Humphrey Grainger's Losses by Hesba Stretton

Victoria was fresh from a last minute wedding when her husband died during a sea voyage. She had nowhere to go but to finish the journey to his home. But at home she found that great emotions were bound up in the legal directives of his father's will. The story is about not being angry with providence but only "decide upon what is right, and leave the rest to God!"

Paperback 4X6, 70 pages. ISBN 9781941281321; Pocket Moral Stories.

SARAH SMITH (1832-1911) was born in Wellington, England.  She had the good fortune of being able to read books from her father's bookshop, a printer of evangelical literature. Her mother was a strong evangelical, but died when Sarah was young. In the March 19th, 1859 issue of Household Words, a publication conducted by Charles Dickens, she published her first short story called The Lucky Leg. It is an intriguing story about a man who wanted to marry a woman with a missing leg. It was more secular, but her talent was recognized. Hesba Stretton became her pen name, Stretton coming from the name of a neighboring village, and Hesba coming from the initials of her siblings. H (Hannah or some sources Harriett), E (Elizabeth), S (Sarah), B (Benjamin), and A (Annie).