Alley contrary to the earnest solicitations of Hugh and Maura, went back to reside with her mother.  Four years have now passed, and the virgin widow is constant to her grief.  With a bunch of yarn on her arm, she may be occasionally seen in the next market-town; the chastened sorrow of her look agreeing well with her mournful weeds.  In vain is she pressed to mingle in the rustic amusements of her former companions; she cannot do it, even to please her mother; the poor girl’s heart is sorrow-struck for ever.  She will never smile again.  As it is, however, the steady subdued melancholy of her manner increases the respect, without lessening the love, of all who know her.  Who, indeed, could see her, and hear her sad history without loving her purity, and her devoted affection to the memory of him that was only the husband of a day, without pitying the stricken girl who suffered so much, and wishing that time, which weans us from our greatest sorrows, may, by its influence, mellow her afflictions, until the bitterness of their spirit passes out of her soul.

Reader, if you want a moral, look upon the wasted brow of Hugh O’Donnell, and learn to restrain your passions and temper within its proper limits.