I heard one woman say to another: 'It is lucky the
child's mother has so much to do; she will have no time to think about her
sorrow, and she will get over it the sooner,' Then it came to me like a
ray of hope, that if I had work to do, I might forget my sorrow too. I
must have work. That very day I begged my mother to let me learn to work.
She was pleased, and sent me to take lessons in sewing, and I followed it
up till I could do all sorts of fine work, and had as much employment as I
could wish. I often heard people say, 'How finely Sabina is getting on!'
But how do you think it was with my spirits? Just as it is with yours now,
Veronica. Oh yes, you needn't look at me so with your great eyes. I know
exactly what you are thinking. You think that my trouble never can have
been equal to yours. People always think that their own sorrows are the
worst. I sat and sewed just as you do--early and late; my work was
perfect; I had no rival. I knew that it was good, and I rejoiced over it
in a half-hearted way; but what good did it do me after all? The thought
that I was a hunchback, was always in my mind. It was like a stream of
troubled water flowing through my heart; it spoiled everything. 'Always
deformed, never like other girls,' I never forgot it for a moment. So it
went on till I was about twenty years old, and then came on the trouble in
my foot, and I was confined to my bed for many months. Oh! how bitterly I
suffered! Was every misfortune to fall on me alone?' I thought. How could
I foresee that this very trouble would turn out to be good fortune for
me?"

"The doctor came to see me constantly; he took as much interest in my case
as if I could have paid him handsomely.

He noticed that I was industrious, that I did not lie idle even when I was
in great pain. It pleased him to find me always with work in my hand. When
at last the acute attack was over, and the doctor told me that this would
be his last visit, he told me also that I was lame for life. At first I
could not walk at