Roxy Hastings — page 218: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

ROXY HASTINGS. 209 with the signature, and handed it to Mrs. Holden, who, passionately kissing it, at once pronounced it genuine, and with quavering voice, read a few lines aloud : ‘They believe me dead; they have raised a monument to me. Pray, let my mother be undeceived. In some way let her know that I am alive and well. Poor mamma! poor mamma!” “There can no longer be a doubt,” she added. ‘Lucy is as one risen from the dead. And now, sweet messenger of mercy, do not refuse me one request. . Leave me these few lines with her dear name, that I may gaze upon them by night and by day; that I may wear them next my heart, and take them out whenever I begin to fear that this has been all a dream.” Miss Blythe complied with this request, cutting off a portion of the letter and handing it to Mrs. Holden, and then taking her departure. CHAPTER XL. “DEAD TO HER.” It was not until the visitor was gone that the happy mother remembered what momentous tidings she had to send to Lucy, not of their lost wealth, for that she’ con- sidered trivial now, but of the safety of Alfred Lee. That this intelligence, together with an assurance of her parents’ full consent now to their union, would bring her speedily home Mrs. Holden did not fora moment doubt. But how did she know, she asked herself, that Alfred Lee was still willing to wed her daughter? Would he renew, in their low estate, the offer which had been spurned by her parents in their prosperity ? Besides, he might already have formed another attach- ment, forin common with all Lucy’s friends he had long supposed her dead, and being unwilling to awaken hopes which might again be blasted—she resolved to see Mr. Lee and make certain of his sentiments before writing to her daughter. Without communicating her designs to any one she set out on this delicate errand on the day after Miss Blythe’s visit, being resolved to de what she could to repair the wrong she had committed, without the least regard to any personal considerations, Comichoo <S (Elo) =