The $30,000 Bequest, and Other Stories

by Mark Twain

  CHAPTER II

  When I was well grown, at last, I was sold and taken away, and I neversaw her again. She was broken-hearted, and so was I, and we cried; butshe comforted me as well as she could, and said we were sent intothis world for a wise and good purpose, and must do our duties withoutrepining, take our life as we might find it, live it for the best goodof others, and never mind about the results; they were not our affair.She said men who did like this would have a noble and beautiful rewardby and by in another world, and although we animals would not go there,to do well and right without reward would give to our brief livesa worthiness and dignity which in itself would be a reward. She hadgathered these things from time to time when she had gone to theSunday-school with the children, and had laid them up in her memory morecarefully than she had done with those other words and phrases; and shehad studied them deeply, for her good and ours. One may see by this thatshe had a wise and thoughtful head, for all there was so much lightnessand vanity in it.

  So we said our farewells, and looked our last upon each other throughour tears; and the last thing she said--keeping it for the last to makeme remember it the better, I think--was, "In memory of me, when thereis a time of danger to another do not think of yourself, think of yourmother, and do as she would do."

  Do you think I could forget that? No.