[AlexBell]

This quote comes from Wives and Daughters, by Elizabeth Gaskell, set in the early 1800s in which there were virtually no social supports. The male speaker, a widower with an adolescent daughter in need of a mother has just proposed marriage to Mrs Fitzpatrick, a widow also with an adolescent daughter who is struggling to survive by running a school.

There! he had done it - whether it was wise or foolish- he had done it! but he was aware that the question as to its wisdom came into his mind the instant that the words were said past recall.

She hid her face in her hands.

"Oh! Mr Gibson," she said; and then, a little to his surprise, and a great deal to her own, she burst into hysterical tears: it was such a wonderful relief to feel that she need not struggle any more for a livelihood.