forget that she was Sarah's bondmaid, and only remember that she had
been Abraham's wife--that she was still Ishmael's mother.

In that hour must have risen the memory of her wrongs, of her saddened
youth, her darkened womanhood--of the selfishness with which he had
wedded her; of the heartlessness with which he had deserted her; of her
long years of trial and contempt. And her eye might speak reproach,
although the lips were closed and there was no voice. Should we not
rejoice to believe that the patriarch whispered some regret for the
past, and spoke of sorrow and repentance to her whose happiness he had
so selfishly sacrificed, even as he consummated his work by casting her
out, a homeless exile. Such is the enslaving power of custom, so easily
do we blind ourselves to our own delinquencies, that Abraham probably
aggravated Hagar's faults while he overlooked her injuries. He saw in
her but the despiteful, revengeful handmaid; he forgot that she was an
injured wife--a neglected mother.

Yet no words of reproach, of entreaty, or explanation of the past, or
promise for the future, are recorded as having passed between them. He
pronounced the decree, and laid upon the bondmaid, and not upon his
noble boy, the provision for the journey. She turned from the tents, and
thus they parted!

But the connection of Abraham and Hagar had woven a thread into the
destiny of nations, still to be traced. She left the patriarch in
sorrow, in bitterness of soul; but she went out to found nations, to
punish rulers, to establish a long line who should transmit the name of
her son and the influence of her character to remotest ages--even to the
end of time.