But I daresay those City folks, with
their stocks going up and going down, and always bringing about the ruin
of somebody or other, go which way they will, get their poor heads so
muddled with figures that they can't believe there's such a thing as
honesty in the world."
This was the gist of Mrs. Woolper's evening musing in the snug little
housekeeper's room at the Lawn. It was a very comfortable little room,
and held sacred to Mrs. Woolper; the three young females, and the boy in
buttons, who formed Mr. Sheldon's in-door establishment, preferring the
license of the kitchen to the strict etiquette of the housekeeper's room.
This apartment, as well as every other room in the stockbroker's house,
bore the stamp of prosperity. A comfortable easy-chair reposed the limbs
of Mrs. Woolper; a bright little fire burned in a bright little grate,
and its ruddy light was reflected in a bright little fender. Prints of
the goody class adorned the walls; and a small round table, with a
somewhat gaudy cover, supported Mrs. Woolper's work-box and family Bible,
both of which she made it a point of honour to carry about with her, and
to keep religiously, through good fortune and through evil fortune;
neither of which, however, afforded her much employment. She felt herself
to be much nearer grace with the family Bible by her side than she would
have been without it; she felt, indeed, that the maintenance and due
exhibition of the family Bible was in itself a kind of religion.
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