“Her name was Ann White.  She was the daughter of Amos White, an English curate, living in a remote village in Northumberland, and of his first wife, who had died during the infancy of her youngest child, Ann, a year after which her father had married again.  Ann’s step-mother was one of the most beautiful women in England, and—­one of the most discontented, as the wife of a widowed clergyman who was old enough to be her father, who had three sons and two daughters by a former marriage, and who was trying to support his family on a hundred pounds a year.  Yet, so long as her father lived, Ann’s childhood was happy.  But her father, who had been a consumptive, also died when Ann was about seven years old.  Then the family was broken up.  The three step-sons went to seek their fortunes in New Zealand.  The eldest step-daughter had been married and had gone to London a few months before her father’s death; the younger step-daughter went to live with that married sister.  Ann and her step-mother were permitted to remain at the parsonage until the successor of Amos White could be appointed.  At last the new curate came—­a handsome and accomplished man—­Rev. Raphael Rosslynn.  He was a bachelor, without near relatives.  He called on the Widow White and at once set her heart at ease by begging her not to trouble herself to leave the parsonage, but to remain there for the present at least, and take him as a boarder.  He was perfectly frank with the lovely widow, and told her that he was engaged to his own cousin, and that as soon as he should get a living promised him on the death of the present incumbent, and which was worth twelve hundred pounds a year, he should marry, but that he could not allow himself to anticipate happiness that must rise on a grave.  But in the course of the year that which might have been expected happened, the young widow, who had never cared for her elderly first husband, fell desperately in love with her lodger, who was not very slow to respond, for her grace, beauty and allurements attracted, bewildered, and bedeviled him, so that he forgot or deplored his plighted vows to his good little cousin.  To shorten the story, the cousin released him.  In a few days the curate and the widow were married.  Ann was utterly neglected, ignored, and forgotten.  Her lessons, which, before the advent of the handsome curate, had been the widow’s care, were now suspended.  Time went on, and these ardent lovers cooled off.  Not that their youth or health or beauty waned; not at all; but that their illusions were fading.  Yet, as often happens, as love cooled, jealousy warmed to life—­each one conscious of indifference toward the other, yet resented a corresponding indifference in the other.  As years went on, six children were born to this unhappy pair, whom not the Lord but the devil had joined together, and with their increasing family came increasing poverty.  It was hard to support a growing household on one hundred pounds a year.