They used to boast to Aunt Sabina of pillage and of cruelty, on purpose to enrage her; but they never boast to me.

It even makes me smile sometimes to see how awkwardly they come and offer for temptation to me shining packets, half concealed, of ornaments and finery, of rings, or chains, or jewels, lately belonging to other people.
'But when I try to search the past, to get a sense of what befell me ere my own perception formed; to feel back for the lines of childhood, as a trace of gossamer, then I only know that nought lives longer than God wills it.

So may after sin go by, for we are children always, as the Counsellor has told me; so may we, beyond the clouds, seek this infancy of life, and never find its memory.
'But I am talking now of things which never come across me when any work is toward.

It might have been a good thing for me to have had a father to beat these rovings out of me; or a mother to make a home, and teach me how to manage it.

For, being left with none--I think; and nothing ever comes of it.