"I can't give you any ding," he answered.
"There is a virtue which shines far more than all the gold you possess," replied Mrs. Wentworth. "It is in man what chastity is in a woman. An act of charity ennobles man more than all the fame bestowed upon him for any other merit, and his reward is always commensurate with his works. Let this virtue move you. The ear of God cannot always be turned against my prayers to Him, and the hour must surely come, when my husband will be released from prison, and be enabled to repay any kindness you may show his wife and children. Let me have the money I have asked you for." "Oh, sir!" she continued, falling on her knees before him, "believe the words I speak to you, and save my child from the hands of death. But a short time ago I left her gasping for breath, with cold drops of perspiration resting on her brow, perhaps the marks of approaching dissolution. She is very ill, and can only recover through proper treatment. Place it in my power to call a physician and to procure medicines, and I shall never cease to bless you."
He moved uneasily in his chair, and averted his head from where she was kneeling, not because he felt touched at her appeal, but because he felt annoyed at her importuning him for money.
"Here my voman," he said at last. "Here is von tollar pill, dat is all I can give you."
She looked at the note in his extended hand, and felt the mockery.
"It will not do," she answered. "Let me have the amount I have asked you for. You can spare it. Do not be hardened. Recollect it is to provide medicine for the sick."
"I can't do it," he replied. "You should be shankful for what you get."
His motive in offering her the dollar, was not from a charitable feeling, it was only to get rid of a beggar.
"Oh God!" she groaned, rising from her knees, and resting her elbow on an iron safe near by. "Have you a heart?" she exclaimed wildly, "I tell you my child is ill, perhaps at this moment dying, aid me! aid me! Do not turn away a miserable mother from your door to witness her child die through destitution, when it is in your power to relieve its sufferings, and save it, so that it may live to be a blessing and solace to me. If not for my sake, if not for the sake of the child, let me appeal to you for charity, for the sake of him, who is now imprisoned in a foreign dungeon. He left me to defend you from the enemy—left his wife and children to starve and suffer, for the purpose of aiding in that holy cause we are now engaged in conflict for. For his sake, if for no other, give me the means of saving my child."