--_Life's Uses_

[Illustration: HARRIET MARTINEAU]


I believe it was Thackeray who once expressed a regret that Harriet
Martineau had not shown better judgment in choosing her parents.

She was born into one of those big families where there is not love enough
to go 'round. The mother was a robustious woman with a termagant temper;
she was what you call "practical." She arose each morning, like Solomon's
ideal wife, while it was yet dark, and proceeded to set her house in
order. She made the children go to bed when they were not sleepy and get
up when they were. There was no beauty-sleep in that household, not even
forty winks; and did any member prove recreant and require a douse of cold
water, not only did he get the douse but he also heard quoted for a year
and a day that remark concerning the sluggard, "A little sleep, a little
slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep: so shall thy poverty come
as one that traveleth, and thy want as an armed man."

This big, bustling Amazon was never known to weep but once, and that was
when Lord Nelson died. To show any emotion would have been to reveal a
weakness, and a caress would have been proof positive of folly. Life was
a stern business and this earth-journey a warfare. She cooked, she swept,
she scrubbed, she sewed.

And although she withheld every loving word and kept back all
demonstration of affection, yet her children were always well cared for:
they were well clothed, they had plenty to eat, and a warm place to sleep.
And in times of sickness this mother would send all others to rest, and