family near her, and to see some of them daily. The tender solicitude of

her mother, her childlike grief, and her firm belief in the real

guiltlessness of her daughter, touched even the custodians of the Tombs

who are enured to scenes of pathos.

Mrs. Hawkins had hastened to her daughter as soon as she received money

for the journey. She had no reproaches, she had only tenderness and

pity. She could not shut out the dreadful facts of the case, but it had

been enough for her that Laura had said, in their first interview,

"mother, I did not know what I was doing." She obtained lodgings near,

the prison and devoted her life to her daughter, as if she had been

really her own child. She would have remained in the prison day and

night if it had been permitted. She was aged and feeble, but this great

necessity seemed to give her new life.

The pathetic story of the old lady's ministrations, and her simplicity

and faith, also got into the newspapers in time, and probably added to

the pathos of this wrecked woman's fate, which was beginning to be felt

by the public. It was certain that she had champions who thought that

her wrongs ought to be placed against her crime, and expressions of this

feeling came to her in various ways. Visitors came to see her, and gifts

of fruit and flowers were sent, which brought some cheer into her hard

and gloomy cell.

Laura had declined to see either Philip or Harry, somewhat to the

former's relief, who had a notion that she would necessarily feel

510

The Gilded Age