She went out among the poor of her neighborhood and relieved their wants

with such indiscriminate and munificent generosity as to draw down upon

herself the rebuke of the clergy for encouraging habits of improvidence

and dependence in the laboring classes. As for the subjects of her

benevolence, they received her bounty with the most extravagant

expressions of gratitude and the most fulsome flattery. This was so

distasteful to Berenice that she oftened turned her face away, blushing

with embarrassment at having listened to it. Yet such was the gentleness

of her spirit, that she never wounded their feelings by letting them see

that she distrusted the sincerity of these hyperbolical phrases.

"Poor souls," she said to herself, "it is the best they have to offer

me, and I will take it as if it were genuine."

Berenice was right in her estimate of their flattery. Astonished at her

lavish generosity, and ignorant of her great wealth, which made

alms-giving easy, her poor neighbors put their old heads together to

find out the solution of the problem. And they came to the conclusion

that this lady must have been a great sinner, whose husband had

abandoned her for some very good reason, and who was now endeavoring to

atone for her sins by a life of self-denial and benevolence. This

conclusion seemed too probable to be questioned. This verdict was

brought to the knowledge of Berenice in a curious way. Among the

recipients of her bounty was Mrs. Jones, the ladies' nurse. The old

woman had fallen into a long illness, and consequently into extreme

want. Her case came to the knowledge of Berenice, who hastened to

relieve her. When the lady had made the invalid comfortable and was

about to take leave, the latter said: "Ah, 'charity covers a multitude of sins,' ma'am! Let us hope that all

yours may be so covered."

Berenice stared in surprise. It was not the words so much as the manner

that shocked her. And Phoebe, who had attended her mistress, scarcely

got well out of the house before her indignation burst forth in the

expletives: "Old brute! Whatever did she mean by her insolence? My lady, I hope you

will do nothing more for the old wretch."

Berenice walked on in silence until they reached the spot where they had

left their carriage, and when they had re-entered it, she said: "Something like this has vaguely met me before; but never so plainly and

bluntly as to-day; it is unpleasant; but I must not punish one poor old

woman for a misapprehension shared by the whole community."




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