them such an agreeable story as Miss Dolly's; yet she would read
them a letter she had received the evening before from her Cousin
Peggy Smith, who lived at York; in which there was a story that
she thought very strange and remarkable. They were all very
desirous of it, when Miss Sukey read as follows:


'Dear cousin,--I promised, you know, to write to you when I had
anything to tell you; and as I think the following story very
extraordinary, I was willing to keep my word.

'Some time ago there came to settle in this city, a lady, whose
name was Dison. We all visited her: but she had so deep a
melancholy, arising, as it appeared, from a settled state of ill
health, that nothing we could do could afford her the least
relief, or make her cheerful. In this condition she languished
amongst us five years, still continuing to grow worse and worse.

'We all grieved at her fate. Her flesh was withered away; her
appetite decayed by degrees, till all food became nauseous to her
sight; her strength failed her; her feet could not support her
tottering body, lean and worn away as it was; and we hourly
expected her death. When, at last, she one day called her most
intimate friends to her bedside, and, as well as she could, spoke
to the following purpose: 'I know you all pity me; but, alas! I
am not so much the object of your pity, as your contempt; for all
my misery is of my own seeking, and owing to the wickedness of my
own mind. I had two sisters, with whom I was bred up; and I have
all my lifetime been unhappy, for no other cause but for their
success in the world. When we were young, I could neither eat nor