knew not whither, when, like an old piece of furniture, which, left
alone in its wonted corner, may hold together for a long while, but
breaks to pieces on an attempt to move it, he fell down on his own
threshold under a paralytic affection.

The tutor awakened as from a dream. He saw his patron dead, and
that his patron's only remaining child, an elderly woman, now
neither graceful nor beautiful, if she had ever been either the one
or the other, had by this calamity become a homeless and penniless
orphan. He addressed her nearly in the words which Dominie Sampson
uses to Miss Bertram, and professed his determination not to leave
her. Accordingly, roused to the exercise of talents which had long
slumbered, he opened a little school, and supported his patron's
child for the rest of her life, treating her with the same humble
observance and devoted attention which he had used towards her in
the days of her prosperity.

Such is the outline of Dominie Sampson's real story, in which there
is neither romantic incident nor sentimental passion; but which,
perhaps, from the rectitude and simplicity of character which it
displays, may interest the heart and fill the eye of the reader as
irresistibly as if it respected distresses of a more dignified or
refined character.

These preliminary notices concerning the tale of Guy Mannering, and
some of the characters introduced, may save the author and reader,
in the present instance, the trouble of writing and perusing a long
string of detached notes.