herself to the education of her brothers and sisters, and then to the making a home for the family.  She was exact and punctual in money matters, and maintained herself, and made her full contribution to the support of her family, by the reward of her labors as a teacher, and in her conversation classes.  I have a letter from her at Jamaica Plain, dated November, 1840, which begins,

’This day I write you from my own hired house, and am full of the dignity of citizenship.  Really, it is almost happiness.  I retain, indeed, some cares and responsibilities; but these will sit light as feathers, for I can take my own time for them.  Can it be that this peace will be mine for five whole months?  At any rate, five days have already been enjoyed.’

Here is another, written in the same year:—­

’I do not wish to talk to you of my ill-health, except that I like you should know when it makes me do anything badly, since I wish you to excuse and esteem me.  But let me say, once for all, in reply to your letter, that you are mistaken if you think I ever wantonly sacrifice my health.  I have learned that we cannot injure ourselves without injuring others; and besides, that we have no right; for ourselves are all we know of heaven.  I do not try to domineer over myself.  But, unless I were sure of dying, I cannot dispense with making some exertion, both for the present and the future.  There is no mortal, who, if I laid down my burden, would take care of it while I slept.  Do not think me weakly disinterested, or, indeed, disinterested at all.’

Every one of her friends knew assuredly that her sympathy and aid would not fail them when required.  She went, from the most joyful of all bridals, to attend a near relative during a formidable surgical operation.  She was here to help others.  As one of her friends writes, ‘She helped whoever knew her.’  She adopted the interests of humble persons, within her circle, with heart-cheering warmth, and her ardor in the cause of suffering and degraded women, at Sing-Sing, was as irresistible as her love of books.  She had, many years afterwards, scope for the exercise of all her love and devotion, in Italy, but she came to it as if it had been her habit and her natural sphere.  The friends who knew her in that country, relate, with much surprise, that she, who had all her lifetime drawn people by her wit, should recommend herself so highly, in Italy, by her tenderness and large affection.  Yet the tenderness was only a face of the wit; as before, the wit was raised above all other wit by the affection behind it.  And, truly, there was an ocean of tears always, in her atmosphere, ready to fall.