noon
She returned to him , but the fellow had now taken to himself two counsellors , a drunken mate who served under him in the pit , and his own avarice . I am stating mere facts : I may not be believed -- I can not help it -- but three times was I carried backwards and forwards , every transit producing to the sawyer five extra pounds , when , at length , my little head found a resting-place . All these events I have had over and over again from my nurse , and they are most faithfully recorded . Before noon on that memorable morning the chaise-and-four were again at the door , and the veiled and shawl-enveloped lady was lifted in , and the vehicle dashed rapidly through the streets of Reading , in a northerly direction . I pretend not to relate facts of which I have never had an assured knowledge ; I can not state to where that chaise and its desolate occupant proceeded , nor can I give a moving description of feelings that I did not witness . When I afterwards knew that that lady was my mother , I never dared question her upon these points , but , from the strength , the intensity of every good and affectionate feeling that marked her character , I can only conceive , that , if that journey was made in the stupor of weakness and exhaustion , or even in the wanderings of delirium , it must have been , to her , a dispensation of infinite mercy . She deserted her new-born infant -- she flung forth her child from the warmth of her own bosom to the cold , hireling kindness of the stranger .