One grief only
overshadowed the early years of their married life: I mean the fact
that no living children were born to them.
CHAPTER XVII
IN the course of time this sorrow was removed. At the beginning of
the fifth year of her married life Christina was safely delivered of a
boy. This was on the sixth of September, 1835.
Word was immediately sent to old Mr. Pontifex, who received the news
with real pleasure. His son John's wife had borne daughters only,
and he was seriously uneasy lest there should be a failure in the male
line of his descendants. The good news, therefore, was doubly welcome,
and caused as much delight at Elmhurst as dismay in Woburn Square,
Woburn Square, where the John Pontifexes were then living.
Here, indeed, this freak of fortune was felt to be all the more
cruel on account of the impossibility of resenting it openly; but
the delighted grandfather cared nothing for what the John Pontifexes
might feel or not feel; he had wanted a grandson and he had got a
grandson, and this should be enough for everybody; and, now that
Mrs. Theobald had taken to good ways, she might bring him more
grandsons, which would be desirable, for he should not feel safe
with fewer than three.
Pages:
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134