Fortune-Teller. I sometimes consult futurity, madam; but I make no pretensions to any supernatural knowledge.
Mrs. C. Ay, so you say; but every body else says you know every thing; and I have come all the way from Boston to consult you; for you must know I have met with a dreadful loss.
F. T. We are liable to losses in this world, madam.
Mrs. C. Yes; and I have had my share of them, though I shall be only fifty, come Thanksgiving.
F. T. You must have learned to bear misfortunes with fortitude, by this time.
Mrs. C. I don't know how that is, though my dear husband, rest his soul, used to say, "Molly, you are as patient as Job,[Headnote 1] though you never had any children to lose, as he had."
F. T. Job was a model of patience, madam, and few could lose their all with so much resignation.
Mrs. C. Ah, sir', that is too true'; for even the small loss I have suffered, overwhelms me!
F. T. The loss of property, madam, comes home to the bosom of the best of us.
Mrs. C. Yes, sir; and when the thing lost can not be replaced, it is doubly distressing. When my poor, good man, on our wedding day, gave me the ring, "Keep it, Molly," said he, "till you die, for my sake." And now, that I should have lost it, after keeping it thirty years, and locking it up so carefully all the time, as I did—