Ah! dimity-parlours is a thing as may happen to cut both ways, Mrs.Cheeseman." Widow Shanks had good cause to be proud of her cottage, which was the prettiest in Springhaven, and one of the most commodious.

She had fought a hard fight, when her widowhood began, and the children were too young to help her, rather than give up the home of her love-time, and the cradle of her little ones.

Some of her neighbours (who wanted the house) were sadly pained at her stubbornness, and even dishonesty, as they put it, when she knew that she never could pay her rent.

But "never is a long time," according to the proverb; and with the forbearance of the Admiral, the kindness of his daughters, and the growth of her own children, she stood clear of all debt now, except the sweet one of gratitude.
And now she could listen to the moaning of the sea (which used to make her weep all night) with a milder sense of the cruel woe that it had drowned her husband, and a lull of sorrow that was almost hope; until the dark visions of wrecks and corpses melted into sweet dreams of her son upon the waters, finishing his supper, and getting ready for his pipe.

For Harry was making his own track well in the wake of his dear father.
Now if she had gone inland to dwell, from the stroke of her great calamity--as most people told her to make haste and do--not only the sympathy of the sea, but many of the little cares, which are the ants that bury heavy grief, would have been wholly lost to her.