A painted wooden bedstead, covered with coarse but clean
calico sheets, blue calico curtains, four chairs, a straw arm-chair, a
high desk of dark wood, with a few books and boxes placed on shelves,
composed the entire furniture of the room. And yet the man who lay on
that wretched bed, whose pallid cheek, and harsh, incessant cough,
foretold the approach of death, was one of the brightest ornaments of
our literature. His historical works had won for him a European
celebrity, his writings having been translated into all the modern
languages; yet he had always remained poor, because his devotion to
science had prevented him from devoting a sufficient portion of his
time to productive labour.
An unfinished piece of costly embroidery thrown on a little stand near
the bed, another piece of a less costly kind, but yet too luxurious to
be intended for the use of this poor family, shewed that his wife and
daughter--this gentle child whose large dark eyes were so full of
sadness--endeavoured by the work of their hands to make up for the
unproductiveness of his efforts.
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