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THE GREAT ADVENTURE 
 
CCPR., 191', BY F. A. STOKES CO. 
 
 The Great Adventure 
 
£)fje Qreat gftiitttture 
 
 BY 
 
 LOUISE POND JEWELL 
 
 NEW YORK 
 FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY 
 
 PUBLISHERS 
 
tV? 
 
 <* 
 
 Copyright, JQII, by 
 Frederick A. Stokes Company 
 
 All rights reserved, including that of translation into foreign 
 languages, including the Scandinavian 
 
 
 September, iqii 
 
 ©CLA300198 
 
jForetoorD 
 
 ^Y^E were sitting before the glowing logs 
 VL/ of a great open fire, my guest and I, 
 enjoying the little week-end visit, while the 
 February winds howled without. Sud- 
 denly she shivered involuntarily, and said, 
 with a half -laugh, 
 
 "Someone is walking oyer my grave!" 
 Then she added, in real earnest, "How I 
 hate it! How I dread it — the grave, the 
 earth, the cold, the aloneness! The 
 thought almost drives me wild, sometimes!" 
 
 "But it won't be you" I philosophized 
 lamely. 
 
 "Oh, I know all there is to be said," she 
 shook me off, "but I can't get away from 
 it. The thought always haunts me — that 
 [vii] 
 
fioretoorD 
 
 this warm flesh will be cold and inert, this 
 body, palpitating with life and feeling and 
 emotion, will be put down, alone, in the 
 ground, and the earth heaped upon it! 
 'Dust to dust' — I never forget it completely 
 for a moment. In church I sit and look at 
 the hundreds of faces, glad and sad, proud 
 and humble, haughty and sweet, and pity 
 them all; for I say in my heart, 'You all 
 must die some day, and be buried in the 
 ground!' " 
 
 I looked at her in astonishment; that she, 
 so gay, so cheery, seemingly so thoughtless, 
 should be speaking thus! 
 
 "Do you suppose that many people feel 
 as you do?" I asked. "I shouldn't have 
 suspected that you had ever given a thought 
 to the subject of death. Do others, too, 
 carry this dread in secret, do you think?" 
 
 She reached out for a section of the big 
 Sunday edition of the staid metropolitan 
 newspaper that was lying near. Across 
 
 [viii] 
 
HoretoorD 
 
 one whole page, in great capitals, these 
 words were printed: 
 
 The Haunting Terror of All 
 
 Human Life 
 
 It Is The Dread of Death, Says 
 
 Professor Metchnikoff. 
 
 Shall We Ever 
 
 Escape It? 
 
 "You see," she said, "I am not the only 
 one. Probably most people feel the same 
 way. How, indeed, can they escape it?" 
 
 As she spoke, appealingly, wistfully, my 
 mind flew back to the life of one I knew in 
 former days, who did escape it; who not 
 only had no fear of death, but who, looking 
 forward eagerly at each turning of her life 
 to the coming possibilities, with the confi- 
 dence of one expecting a precious gift, saw 
 in the episode called death the most joyous 
 turning of all. 
 
 [ix] 
 
fiotetoort 
 
 On the assumption that my guest may 
 be right — that there are others, perhaps 
 many, who are troubled and depressed by 
 the fear of what is called the "last great 
 enemy" — this slight sketch is given of the 
 life of one who never knew that fear, in the 
 hope that the story of her gladness may 
 make others less sad. 
 
 W 
 
THE GREAT ADVENTURE 
 
Cft* ©treat Elfoimtture 
 
 &lje tttiio was ilj* If rart 
 
 And Iiingp of «U «mr Uamitts ano our loo**. 
 
 — Wordsworth 
 
 /SSfHE must have had a vivid personality, 
 dx even as a little girl. I remember well 
 the dramatic suspense and expectation that 
 marked her first entrance upon the stage of 
 my acquaintance with her. We had just 
 moved to Detroit; and I, in the manner of 
 childhood of that day (and for aught I 
 know, of this day, too), became informally 
 acquainted with the other boys and girls on 
 the "block" through joining in the games 
 played on sidewalks, and in front door- 
 yards. But I noticed that whenever the 
 finest plans, the nicest games, the greatest 
 "larks," were suggested, they were always 
 [i] 
 
Of>e Great Bfoaenture 
 
 put off with the words, "Oh, we can't do 
 that without Carroll!" or, "Wait till Carroll 
 comes!" or, "When Carroll comes back we'll 
 do — thus and so." I never questioned the 
 finality of this decree. I never asked 
 "Why?" In the dumb and wondering man- 
 ner of childhood, I accepted the ruling as 
 undebatable, and joined in the common- 
 place round of pursuits considered allowable 
 in the absence of this unknown and wonder- 
 ful arbiter of childish destinies. 
 
 For a long time I supposed Carroll to be 
 a boy; and only by chance I found out that 
 she was a girl, and about my own age. 
 Then I built fancies around her; she must 
 be very pretty, very rich, and very much a 
 leader — "bossy," I probably phrased it to 
 myself. When, after what seemed an in- 
 terminable time of almost suspended ani- 
 mation, she finally swooped down gaily 
 upon our stolid little band, my castle of cards 
 suddenly collapsed. I found her a very 
 
 M 
 
C55e Gtreat Btofcenture 
 
 ordinary-looking little girl; not pretty at 
 all, but with a small, eager face, a thin lit- 
 tle figure not over well-dressed, and a man- 
 ner of joyous cameraderie that precluded 
 any possibility of "bossiness" from the start. 
 
 "Is this Carroll?" I asked myself. 
 
 But though I marveled at first, and 
 though I probably never, as a child, ana- 
 lyzed the secret of her leadership, I soon 
 recognized the fact of it, and felt as abso- 
 lutely as did the others that she was the 
 heart and soul of all games worth playing, 
 of all mischief worth venturing on, of all 
 talks that had fun and sparkle in them; in 
 short, that without her we were without 
 what we would have called "the go." She 
 had a quick, glad way and she loved so to 
 do everything, that even Isaac Franz, given 
 by us the cruel sobriquets of "Fatty," and 
 "Dutch," roused himself into some semblance 
 of human childhood, and imagined he was 
 having a good time when he went wheez- 
 
 [3] 
 
C56e ©treat Hmoenture 
 
 ing and puffing through the parts she as- 
 signed him in our games. 
 
 As I look back upon that far-away time, 
 I see in it a prophecy of our later years. 
 I do not remember that Carroll was espe- 
 cially loved by anyone but me. Like sun- 
 shine, she was necessary, she was the very 
 spirit of play, we should have been lost 
 without her; yet, like many leaders, she 
 missed the more personal intimacies and 
 friendships that fell to the lot of less gifted 
 ones and of those less useful to the many. 
 But my own silent admiration for her, and 
 to a certain extent, too, understanding of 
 her, began even then, and continued until 
 — when? Perhaps, in view of her attitude 
 towards life and death, I should say they 
 continue yet. 
 
 M 
 
 c 
 
Qty* r* sat tlj* fcljahom, U&ttb of man. 
 -t-Tennyson 
 
 II 
 
 nER earliest recollection was of living, 
 outside the city limits, in a great, barn- 
 like house, set in the midst of several acres 
 of uncultivated garden; a house of big, 
 scantily furnished rooms and uncanny* si- 
 lent corners; a dreary enough place for a 
 little girl without brothers or sisters to be 
 brought up in. But to Carroll it was al- 
 ways a palace ; and she played blithely about 
 in the empty rooms, and amongst the tan- 
 gle of neglected shrubbery, happily uncon- 
 scious of the fact that through the unprac- 
 tically of a visionary artist father the big 
 ancestral estate had gone to ruin, and, under 
 mortgages and mismanagement, was fast 
 slipping through his ringers. 
 
 [5] 
 
<5&e ©treat Eftroentitre 
 
 To Carroll the place was never sad nor 
 gloomy nor deserted. For her it was peo- 
 pled with "pretend" playmates and friends 
 and fairies, and the grounds with elves and 
 sprites and nymphs. It was not until she 
 was five years old, at the ecstatic time when 
 the little sister arrived, that she realized 
 that her sum of happiness had not always 
 heen complete. Then, for six months, life 
 was so wonderful and so splendid that the 
 "pretend" friends and conipanions of the 
 past sank into oblivion. The tiny new- 
 comer, so fair, so sweet and cuddly, with its 
 real eyes that opened and shut; its little 
 hands that clasped one's finger ; its soft, soft 
 hair, that one might touch lightly with the 
 forefinger — at the same time raising a com- 
 rade's eyes to the mother's face, as if to 
 say, "Don't we think she's sweet?" — the 
 round, rose-leaf cheek; the dear, limp little 
 arms; even the real cry, that desecrated the 
 solemn silences of the respectable old house ; 
 [6] 
 
Of>e Gtreat Bxtoenture 
 
 the actual daily possession of all this seemed 
 to Carroll an experience almost unbeliev- 
 able. Sometimes she got up at night, and 
 stealing softly to the crib in her parents' 
 room stood on tiptoe so as to reach in over 
 the top with caressing hand, and so make 
 sure that the miracle was still there. 
 
 For Carroll, though she had not known 
 it, had been much alone, and life for her now 
 was absolutely transfigured by this experi- 
 ence of a real human love and interest. 
 
 Then came an awful day, the memory of 
 which was a confused blur of fear and name- 
 less dread; of being pushed aside whenever 
 she came near the little group that hung 
 round the baby sister's cradle ; of being told 
 to "run out and play," when she asked one 
 after another, 
 
 "Please tell me what is the matter? 
 Mayn't I please speak to baby sister?" 
 
 That day had held a long pain of waiting 
 about, outside in the shrubbery, in trem- 
 [7] 
 
C56e Gtreat Botienture 
 
 bling fear of she knew not what calamity, 
 and then later — Carroll could never tell 
 me about what happened during the next 
 two days. She saw nothing of the little sis- 
 ter ; her mother sat and wept, and her father 
 tried in vain to comfort her. One room 
 was locked and Carroll was told she must 
 not try to go in; and to her oft-reiterated 
 question, * 'Where is she — won't you please 
 answer just that?" she received only the re- 
 sponse, "Hush — she is dead!" which told 
 her nothing. 
 
 After these two days had passed, the 
 locked door was opened, and many people 
 came to the house and silently entered that 
 darkened room. Carroll, too, was led 
 within by the old family servant, and seated 
 near the door. In the middle of the room, 
 on the marble-topped center table stood a 
 long, narrow little box. The man whom 
 Carroll knew well as the gentleman who did 
 all the talking in the church she was taken 
 
 M 
 
C&e Gfeeat Bttoenture 
 
 to, each Sunday, rose beside the little box, 
 and read from a book that she knew, from 
 his solemn tones, was the Bible; then he 
 talked and prayed, and all sang, and almost 
 everyone cried. 
 
 Then the people went out, first walking 
 past the box in the middle of the room, and 
 looking at it. And then old Elsa, who had 
 Carroll in charge, asked her if she wanted 
 to look, too. Of course she did; and they 
 went up to the box, and Carroll stood on 
 a little hassock so as to be able to reach up 
 far enough, and looked in. 
 
 With a cry of mingled amazement, joy 
 and terror — "Why, here's baby sister!" — 
 she raised her eyes to the face of the serv- 
 ant, then to those of her father and mother ; 
 the situation was inexplicable; the little sis- 
 ter lay before her, but the friends about her 
 wept, and a nameless terror was upon her. 
 
 The events of the rest of the day seemed 
 branded upon the child's heart, and she 
 [9] 
 
G&e Gtreat Sfotoemute 
 
 never, even in her later wholesome and joy- 
 ous view of all things, could speak of them 
 without trembling. No one told her, no 
 one thought of explaining; she was a hor- 
 rified spectator of the pageant that followed : 
 the screwing on of the lid of the box; the 
 drive, in darkened carriage, to a remote gar- 
 den of white "statues"; the halt; the stand- 
 ing, in a keenly cutting snow-storm, before 
 a mound of earth and a deep hole in the 
 ground ; then, before her agonized sight, the 
 lowering of the box into that freshly dug 
 hole — the box in which she knew her treas- 
 ured little sister lay. Childhood often en- 
 dures its tragedies in a silence as profound, 
 through ignorance and inarticulateness, as 
 is that of mature years through stoicism, 
 philosophy, or religion. 
 
 But when the sad little company returned 
 home, Carroll's lips were loosed. 
 
 "I want my baby sister! I want her!" 
 she wailed. 
 
 [10] 
 
©fie Gtteat Bmientute 
 
 Then the mother turned for the first time 
 to attend the child that was left her. She 
 took Carroll in her arms and offered to 
 comfort : 
 
 "Baby's soul is with God, Carroll," she 
 said, between her own tears, "and if we — " 
 
 "I don't care anything about her soul — " 
 interrupted the child, tempestuously. "I 
 want to see her!" 
 
 "Oh, hush, hush, Carroll, you mustn't 
 talk that way! You ought to be very 
 thankful that God is taking care of our 
 precious little one's soul for us, and that she 
 will not have to go through all the suffer- 
 ing and trouble of this life!" 
 
 "Then why are you crying, mother, if you 
 are glad? Oh," she sobbed, repudiating ar- 
 gument, "I don't want to talk about it! I 
 just want her!" 
 
 No one happened to think that the word 
 "soul" was a new one to the little girl; chil- 
 dren ask a thousand trivial questions, but 
 [HI 
 
C5&e 6(teat Bfotienture 
 
 often ponder in strange silence over the 
 difficulties that sometimes a word might 
 clear away — and sometimes a philosopher be 
 powerless to remove. 
 
 [12] 
 
A lonrlQ apparition arttt 
 
 do bt a monmti'a ornament. — Wordsworth 
 
 III 
 
 HROM the day of her sister's death, 
 Carroll lived in a darkened world. 
 The fairies no more danced in the motes and 
 sunbeams, the "pretend" playfellows no 
 longer beguiled her hours; she walked around 
 the garden quite alone, and even the bird- 
 notes of the returning spring sounded sad 
 and pitiful. As has been the experience of 
 many an older person, the blessing that had 
 come for awhile into her life had revealed 
 a need she had not known existed; and, de- 
 parting, had left a void not to be filled by 
 occupations and joys that had formerly 
 been absolutely satisfying. The little girl 
 was very lonely. 
 
 [is] 
 
Gfce Gfteat BDtjenture 
 
 One day a new interest came into her 
 life. As she walked up and down the 
 length of the long picket fence at the front 
 of the dreary old garden, peeping through 
 at the rare passers-by in the outside world, 
 a vision of beauty dawned upon her sight. 
 A little girl, not much older than herself, 
 was mincing along the sidewalk in the di- 
 rection of the town. She was a very prim 
 little girl, in stiff, starched skirts that stood 
 out proudly and rattled as she walked. 
 She wore patent-leather slippers with toes 
 turned correctly outward, she carried a lit- 
 tle purse of great distinction in her hand. 
 But more than all this, she was a child of 
 charm and elegance. She had a haughty 
 little face, with brown, unsmiling eyes, a 
 scarlet mouth that seemed to Carroll so 
 sweet that she would like to kiss it, and, 
 best of all, long auburn curls, reaching 
 nearly to her waist. Surmounting this 
 wondrous hair was a hat of many ribbon 
 
 [14] 
 
<5&e Gfteat Botoenture 
 
 bows, and above that a dainty little sun- 
 shade, carried at the prettiest conceivable 
 angle. Carroll, conscious of her own plain 
 little face, her short-cropped hair, her ging- 
 ham pinafore, her high black boots with 
 "copper" toes, beheld this embodiment of 
 grace and beauty with childish rapture, 
 tinged with awe. 
 
 Not presuming to address a being so su- 
 perior, she contented herself with walking 
 along on her own side of the fence, like a 
 little sheep, keeping pace with the beautiful 
 child without, who vouchsafed to her never 
 a glance. All too soon the long stretch of 
 fence was passed by the auburn-haired one, 
 who went intrepidly on her way, apparently 
 unconscious of the almost reverent regard 
 which from within the dilapidated garden 
 accompanied her progress. Carroll, with 
 small face pressed between the unyield- 
 ing pickets, followed her with adoring eyes 
 as long as she could, then desperately 
 
 [15] 
 
<5&e Gfreat HDtoentute 
 
 climbed one of the square gate-posts, and 
 there, perched at a dangerous height, caught 
 another last blissful glimpse of the vanish- 
 ing loveliness. 
 
 Then she descended, and for the rest of 
 the day she dreamed. It is easier to "pre- 
 tend" about a lovely vision of flesh and blood 
 than about fairies and elves, that one knows 
 all the time do not really exist at all. "My 
 little new friend," she called the child with 
 curls to herself, made bold, by distance, to 
 the delicious point of familiarity. All that 
 day they played together in her fancy. 
 Sometimes the little stranger was a princess, 
 sometimes only a very, very rich heiress; 
 but she was always real and human, not a 
 fairy-tale personage, though always far 
 above Carroll, who even in play would not 
 presume to consider herself the equal of so 
 much elegance. 
 
 The next day a great thing happened; in 
 fact, the very same thing that had happened 
 [16] 
 
C5fie Gfteat Sfotienture 
 
 the day before! Once more the strange 
 child walked by, and once more Carroll ac- 
 companied her, on her side of the fence, in 
 silent, worshipful admiration. Once more, 
 at the last, she mounted the gate-post, and 
 looked long after the retreating figure, un- 
 til it disappeared. 
 
 That day a determination came to her 
 that made her catch her breath because of its 
 sheer audacity. "If she comes to-morrow 
 I will speak to her!" she said to herself. 
 
 But it seemed such a tremendous step to 
 take, that secretly she wondered if her cour- 
 age would be equal to the deed when the 
 crucial moment should arrive. 
 
 The morning came. Carroll perched 
 herself on watch an hour before the time — 
 and no little girl came! It was a heavy 
 disappointment, and the day was a blank. 
 But, on the day following, her heart was 
 once more set a-flutter by the approach of 
 the auburn curls, the furbelowed hat, the 
 [17] 
 
O&e ©treat BDtientute 
 
 fashionable parasol, the pretty face, the stiff 
 little skirts, the outward-pointed patent- 
 leather toes. 
 
 Primed almost to suffocation with her 
 great resolve, Carroll kept pace with the lit- 
 tle stranger almost to the end of the fence. 
 Then, blushing a furious red, she gathered 
 together all her courage, and said shyly, in 
 a soft little voice that could Jscarcely be 
 heard, for its trembling, P 
 
 "Little girl, what is your name?" 
 
 The wonderful one turned towards her, 
 and replied, without an instant's hesitation, 
 
 "Mind your own business!" — instantly 
 following up this piece of advice by the 
 proffer, as far as it would reach, towards 
 the child behind the fence, of a very red, 
 narrow little tongue. 
 
 Thus, summarily, ended the great ro- 
 mance. It is unnecessary to describe Car- 
 roll's emotions. Only those who retain a 
 vivid memory of some personal childish 
 
 [18] 
 
C5&e Gtteat HDtientute 
 
 tragedy can picture the shock of such a 
 wounding, the grief, the disillusionment. 
 No grown-up sorrow could be keener, while 
 it lasted, and all the timid, glorious half- 
 dreams of having a "real little friend" fell 
 then and there to earth. 
 
 m 
 
Htfo an uttbotori* jug mfyoBt ran* is faat fontm. 
 
 — Shelley 
 
 IV 
 
 ^^T^ WISH I could have someone to 
 ^*^ play with to keep," she confided, 
 not long after this, to a gay young uncle 
 who was visiting for a few days at the big, 
 gloomy house. "I almost had a very nice 
 little girl for a friend — an almost very nice 
 little girl, only she stuck out her tongue, 
 and mother says it is vulgar to stick out your 
 tongue; and I did love my baby sister, and 
 she was almost big enough to play with me, 
 only she couldn't because her dress was too 
 long; but they put her in the ground and 
 covered the box all up, and she is there 
 now ; and sometimes it rains." 
 
 "But her soul isn't there in the ground," 
 comforted the gay young uncle. 
 
 [20] 
 
C5&e Gtteat Bfotiemute 
 
 Again that word! It seemed that every- 
 one must always mock her with this empty, 
 meaningless mummery. This time Car- 
 roll's rebellion was put into forcible words. 
 
 "Do you know, uncle Asaph," she said, 
 very slowly and distinctly, so that he surely 
 could not misunderstand her, "I don't care 
 a speck about her soul — not a speck ! What 
 I care about is, my baby sister is out there 
 all alone in the cemet'ry!" 
 
 The young uncle gazed steadily at the 
 earnest little face, and wondered what an- 
 swer to make. Wisely, he made none at all, 
 at the time. The next day he spent the 
 morning wandering about the grounds, and 
 at noon brought back to the house a small 
 tree branch, with a queer brown growth at- 
 tached to it. After dinner he gave Carroll 
 a long explanation about the cocoon, and 
 when he felt sure she understood, passed the 
 trophy over into her hands. He did not 
 need to extract a promise that she would 
 
 [21] 
 
©6c ©treat Bfotienture 
 
 keep watch for the transformation. He 
 suggested no parallels, drew no moral les- 
 son, but waited for Nature's miracle to do 
 its own work, in its own way. v 
 
 In the days that followed, Carroll kept 
 such vigilant guard over her mysterious 
 treasure — running every few minutes from 
 her play to see if anything had "happened"; 
 observing it the last thing at night, and pat- 
 tering down stairs to the room in which it 
 was kept when she first sprang out of bed 
 in the morning, though the old servant pro- 
 tested against her bare-footed trips, and 
 prophesied her taking her "death of cold" — - 
 that she was actually on the spot when the 
 moth finally appeared. Glowing with ex- 
 citement, she called Elsa, who alone hap- 
 pened to be in the house at the time, to view 
 the wonder with her; and together they 
 watched, the old woman and the little child, 
 equally astonished and delighted. 
 
 "It's good the other worms don't know 
 what's going to happen to them, isn't it, 
 [22] 
 
<5&e ©treat Eftitienttite 
 
 Carroll? Else they'd be so impatient for 
 flying, it would be hard for 'em to wait," 
 philosophized the old woman, as they 
 watched, breathless. 
 
 "Oh, I don't think so, Elsa," replied the 
 child; "I hope they do know beforehand, 
 for then it must be such fun to wait! It 
 would make worm-hood so much more nicer, 
 if they knew they were going to have air- 
 hood afterwards!" 
 
 Elsa shook her head, unconvinced; and 
 then they both gave a gasp of tremulous 
 wonder and satisfaction, as the winged crea- 
 ture, at last sufficiently metamorphosed to 
 venture forth, flew gently a short distance 
 and waveringly alighted on a veranda rail 
 near by. 
 
 Carroll's expression changed; she turned 
 deepened eyes to the withered face above 
 her. 
 
 "Elsa," she said, in a low, awed voice, "do 
 you s'pose that is its soul?" 
 
 [23] 
 
Attii by tip ttfeimt Bplntbiii 
 
 3ta Dtt Up mag aitntteii.— Wordsworth 
 
 -CVROM this time on she ceased to accom- 
 -*-A pany her mother on her weekly trips to 
 the little grave, which before had held for 
 her a mingled fascination and terror. Upon 
 being pressed for the reason for this change 
 of inclination, she would only answer: 
 
 "I don't want to put flowers on an empty 
 box." 
 
 How literally and materialistically she 
 translated her butterfly lesson into what had 
 happened to her little sister, she could never 
 be quite sure herself when she was older. 
 But of one thing it was evident she was ut- 
 terly convinced. What she loved was not 
 there, under the ground ; and if, to her child- 
 ish idea, the physical body itself had taken 
 
 [24] 
 
G&e 6(reat Bnuentute 
 
 wings and flown away, what matter? Her 
 joyous belief in life, continuous, expanding, 
 radiant, never again left her. 
 
 With this idea, too, her old resourceful- 
 ness and gayety returned. She found pleas- 
 ure in every circumstance and detail of life. 
 She walked about the large grounds in 
 pleasant weather, and around the house on 
 rainy days, talking softly to herself, seem- 
 ing never lonely nor at a loss for occupation. 
 One stormy Sunday her father, seeking her 
 in every probable and improbable spot, 
 found her at last in a remote room, sitting 
 astride a rocking chair, facing its back, 
 rocking furiously and talking away to her- 
 self, cheerfully unconscious of an encroach- 
 ing presence. 
 
 "What in the world are you doing, Car- 
 roll?" he asked, in some disapprobation. 
 
 "Oh, having fun," was her instant and 
 hearty rejoinder. 
 
 In fact, "having fun" seemed the key- 
 
 [25] 
 
Gfie Great Efotoentute 
 
 note of her life. The little tasks which 
 were given her now, gradually, to perform, 
 were transformed through the alchemy of 
 her happy spirit into games, and her play- 
 times never lost their zest. 
 
 [26] 
 
3Jrl| katm uirtjt attium— Luther 
 
 VI 
 
 pT SEVERE test of Carroll's new-found 
 3— I. philosophy came two years after the 
 loss of her little sister. Her mother, always 
 an invalid, died while on a trip to the south 
 in search of health. As to what the child's 
 thoughts were, and how she bore this new 
 bereavement, she gave no sign. This was 
 partly due, doubtless, to the fact that her 
 aunt, her father's maiden sister, who was 
 her guardian and only companion at this 
 time, was a devoted adherent of conven- 
 tional Calvinism; and, far from encourag- 
 ing confidences from her small niece, would 
 not have conceded any right, on the part of 
 one so young, of having individual ideas or 
 even feelings on such an occasion except the 
 [27] 
 
C5f>e ©(teat BDtientute 
 
 scrupulously orthodox ones of filial grief 
 and pious resignation. 
 
 It was to this disciple of ritualism that 
 the future well-being of the little girl was 
 consigned, on the return of her father from 
 the south; for Miss Sophia Page, being free 
 from other ties, then took up her post per- 
 manently as house-keeper and home-maker 
 in her brother's family. At the same time, 
 an oddly advantageous offer of purchase 
 being made for the ramshackle old house and 
 its dejected acres, a removal to the city was 
 decided upon, and Carroll's life was set to 
 new music. 
 
 Her mother had been one of those women 
 who live for their husbands only, and to 
 whom their children are a very secondary 
 consideration; so that, in spite of the con- 
 trast between her gentle personality and the 
 more silent and austere one of her sister-in- 
 law, there could not have been for little Car- 
 roll the heart-breaking sense of mother-loss 
 
 [28] 
 
B&e Great Efotientute 
 
 that comes to some children at such a time. 
 And though she had been happy in the 
 great, empty place in the country, she soon 
 became happier still in the small, plain quar- 
 ters in the city street ; for here, for the first 
 time, she found herself in the midst of a 
 life teeming with human interest, and de- 
 lightedly acquiring new playmates and 
 friends. 
 
 There were trials, of course; what child's 
 life does not abound in them? One of these, 
 upon her entering the public school, lay in 
 the rather erratic name her parents had 
 given her, with never a thought, parent- 
 wise, of the childish embarrassments which 
 are the school-world penalty for anything 
 that smacks of the unusual. 
 
 "Carroll — " repeated the teacher; "how 
 do you spell it— 'C-a-r-o-1'?" 
 
 The child spelt the name correctly. 
 
 "You must be mistaken," was the teach- 
 er's verdict. " 'Carroll' is a boy's name. 
 [29] 
 
C5&e Qteat Bfotoenture 
 
 Your name is probably Caroline, and they 
 call you 'Carol,' for short." 
 
 ''No, ma'am, it isn't," persisted the little 
 girl, stoutly, but blushing painfully at being 
 thus made conspicuous before the whole 
 class. "I know my name is 'Carroll.' " 
 
 "You may take a demerit for contradict- 
 ing your teacher, and you may go home at 
 once and get your mother to write your name 
 on a card for me." 
 
 "I can't," said Carroll, scarcely above a 
 whisper. 
 
 " You can't ! Well, I'd like to know why 
 not, when I tell you to!" 
 
 "Because she can't — not now." 
 
 "She can't! You don't mean to tell me 
 your mother can't write, do you?" Scath- 
 ing tones indicated the teacher's profound 
 disgust for any luckless child that would 
 have to answer such a question in the af- 
 firmative. 
 
 Carroll looked interested and perplexed; 
 
 [30] 
 
C56e Gxm Btnientute 
 
 for a moment she forgot the forty pairs of 
 eyes that had been making her inquisition so 
 painful. 
 
 "I don't know whether they can write or 
 not," she said, thoughtfully. "Butterflies 
 can't; but then the worm couldn't, either." 
 
 "I wonder if you are a half-wit! You 
 may take your seat, and stay after school!" 
 cried the exasperated teacher. 
 
 Hot with embarrassment again, Carroll 
 obeyed her. The facts as to her name, and 
 the misunderstanding about her mother 
 were cleared up satisfactorily; but it was 
 an unfortunate and trying entrance upon 
 school lif e. For weeks the little girl had to 
 endure the appellations "half-wit," and 
 "Mister Carroll" — trials the depth of which 
 a grown-up can scarcely imagine — and only 
 her own sunny nature and merry disposition 
 kept them from becoming permanently 
 fixed. 
 
 School life, in fact, throughout its whole 
 
 [31] 
 
G&e Gtreat HDtoentute 
 
 course, was anything but a primrose path 
 to Carroll, and most of her troubles came 
 from her ignorance of the gentle art of dis- 
 sembling. The principal of the school was 
 fond of coming into the class-room, and 
 propounding some problem for the children 
 to work out "in their heads," then, in the 
 absence of any response from them — for his 
 questions were invariably beyond their depth 
 — he would give the solution and the correct 
 answer himself, with the stereotyped query, 
 as he turned to go: "Is there anyone who 
 does not understand?" Forty frightened 
 little pieces of humanity would maintain a 
 relieved and intelligent-looking silence, only 
 too glad to be let off from questioning ; but, 
 regularly, up would go Carroll Page's hand, 
 though her face, flushed with shame and 
 self-condemnation, showed anything but 
 bravado. 
 
 This came to be such an invariable occur- 
 rence that the principal inquired privately 
 
 [32] 
 
<3&e Gtreat BDtientute 
 
 into Carroll's class record, and was almost 
 incredulous when he found that she ranked 
 among the highest. 
 
 "She must be extremely slow — abnormally 
 so, then," he concluded. "She is the only 
 one who never understands my explana- 
 tions." 
 
 The teacher finally went to the length of 
 suggesting to the delinquent the propriety 
 of preserving a politic silence at these times. 
 
 "Your raising your hand annoys Mr. 
 Smythe," she explained. But the little 
 girl's answer showed her the futility of pre- 
 senting the argument of expediency to a 
 nature so downright and uncompromising. 
 
 "Why, I'll try to understand, Miss Win- 
 ter; I'll try hard; but if I can't, I just s'pose 
 I can't; and then of course I'll have to say 
 so, when he asks, even if it kills me — and 
 Mr. Smythe, too— won't I?" 
 
 [33] 
 
By ttytit tonrka.— St. James 
 
 VII 
 
 ON Carroll's vigorous conviction of the 
 unalterableness of truth was doubtless 
 reflected something of her aunt's Puritan 
 training. But she showed, over and over 
 again, even in those early days, that, what- 
 ever the principles that governed her, she 
 adopted them only when they met the ap- 
 proval of her own reason. 
 
 A conversation illustrative of this oc- 
 curred one day when Carroll was sitting in 
 her little rocking chair by her aunt's side, 
 sewing on her daily half -hour "stint," down 
 the middle of a sheet; an "over-and-over" 
 piece of work, showing stitches of varying 
 sizes, and marked here and there by little 
 rusty-looking blood-stains that blazed the 
 painful trail to housewifely perfection. 
 
 "Aunt Sophy," said Carroll, suddenly, 
 
 [34] 
 
G&e ©treat HDtiemure 
 
 without preface or warning, as she rocked 
 back and forth in her matter-of-fact little 
 way, "did you know I'm an unbeliever?" 
 
 Aunt Sophy jumped. 
 
 "What did you say?" she asked, nerv- 
 ously. Her niece often made speeches call- 
 ing for a mental alertness in which the aunt 
 felt herself lacking. 
 
 "Did you know I'm an atheist?" repeated 
 Carroll, calmly, biting off her thread and 
 making a knot and speaking in the casual 
 manner of one who might have asked, "Did 
 you know the Sanborns had soup for din- 
 ner?" 
 
 "What do you mean, child?" asked her 
 aunt. "Why do you think you're an — 
 atheist?" She hesitated over the word; it 
 was too nearly a "scriptural" word to be 
 spoken lightly. 
 
 "Because I don't believe in Hell and the 
 Devil," replied the little girl, cheerfully, as 
 if that ended the matter. 
 
 [35] 
 
CDlje ©[teat Btrtnemure 
 
 Miss Page was aghast; more, it must be 
 admitted, by the avowal of disbelief in the 
 orthodox place of torment and its perma- 
 nent resident, than by the astounding con- 
 clusion the child drew from this disbelief, 
 and its implied commentary on what she 
 had been taught. 
 
 "Hadn't you better talk with the minister 
 about it?" she asked, helplessly, after a mo- 
 ment's pause. 
 
 "No," was the sober response, while Car- 
 roll still rocked and sewed; "he seems so 
 happy the way he is that I think it would be 
 a pity to 'sturb him." 
 
 Aunt Sophy fell silent, from pure ina- 
 bility to cope with the situation. But she 
 talked with her brother about the matter, 
 later in the day, and begged him to reason 
 with the child, and try to get her out of so 
 dreadful a state of sin. Fortunately, Car- 
 roll's father approached the question from a 
 different angle. 
 
 [36] 
 
<5&e Gtteat Bfotoenture 
 
 "Carroll," he said to his little daughter, 
 gravely, after supper that evening, "a man 
 who does not believe in Hell and the Devil 
 is not called an atheist." 
 
 "Isn't he? What is he called?" asked 
 Carroll, simply. 
 
 Her father, puzzled, hesitated; any an- 
 swer he might make seemed open to the 
 child's objections. He compromised: 
 
 "An atheist is a man who does not believe 
 in God." 
 
 Carroll's eyes grew wide with dissent. 
 
 "Why, father, I've heard you call Mr. 
 Warden an atheist, and I know he believes 
 in God!" 
 
 "What makes you think that?" 
 
 Mr. Warden was one whom Carroll's 
 father would have called a "moral man." 
 
 "Why, because he is so nice," said the lit- 
 tle girl, confidently. "When those rowdy 
 boys over on the Avenue were just 'busing 
 that little yellow lost dog that you called a 
 [»7] 
 
C5&e Gtteat Hotientute 
 
 cur — you remember that little dog, don't 
 you, father? You wouldn't let me keep 
 him? — Mr. Warden drove them off, just as 
 stern, and was so gentle to the little cur ; and 
 he had the Cruelty Society come and get 
 that poor old lame cat with one eye that was 
 so mis'able; and he always unchecks his 
 horse when he goes in a store ; I've seen him ; 
 and—" 
 
 "But what has all that to do with his be- 
 lieving in God?" interrupted her father, a 
 trifle impatiently, seeing no end in prospect 
 to the narrative so earnestly recited. 
 
 "Why — why — why — " began Carroll, 
 puzzled in turn. "Of course he believes in 
 God if he — why, don't you see it, father?" 
 
 She looked up into his face anxiously, sure 
 her idea was right, yet finding it hard to 
 reduce to argument. He gave her no help ; 
 probably he was incapable of it, for his mind 
 had seldom wandered out of the safe fold 
 of creed and dogma; and the matter was 
 dropped. 
 
 [38] 
 
©If Iff* ttttl* mart, nnh Jjow murlj it t0 1 
 An& % Itltlr lr0s, mt& mtjat ttrorlfcii tttmtg! 
 — Browniko 
 
 VIII 
 
 XT was in this same year, when Carroll 
 was nine, that she made her wonderful, 
 and to her, original, discovery about love. 
 
 She came to her aunt one day with her 
 eyes deep and glowing. 
 
 "Why, Aunt Sophy," she exclaimed, "if 
 everybody loved each other there wouldn't 
 have to be any prisons, would there?" 
 
 "Oh, yes," argued her aunt, whose mental 
 processes were slow, "it would be necessary 
 to punish the offenders even if we loved 
 them — as I punish you when you do wrong, 
 for your own good." 
 
 "But if they loved each other those per- 
 sons wouldn't have done wrong!" urged the 
 little girl. "You see, they would have loved 
 the other people, and wouldn't have stolen 
 [891 
 
G&e ©treat Bttoenture 
 
 anything or killed anybody. And there 
 wouldn't have to be any policemen," she 
 went on, following up the subject, "because 
 nobody would do anything to be arrested 
 for ; and there wouldn't have to be any laws, 
 because every one would be nice to every one 
 else, without laws; and there wouldn't be 
 any hungry people, because the rich people 
 would love them so much they'd have them 
 at their houses ; and they wouldn't be cold in 
 winter — why, they wouldn't be poor at all, 
 because everybody would go halves. What 
 a little, little thing would make all the dif- 
 ference, wouldn't it, Aunt Sophy — just to 
 love everybody! Wouldn't it be fun?" 
 
 It was a new thought to Miss Page. It 
 is an old thought to most of us. Since then 
 many books have been written on the sub- 
 ject, and an eminent Scotchman has called 
 it the "greatest thing in the world." But 
 to Carroll, at nine years, the beautiful ideal 
 came as one out of a clear sky. 
 
 [40] 
 
IX 
 
 ONE of Carroll's "naughty ways" that 
 her Aunt Sophia could never quite for- 
 give, even when she had been reluctantly 
 won over to regard leniently much that to 
 her was inexplicable if not irreligious, was 
 her manner of conducting herself during the 
 formal "pastoral calls" that were made, 
 three or four times a year, by the punctil- 
 ious, old-school minister. 
 
 These calls were all very much alike, hav- 
 ing an order of procedure as unvarying as 
 that of the public worship in church on the 
 first day of the week. The minister would 
 be escorted into the seldom-used and chilly 
 "front parlor," chilly at all seasons of the 
 year, by reason of its air of speechless indig- 
 nation at the liberty being taken in using it 
 
 [41] 
 
<3&e Gtreat HDtienture 
 
 at all. He would be carefully seated in the 
 one rocking chair which the room boasted; 
 and then, with his hostess opposite him and 
 the rest of the family — if family there were 
 — in respectful and attentive attitudes near 
 by, there would be introduced topics of semi- 
 religious conversation, such as the numbers 
 "out" at church, on recent Sunday evenings, 
 the amount of collections "taken up," the 
 dates and importance of various missionary 
 or other religious meetings to be held in the 
 near future, the success or inadequacy of the 
 efforts of the "Ladies' Society," and kindred 
 subjects of impersonal nature and languid 
 interest. At a certain proper point in the in- 
 terview the minister, clearing his throat, 
 would say, after an appropriate and sugges- 
 tive pause, "Let us pray!" and all present 
 would kneel by their chairs. After a prayer 
 similar in character to the one which Carroll 
 called "the flfteener," on Sunday (having 
 repeatedly and accurately timed it by peep- 
 
 [42] 
 
C5&e Gtteat Efttoenture 
 
 ing through her fingers at the big clock at the 
 back of the church) , they would rise, a little 
 general sigh and a pushing back of chairs 
 would indicate that this duty was fulfilled 
 and that the ordinary routine of life would 
 now proceed, the minister would shake 
 hands with every one, and take his depart- 
 ure. 
 
 Carroll had, almost from infancy, shown 
 a preference for conversation with men, pos- 
 sibly because she found greater freedom 
 with them for expressing her ideas; they 
 were not quite as sure to turn aside her ques- 
 tions as foolish and her opinions as "unlady- 
 like," as were the women who belonged to 
 her circle of acquaintance. So, whenever 
 the minister called, she took great pains to 
 be present, and always managed to "get into 
 the conversation," as she expressed it, by 
 asking questions, and often by introducing 
 the discussion of such trivial matters as made 
 her aunt turn cold with horror. But, in- 
 
 [43] 
 
Gfte Gtreat Btwentute 
 
 stinctively perceiving the approach of the 
 moment for the prayer, Carroll invariably 
 had some reason for leaving the room just 
 in time to escape the premonitory pause and 
 the invocation; though, just as invariably 
 she was found at the gate, on the pastor's 
 departure, smilingly ready with a cordial 
 little hand in farewell. 
 
 After one of these occasions Miss Page 
 ventured to overstep the embarrassed reti- 
 cence in such matters that was a part of her 
 nature, and asked Carroll tactfully if she 
 had noticed that it always happened that she 
 left the room before the minister's prayer. 
 
 "Oh, it doesn't happen" replied Carroll, 
 without hesitation. "I go on purpose." 
 
 "Why do you do such a thing as that, 
 child?" 
 
 "Oh, I don't know; I hate it — and I bet 
 God hates it, too !" 
 
 "Why, Carroll Page, what a dreadful 
 thing to say ! The idea of God's hating the 
 
 [44] 
 
(5&e Great Bbbenttire 
 
 minister's prayers! What makes you say 
 that?" 
 
 Carroll looked puzzled, as she often did 
 when asked to give her entirely unformu- 
 lated reasons. It seemed to her that grown 
 people had a peculiar propensity for de- 
 manding explanations of some of the sim- 
 plest and most obvious things. Her answer 
 this time came slowly and with hesitation. 
 
 "Oh, I can't say, really, Aunt Sophy; but 
 I should think that God was too busy to pay 
 real good 'tention to all those call-prayers, 
 every day. They're so much alike, that I 
 shouldn't think they'd be very interesting to 
 Him, yet I s'pose He is too polite not to 
 listen — so I'll bet He hates it." 
 
 Her vague feeling about this whole mat- 
 ter was something which, young though she 
 was, she felt it impossible to put into words ; 
 and even in later life, when she was so frank 
 and ready to speak about almost all deep 
 things of experience, she maintained a pe- 
 
 [45] 
 
CD&s 6toat BDtientute 
 
 culiar silence on the subject of prayer. It 
 was only by some word or expression 
 dropped by chance now and then that I came 
 to understand her feeling that prayer, com- 
 munion between one's most real and inmost 
 self and the great universal Source and 
 Father, could seldom be voiced at all in the 
 presence of others, and never as a set and 
 formal functioning. 
 
 [46] 
 
" 2% rnuntlwfi goli of a ntrrra ^rart." 
 
 X 
 
 XN" those first days of our acquaintance 
 in Detroit, her undaunted spirit of 
 cheerfulness was a constantly recurring sur- 
 prise to me. There was never such a girl as 
 she for "having fun," and she entered into 
 all our play with such heart and soul that, as 
 I have said, nothing seemed to go on well 
 without her. Yet her love of "good times" 
 never seemed to make her even childishly 
 intolerant of the little duties that were in- 
 creasingly laid upon her as time went on. 
 
 I remember going one afternoon, in great 
 excitement, to get her to come and try some 
 new roller-skates that Eunice Sanborn had 
 just acquired, and that each one of us on 
 "our block" was trying, in turn, with timor- 
 ous delight. I found Carroll busy in the 
 [47] 
 
G&e Great Efotienture 
 
 wood-shed, piling up, stick by stick, against 
 a long wall, two cords of stove wood to be 
 used for the kitchen fire during the winter. 
 My friend heard the news of the wonderful 
 skates with the most satisfying enthusiasm, 
 and then went on methodically with her 
 work. 
 
 "Isn't that splendid!" she said. "Won't 
 it be too much fun for anything to use them ! 
 I guess I'll be ready by to-morrow, and then 
 won't you die of laughing to see me fall all 
 over the sidewalk and gutter, after you've 
 all learned how!" And she laughed gaily 
 herself, and returned to her piling. 
 
 "Oh, can't you come a little while to-day?" 
 I cried, in disappointment. 
 
 "Nope," was the uncompromising but 
 cheerful answer. "I've got to finish this 
 first." 
 
 "Don't you suppose your aunt would let 
 you off a little while, just this once?" I 
 pleaded. "You could do the rest of it to- 
 morrow. Why don't you ask her?" 
 
 [48] 
 
C5&e Gtreat Efttoentute 
 
 "Oh, it isn't Aunt Sophy; she wouldn't 
 care when I do it. But it's got to be done 
 sometime, and — it's so much more fun to 
 think of play when you're working, than to 
 think of work when you're playing!" 
 
 "Well, I think it's mean and hateful," 
 was my view of the situation. "Aren't you 
 mad that you've got to do the old work at 
 all, Carroll?" 
 
 "Why, no," she replied, standing up and 
 regarding me with her "thoughtful" look. 
 "I won't mind it a particle, really, Theo- 
 dora, now that you have told me about the 
 skates." 
 
 "But doesn't your back ache, stooping 
 down, and standing up all the time?" I 
 asked, transferring my attention to the de- 
 tails of the work. 
 
 It was a kind of labor to which I was not 
 accustomed. In my family there were men 
 and boys to do such "chores." 
 
 Carroll straightened herself and stretched 
 her arms. 
 
 [49] 
 
G&e Gtreat HDtienture 
 
 "A little," she admitted, "if you weren't 
 too busy doing it to think about it!" 
 
 "I hate work, anyhow!" I exclaimed, 
 starting to go, and possibly relieving my 
 twinges of conscience for not stopping to 
 help my friend with this statement of indi- 
 vidual eccentricity. 
 
 "I don't," said Carroll; "at least, not 
 much ; at least, I may hate the working part 
 of work, but when there's fun to think 
 about, you don't have any time to spare 
 for hating. Of course," she added, anxious 
 to agree with me as far as she could, "it 
 would be horrid if it weren't for that!" 
 
 [50] 
 
©tine • , . «. in wfrjrif tfje mmUt 
 Anil all Ijf r train msrt Ijurl'h. 
 
 — Henry Vaughan 
 
 XI 
 
 CERTAIN day, in that same first 
 year of our acquaintance, was one 
 of those dates periodically designated by 
 various religious sects as the time appointed 
 for the "end of the world." 
 
 We children heard our parents talking 
 about it, most of them with outward skep- 
 ticism, but, to the finely attuned ear of child- 
 hood, with a concealed note of awe and un- 
 acknowledged half -dread. We all made 
 light of the matter when we discussed it on 
 our corner, early in the afternoon; but, as 
 sunset approached, the sky took on a 
 strange, lurid appearance, ominous murky 
 clouds were rolled up from the east; and 
 
 [51] 
 
C56e ©teat Efttoenttite 
 
 the sun, a great crimson globe of fire, behind 
 a screen of vapor, seemed to hold within it- 
 self a fearful menace of impending doom 
 and desolation. 
 
 People came running out of their houses 
 to look, and our corner became the gather- 
 ing place for the families who lived near by 
 on the adjoining block. I remember still 
 the vague alarm in most of the faces; and 
 even the fathers, those usual strongholds of 
 confidence and comfort, gazed not without 
 uneasiness at the portent. I felt a gentle 
 nudge at my elbow, and found Carroll Page, 
 tip-toeing up to look, at my side. 
 
 "Isn't it awful?" said I. 
 
 "Isn't it fun?" said Carroll. 
 
 "Aren't you scared?" I whispered. 
 "What if it is going to be the end of the 
 world!" 
 
 "Oh, I hope it is!" she exclaimed, jubi- 
 lantly. "Wouldn't it be just too splendid, 
 if God had put off the end of the world all 
 
 [52] 
 
<5&e Gfceat Eftftenture 
 
 this time, and then had it exactly when you 
 and I happened to be here?" 
 
 I gaped at her, speechless. 
 
 "It would be so much nicer than dying the 
 usual way," explained Carroll — "to be 
 snatched up into those clouds. Just think, 
 maybe in ten minutes we will be! I can 
 hardly realize it, can you?" 
 
 "I thought you loved to live, and had such 
 good times," I objected, reproachfully. 
 
 "Why, I do. That's why I'd like this. 
 'Most everything is interesting, but this 
 would be so dreadfully interesting!" 
 
 I drew away from her and went and stood 
 by my father. At that weird hour it seemed 
 more natural and normal to be awe-struck 
 and afraid, than cheerful and exulting. 
 The end of the world did not come, and I 
 believe only one person in the city of Detroit 
 went disappointed to bed that night. 
 
 [53] 
 
Mi\a atj«ta tjis Ijatth Fyatb last Iff* golh. 
 — George Herbert 
 
 XII 
 
 CARROLL'S attitude towards religious 
 matters was so entirely different from 
 her aunt's that she escaped much of the ar- 
 gument and admonition that that conscien- 
 tious and good woman would have felt she 
 must bestow if she had not been at every at- 
 tempt baffled and mystified by a point of 
 view at once so startling and yet so serious 
 that she found her stock of phrases inappli- 
 cable to the real situation. On the occasion 
 when, after long inner debate and prayer, 
 the aunt approached the niece on the subject 
 which she felt her now at a fitting age to take 
 up, properly consider, and duly act upon, 
 namely, "conversion and joining the church," 
 she was rendered speechless at the outset of 
 
 [54] 
 
C5&e 6(reat Efotienture 
 
 their conversation, not by a "hardened state 
 of sin," which she would have had plenty of 
 arguments to cope with, but by an attitude 
 of mind wholly novel and unprepared for, 
 
 "Carroll," she had said, very seriously, 
 "have you ever talked to the minister about 
 the state of your soul?" 
 
 "No, Aunt Sophy." 
 
 "Don't you think it's about time for you 
 to be interested in it?" 
 
 "Why, I don't know as I do, dear. Don't 
 you think it is terribly selfish to be so inter- 
 ested in one's own soul?" 
 
 Selfish! Miss Page, trying to think of 
 an appropriately severe rejoinder, became 
 involved in her own thoughts, and the golden 
 moment slipped by. 
 
 [55] 
 
3% Iftuvt Ijaiij rawma tljat r*amm fcotlf nnt burnt. 
 
 — Pascal 
 
 XIII 
 
 y?^Y own first talk with Carroll on the sub- 
 ^-*4! ject of death, or rather, of life — for the 
 idea of death was one that her mind seemed 
 to glance off from, take no cognizance of — 
 was when Curly, the small brown water- 
 spaniel that was the joy of "our block," was 
 killed by a passing street-car. Carroll and 
 I saw the cruel accident, and she it was who 
 ran and picked the limp little creature up in 
 her arms. Sitting on the curb at the side of 
 the street, she held him while he gasped his 
 poor little life away, raising tragic and lov- 
 ing eyes to hers the while, and showing his 
 gratitude, even in those last moments, by 
 trying to lick her tender, pitying hand. But 
 when the final breath was drawn, and I was 
 [56] 
 
©be ©treat JEfotoentute 
 
 wringing my hands in sorrow and distress, 
 Carroll laid him gently down, and rising, 
 looked about. 
 
 "Now we must tell a policeman, and he'll 
 know what to do," she said, quietly. 
 
 "Oh, Carroll, sha'n't we bury him?" I 
 urged, as usual ready to defer to her, but 
 not without protest. 
 
 "That isn't him" she answered with un- 
 grammatical force, turning half about to 
 give a glance at the little heap; "not any 
 more than this curbstone is. Why should 
 we want to carry it home with us, and feel 
 sorry and sad about it, and cry as we buried 
 it in the ground, any more than we'd do it 
 to the curbstone?" 
 
 "But even you think it is the house he 
 lived in, don't you? I'd like your house, 
 Carroll, and would love to stay near it as 
 long as I could, even after you'd moved out, 
 just because you'd lived there. It would 
 make me think of you." 
 [57] 
 
<3&e Gtreat HDtientute 
 
 Carroll dug her heel into the turf and 
 swung back and forth on it before answer- 
 ing. It always took her some time to think. 
 
 c 'But if I had moved out because the 
 house was on fire, and when I was gone you 
 found everything all burnt and blackened 
 and charred and the rafters ready to fall, I 
 guess it wouldn't make you think of me, 
 would it? I'd consider you pretty foolish 
 if you preferred to stay at that falling house 
 instead of looking down the street after me, 
 and perhaps seeing me wave my hand to you 
 as I turned the next corner." 
 
 "But — to me that isn't just his house; it's 
 Curly," I persisted. 
 
 "Why? Don't you see that already it 
 doesn't look like him? Even the hair looks 
 different, somehow, and those aren't his dear 
 eyes! I don't know what to call that, but 
 Curly himself, with his glossy, curly hair, 
 and his wagging stump of a tail, and his 
 bright brown eyes all full of fun, — he's up 
 
 [58] 
 
<5&e Gtreat Bfotoenture 
 
 here, somewhere. I wish I could see him!" 
 And she raised her head, and looked up, 
 blinking, to a place just above the level of 
 our heads, readjusting the focus of her eyes, 
 as if trying by sheer force of will to pene- 
 trate a baffling veil that hid something real 
 and actual from her sight. 
 
 I followed her example, as usual, and 
 looked too, but saw nothing but the motes 
 in the sunbeams, and empty air. 
 
 "What makes you think so, Carroll? 
 [Why do you say Curly isn't there?" I 
 pointed behind me, but did not look down. 
 I did not believe Carroll, of course, but 
 there was something very assuring in her 
 confidence. 
 
 "I don't know," was the rather disap- 
 pointing answer. 
 
 "Is it because the Bible says so?" I urged, 
 really eager to be convinced. 
 
 "Oh, no; how could the people in the 
 Bible know any more about it than we do?" 
 [59] 
 
©&e Gfreat gfotoenture 
 
 "Carroll! The people in the Bible!" I 
 reproved. "Of course they knew things 
 that we don't." 
 
 "Well, do you believe it, then, because the 
 Bible says so?" She turned the war into 
 my camp. 
 
 "Why — why, yes — I believe it, of course." 
 I was eleven, and a member of the church, 
 and "believed" many things I had never 
 thought about. 
 
 "But," I added, honestly, after an in- 
 stant's thought, "someway I don't believe it 
 the way you do. I believe it like — like re- 
 ligious things, and you believe it like every- 
 day things. Please tell me why you do, 
 Carroll." 
 
 I remember, after all these years, just 
 how she looked at me, there in the city street, 
 the little brown heap lying beside us— the 
 earnest, puzzled, thinking look, as if she 
 were trying hard to find the answer. 
 
 "1 — I truly can't tell you how I know, 
 [60] 
 
C5&e Gtteat BDtientute 
 
 Theodora," she said at last. "I just know. 
 I know it all through me!" 
 
 And with that answer I had to be con- 
 tent. 
 
 [61] 
 
(Com* a Itttir rlouhle t 'tnrixt must Iupb an& IjMttrn. 
 
 — BlJLWER LYTTON 
 
 XIV 
 
 XAM constantly tempted to digress and 
 mention other incidents of that far- 
 away childhood not directly relevant to this 
 development of Carroll's character and be- 
 liefs. Indeed, her belief about life was so 
 woven into her entire nature, was such an 
 everyday and genuine part of her, that it 
 sometimes seems as if almost every recollec- 
 tion of her is irradiated with that spirit of 
 vividness and enjoyment. But that her en- 
 joyment demanded a free right of way, 
 brooking no obstacles in the form of a 
 troubled conscience or a sense of wrong- 
 doing, we learned when we gave her her 
 "surprise party." 
 
 We had arranged it with great secrecy 
 and excitement, had gained Miss Page's 
 [62] 
 
<5&e Gtreat HDtoenture 
 
 consent, sending a scared little delegation 
 to her beforehand, and at four o'clock, one 
 spring afternoon, knocked loudly upon the 
 forbidding door with the old-fashioned, big 
 brass knocker, shaped like a dragon's head, 
 which held guard over the sacred "hall and 
 front parlor" part of the house. Carroll 
 duly appeared in answer to our somewhat 
 abashed knocking, and all in unison we cried, 
 "Surprise! Surprise!" waving our little 
 boxes and packages containing the various 
 elements of the supper we had assigned to 
 each to bring. 
 
 But Carroll's reception, which, being Car- 
 roll's, we had expected to be much more 
 glowing and appreciative than the usual one 
 of the "surprised" child, was a disappoint- 
 ment. Instead of ecstatically inviting us 
 into the house, she came out on the little 
 front "stoop," partly closing the door be- 
 hind her. 
 
 "Oh, I'm so glad you have come to play," 
 [63] 
 
C3&e ©[teat Bsfcemure 
 
 she said, politely, "but let's play out in the 
 yard; wouldn't you rather?" 
 
 That, however, was not at all our pro- 
 gramme. Our boxes must be handed to 
 Miss Page, our "things" must be duly placed 
 on the spare-room bed, and we had come, 
 not for the every-day, out-of-door sports, 
 but for "Clap-in-clap-out," "Pillow and 
 key," "Black magic," "Post-Office," and 
 like elevating and instructive in-door games. 
 So we pushed past her into the house, and 
 Carroll reluctantly followed. 
 
 "She isn't glad to see us!" someone said, 
 disappointedly, almost resentfully ; and that 
 voiced the feeling of all of us. 
 
 We invaded the sitting-room, and method- 
 ically began our strenuous games. Car- 
 roll took part, but without her usual whole- 
 souled enjoyment. There was a shadow on 
 her face, almost a worried look. She 
 seemed, very unlike Carroll, to be trying to 
 have a good time ! 
 
 [64] 
 
C5&e Gtreat Efctienture 
 
 During one of the games of greatest hi- 
 larity, I saw her slip out of the room, and 
 quietly followed her, in the hope of finding 
 out the cause — for I felt sure there must 
 be one — of her strange behavior. I reached 
 the kitchen door just in time to hear her 
 saying: 
 
 "I don't know what to do, Aunt Sophy! 
 They would come in, though I invited them 
 not to, and I can't bear to tell them to go 
 away, I thought they knew you never al- 
 lowed me to have company without your 
 permission." 
 
 "Oh, it's all right," Miss Page answered. 
 "I realized that it would be a lot of trouble, 
 but they said you were the only one that 
 had never had a party, and this seemed as 
 easy a way of giving one as any." 
 
 "Oh!" came Carroll's voice, quite changed, 
 and with its usual ring. "Then you knew 
 they were coming, Aunt Sophy! You said 
 they might?" 
 
 165} 
 
<5&e Great BtrtJenture 
 
 "Why, of course, child! What do you 
 suppose I had you put on your best dress 
 for, if not for this?" 
 
 "Oh, Aunt Sophy ! How perfectly lovely ! 
 How darling of you to let me have a 
 party!" And Carroll, wheeling round, her 
 face aglow, encountered me at the door, 
 eavesdropping, and waltzed me breathlessly 
 around the room to work off her pent-up 
 anxiety and the joyous reaction from it. 
 
 After that there was nothing to complain 
 of in Carroll's conduct. Everything went 
 with a swing and a dash, and we had what 
 we had expected to have at Carroll's house, 
 "just the best old time," as one of the girls 
 said, on the way home. 
 
 [66] 
 
^l}OBf> obstinate ntxtBtioninaji 
 
 ©f Btnst, mb ontnxaro t^inga 
 
 — Wordsworth 
 
 XV 
 
 ONE day in summer, Carroll and I had 
 walked beyond the city limits to "the 
 woods," which was a favorite place with us. 
 We were lying on the ground, looking up 
 through the green branches to the sky, which 
 always looks its most wonderful blue when 
 seen in just that way, when my friend said, 
 after a long silence, and apparently a propos 
 of nothing, that she hoped when she grew 
 up she should get married and have some 
 children, — "quite a lot of them." 
 
 "Why?" I asked. 
 
 My own aspirations were more exclusive. 
 
 "Because," she said dreamily, "I know 
 how they'd feel, and I'd feel with them." 
 [67] 
 
C5&e Gtreat Btotienture 
 
 "What do you mean, Carroll Page?" To 
 me there seemed to be no use in talking so 
 vaguely. 
 
 "Well, this blue sky reminds me of one 
 time when I was a little girl" — she was now 
 twelve or thirteen ! — "and had a balloon, one 
 of those red balloons, you know, attached to 
 a string, that one gets at a circus. I never 
 went to a circus, but my best uncle brought 
 me this balloon and I just loved it. I used 
 to take it out in the big yard we had then, 
 and run up and down, holding to the end 
 of the string, and playing it was the sail and 
 I was the boat, or playing it was the rain- 
 bow and I was running after the pot of 
 gold, or that it was a guiding fairy — lovely 
 games I played with it," said Carroll, smil- 
 ing reminiscently and forgetting the pres- 
 ent. 
 
 "And what happened?" I prompted. 
 
 "Well, one day the string broke and the 
 balloon went up, up, up, in the air. I 
 [68] 
 
Cfie ©treat Etotoenture 
 
 watched it, tipping my head 'way back, and 
 it went up higher and higher, and got 
 smaller and smaller, and then I couldn't see 
 it at all. I was dreadfully sorry to lose it 
 and felt almost like crying, for I guess I 
 didn't have so very many bought things to 
 play with; and then I thought of something 
 so nice that I forgot to feel bad." Once 
 more she seemed to forget her listener, and 
 I became impatient. 
 
 "What has all that to do with your hop- 
 ing you'll have a lot of children, Carroll? 
 I'm sure I don't see !" 
 
 "Why, it all belongs together," she as- 
 sured me. "It was a day like this, and I 
 remember just how blue the sky was where 
 the little speck disappeared. So I went 
 into the house to tell my mother my nice 
 thought, and I said, 'Mother, my balloon 
 broke and went up into the sky, and do you 
 s'pose God has got it by this time, and is 
 glad to have it up there for baby sister and 
 [69] 
 
Gfie Gtreat Bttoenture 
 
 the other little children angels to play with?' 
 I was all excited about it, you know, for 
 you see it was a very comforting thought, 
 I had loved the balloon so. And my mother 
 said, 'Why, Carroll Page, what a naughty, 
 irreverent thing to say! You mustn't ever 
 say such a thing again in your life!' She 
 didn't tell me why, and I didn't understand, 
 and everything suddenly felt all kind of 
 dark and heavy — like indigestion, you 
 know. I'd lost my balloon, and it was 
 wrong to think God had liked it, — and 
 somehow there wasn't anything to be glad 
 about." 
 
 "You do 'most always manage to be glad 
 about something, don't you?" I interpolated, 
 with unwonted perception. 
 
 "Well," Carroll laughed, "I was very lit- 
 tle then, and of course I believed my mother 
 must be right. But I think now, that if I 
 was someone's mother and she came to me 
 and said what I said to my mother that time, 
 [70] " 
 
 
<5&e ©treat Efotienture 
 
 I'd know that she didn't feel naughty and 
 irreverent, but just the most reverent; and 
 I'd say, 'Yes, indeed, God loves the balloon, 
 and will be so pleased to have it, and will 
 keep it for you, after the angel children 
 have played with it a little, so that you can 
 have it again sometime.' " 
 
 "The idea! That's a fairy tale, Carroll. 
 'Keep it for you!' You'll grow up before 
 you die and go to heaven, and what will you 
 want of a balloon then?" asked I, Theodora 
 of the literal mind. 
 
 "I don't know," she answered. "But I 
 think there's something in fairy tales that's 
 true, and I think there is something in that 
 that's true. The little red balloon made me 
 awfully happy, and perhaps I'd mean that 
 God would take care of the happiness in it 
 for me, and keep it till I came. But what- 
 ever is the true part of it, I somehow know 
 I'd say that to my little girl, and she would 
 go out and play again, and have a better 
 [71] 
 
£5!)s Gtteat BODenture 
 
 time than before even; and besides, she'd 
 never be afraid to tell me her thoughts. 
 Sometimes, after that, I wouldn't tell my 
 mother some of the things I was thinking, 
 for fear she would tell me they were 
 naughty. To me they didn't seem so, but 
 you never could tell. I always remembered 
 the balloon." 
 
 "That's an awfully little thing to remem- 
 ber, all these years," I said. "I presume 
 a hundred such things have happened to me 
 and I have forgotten them." 
 
 "It is funny, what things we remember 
 and what ones we forget, isn't it?" she 
 mused. "All the time I was a little girl in 
 that big old house looks to me now like this 
 empty air up here above us, with just a few 
 little pictures, like this balloon-happening, 
 shining out of it like pin-points, here and 
 there. It seems to me the times I remem- 
 ber are the times that made me surprised or 
 glad, or that hurt me inside; and that I re- 
 [72] 
 
<5&e Gtreat HDtoentute 
 
 member more the way I felt than the things 
 that happened. Isn't that funny?" 
 
 And so we speculated, lying on our backs, 
 under the trees, shading our eyes with our 
 hands and gazing up through the dark green 
 branches into the blue, blue sky beyond. 
 
 [73] 
 
®\\t tt re mnttiouH air of gloom. 
 — Matthew Arnold 
 
 XVI 
 
 CARROLL'S way of looking at death, 
 even when it invaded her own circle 
 of friends, was so different from the con- 
 ventional way that I believe we never be- 
 came quite accustomed to it. One of the 
 first times when this peculiarity of her 
 niece's attitude was brought to Miss Page's 
 notice came when Carroll was about sixteen. 
 
 The aunt came home just at dusk, after 
 a round of church calls, solemn and impor- 
 tant and full of news. 
 
 "What do you think, Carroll?" she an- 
 nounced. "Poor Deacon Everett is dead!" 
 
 "Is he, auntie?" Carroll was sitting on 
 the floor in front of the fire-place, playing 
 [74] 
 
G&e Gtteat fifotienture 
 
 with the black-and-white kitten. She 
 looked up. 
 
 "Well, I'm glad I had such a lovely talk 
 with him the other day about plans for the 
 League this winter. There's not another 
 person could give me so much help and 
 good advice." 
 
 "I think it's rather unfeeling, my dear, 
 to be thinking of yourself instead of the 
 poor man!" 
 
 "Why do you say c poor man,' Aunt 
 Sophy? Do you think he has gone to 
 Hell?" 
 
 "Carroll! What a dreadful thing to say! 
 Even if he had, what a brutal way to put 
 it! And how could you even ask such a 
 question about him? A good man like 
 Deacon Everett going to — to that place!" 
 
 "He has always been good, hasn't he?" 
 approved Carroll. "Then you surely be- 
 lieve that he has gone to Heaven, don't 
 you?" 
 
 [75] 
 
«5&e 0xm BotJentute 
 
 "Gone to Heaven? Why, of course I do, 
 child! But death is solemn and dreadful, 
 no matter how you look at it." 
 
 "Why?" persisted Carroll. "Is it reli- 
 gious to think it dreadful? If it is, what's 
 the use of religion? Or don't you truly be- 
 lieve what religion teaches?" 
 
 "Oh, of course I believe he's happy in 
 Heaven now," grudgingly admitted Miss 
 Page, "but it seems irreverent for you to 
 talk about it the way you do. And besides, 
 aren't you sorry a single bit for his wife 
 and daughter? That's what comes of never 
 having been converted and joining the 
 church !" 
 
 "But I am very sorry for Mrs. Everett 
 and Anna. Of course they will miss him, 
 dreadfully. I missed you, when you were 
 away at Grandma's, that six months, and 
 you left me here with Elsa. All I wanted 
 to know, just now, was why you said 'poor 
 Mr. Everett,' if you believe he's having a 
 [76] 
 
<5&e Gtreat BDtienture 
 
 better time than we are, at this very minute." 
 
 "And to think," went on Aunt Sophia, 
 dismissing her niece's comparison as irrele- 
 vant, "to think he was out at prayer-meet- 
 ing only night before last; and just as smil- 
 ing and cheerful as usual; even made jokes 
 afterwards, as someone recalls, about our 
 Fair ! He little dreamed, then, that the end 
 was so near, poor man! Well, it should be 
 a lesson to all of us!" 
 
 "What lesson, Aunt Sophy?" Carroll 
 stroked the kitten and looked at the fire. 
 
 "That 'in the midst of life we are in 
 death,' " quoted Miss Page. " 'We know 
 not what hour the Bridegroom cometh.' 
 We should be prepared, any moment, for 
 the summons to meet our Maker." 
 
 "Oh, auntie!" cried Carroll, in genuine 
 distress, at last, "what a terribly gruesome 
 sort of thing you make it ! To be constantly 
 'prepared to meet one's Maker,' seems, the 
 way you say it, to be the most depressing 
 [77] 
 
<5&e ©treat Bfotietnure 
 
 thing to be prepared for in the world! It 
 looks so diif erent to me — but I suppose that 
 is because I always did like surprises, and 
 that is going to be such a big surprise; for 
 after all we don't really know anything 
 about it. Sometimes I feel as if I can 
 hardly wait!" 
 
 "Oh, Carroll, Carroll!" sighed her aunt. 
 "I wish your poor mother had lived and 
 brought you up ! I've done the best I could, 
 but when you go on like this, I'm fright- 
 ened. It all sounds like blasphemy to me, 
 talking about what comes after death as a 
 surprise — a pleasant one, too — and being in 
 a hurry to gratify your curiosity, instead 
 of grounding your faith in the Bible, which 
 tells you all about it, and which ought to 
 be your sure and sufficient guide unto eter- 
 nal life ! And yet no one can say I haven't 
 faithfully tried to give you sound religious 
 instruction and training!" 
 
 "No, no one can say that, and no one 
 [78] 
 
C56e Gtreat Bfotienture 
 
 would better, in my presence!" said Car- 
 roll, jumping up from the hearth rug and 
 giving her aunt's unwilling cheek a laugh- 
 ing kiss. "If keeping on living seems a 
 natural and un-dreadful sort of thing to me, 
 and I'm a discouraging limb,' in conse- 
 quence, it surely isn't your fault. So let's 
 not feel bad about it, but let's have a nice, 
 cosy time, because it's such fun to be to- 
 gether in front of a jolly fire on a cold, 
 snowy, blowy, winter evening like this! 
 Shall I make some tea?" 
 
 [79] 
 
Aa a man trawling into a far rotmtrn. 
 — St. Matthew 
 
 XVII 
 
 ©UT the sense of humor was too strong 
 in Carroll to allow her to overlook 
 tempting opportunities for mischief. 
 
 One day, a few weeks later, Miss Page 
 on entering the library found her niece hud- 
 dled in the most dejected attitude, her face 
 buried in her arms, and deep sobs shaking 
 her from head to foot. 
 
 "What is the matter?" she asked in alarm. 
 
 "Oh, auntie," came a stifled voice, "poor 
 Mary Royce is going to Berlin to study 
 music and will be gone three years, at 
 least!" 
 
 "Why, I know that, child; but why on 
 earth do you say 'poor' Mary? It's the 
 
 [80] 
 
C5&e Gfreat Btroenture 
 
 thing she's been hoping for and counting on 
 for years — all her life, you might say." 
 
 "But I saw her only yesterday, before her 
 mother told her about the legacy; and she 
 so little suspected anything unusual — 
 looked so bright and happy!" 
 
 "What are you driving at, Carroll? 
 What is there sad about her looking happy 
 before she heard the good news? I should 
 think you'd be glad she could look happy 
 then, for she's happier still to-day." 
 
 "But her poor family — " 
 
 "Good gracious, Carroll! Sometimes I 
 almost think you're mentally defective! 
 Don't you know the plan is for her family 
 to go over and visit her in a year or two? 
 Of course they will miss her, while she's 
 gone; but I hope they are not so selfish as 
 to let that interfere with their rejoicing over 
 her good fortune ! And, anyway, you were 
 crying your eyes out because of pitying 
 'poor Mary. 5 " 
 
 [81] 
 
C56e Gtreat Bfotoenttire 
 
 "Well," said Carroll, raising somewhat 
 ashamed but dancing eyes, "You said, 'poor 
 Deacon Everett'!" 
 
 Her aunt looked mystified, perplexed, for 
 a moment. Then, with sudden comprehen- 
 sion, she emitted a sound of utter disgust, 
 and swept disapprovingly from the room. 
 
 [82] 
 
Atintljrr gotten rfjamb* r .... 
 Cargwr lljan U|tH ta* Uaa*, anil iavtlxtv. 
 
 — P. A. Baiuey 
 
 XVIII 
 
 HOR a long time, it seemed to me incon- 
 sistent in Carroll that one who had so 
 keen an appreciation of life should feel so 
 cheerful and light-hearted at the thought of 
 "leaving it all," as I should have called it; 
 in other words, on the subject of death. 
 
 "I should think you'd hate it," I said to 
 her finally, one day, when I mustered up 
 courage to open the subject. 
 
 "Why, I guess that is just the reason I 
 don't hate it," she replied, after her usual 
 pause to think the matter out. "I love life 
 because it is so interesting; you never know 
 what is going to happen next, so you never 
 get bored. It's like reading a book; if one 
 page is dry, you know that when you turn 
 the leaf the next page may be sparkling. 
 
 [ 8 *3 
 
(5&e ©treat Efctoenture 
 
 And so, some days might seem dull and 
 stupid if one didn't always know that the 
 next ones may hold pleasant surprises in 
 store." 
 
 "Yes, that is life; I understand that," I 
 said. "But how about death?" 
 
 "Well, Theodora," Carroll said, quite 
 slowly, "to my mind it is all, life here, and 
 life later, in short, Life, — just like an ad- 
 venture ; new and wonderful things happen- 
 ing to us all the time as we wander on, 
 eager-eyed, pleased with the pleasant things, 
 and not bothered, over-much, by the loud 
 but harmless roar of the lions. And when 
 the time comes for us to be advanced into 
 a different state of being, as the butterfly 
 is when it leaves the cocoon, why, it seems 
 to me that is the most interesting happening 
 of all. Yes, that's the best way I can de- 
 scribe how it looks to me, when I stop to 
 think it out, — that which people call death — 
 like a wonderful, great adventure." 
 
 [84] 
 
© 
 
 Oily* ttt rttal gwrtwrtatj.— Schiller 
 
 XIX 
 
 HEN Carroll's father died, and she did 
 not put on mourning, there was a good 
 deal of comment in the circle of her friends. 
 But it was not until several weeks had passed 
 by, and some of us were spending an after- 
 noon at little Ellen White's house, making 
 Christmas presents, that one of the girls ven- 
 tured to broach the subject, tentatively, to 
 Carroll herself. 
 
 "Why should I wear black?" she parried. 
 "I don't advertise by my style of dress any 
 other sort of event in my private life. Why 
 should I this one?" 
 
 "Well, it seems to me rather the right 
 thing to do, as a mark of respect," suggested 
 Kate Pearson. 
 
 "Respect?" repeated Carroll. "If the 
 
 [85] 
 
<5&e Gtreat Efotienture 
 
 creatures that become butterflies — the grubs 
 — if the immediate family of one of those 
 who had found his wings and flew away 
 could change their color to black or gold or 
 sky-blue, I don't see how it would be show- 
 ing respect to the happy one that had gone 
 a-flying so much as it would be a self-im- 
 portant attracting of attention to them- 
 selves." 
 
 "That parallel is foolish, Carroll, ,, an- 
 other of the girls put in. "What one means 
 by 'respect' is really love. People are in- 
 clined to think one doesn't care, is heartless, 
 if one makes no outward sign." 
 
 "If people's only way of deciding whether 
 or not I love my father is by looking at 
 the color of my dress now," said Carroll, 
 with some heat, "then I don't believe I care 
 much for their opinion. If I've never shown 
 it in any real way, worth counting, I'd be a 
 hypocrite to try to intimate it conventionally 
 now!" 
 
 [86] 
 
O&e Gfreat BotJentute 
 
 "Don't you think, dear," said gentle Mrs. 
 White, little Ellen's mother, who had been 
 passing through the room and had paused 
 a moment, her attention arrested by the 
 conversation, "Don't you think that mourn- 
 ing dress is a protection? I feel that it shel- 
 ters one from the pain of careless questions 
 or distressing remarks, which might be 
 made, through ignorance, by those who 
 would not otherwise guess what had hap- 
 pened." 
 
 "How do you mean, Mrs. White? I 
 can't quite imagine what kind of remarks 
 and questions would be distressing." 
 
 "Well, I had a friend once, who was asked 
 how her daughter was, two or three months 
 after she had lost her; such questions as 
 that, I mean." 
 
 "How dreadfully hard for her!" came 
 our commiserating murmur. 
 
 "And," went on Mrs. White, in her sweet, 
 half-pleading voice, "when people aren't 
 [87] 
 
O&e Gfreat Bfefcentute 
 
 warned in that generally adopted way to 
 be on their guard, it is of course quite nat- 
 ural for them to refer to those who have 
 gone in the most casual, familiar manner. 
 I even knew a man, once, to make a joke 
 to a woman about her husband, who had re- 
 cently passed away. You can imagine how 
 he felt, when he found out, and as for her — " 
 
 "Oh, Mrs. White!" we girls cried, in con- 
 sternation at the thought. 
 
 But Carroll was imperturbable. 
 
 "The trouble is, we feel so differently 
 about the thing itself," she objected. 
 "Now, I like to talk about my father, and 
 I'd love to have someone joke to me about 
 him. I wish he had had more jokes in his 
 life, but I hope that now he is going to make 
 up for all that lack." 
 
 There was a constrained and disapprov- 
 ing silence for a moment, then someone 
 asked, 
 
 "But if someone who didn't know what 
 
 [88] 
 
C5&e Gtteat Bfotientute 
 
 has happened should come up to you sud- 
 denly, to-day, and ask how your fath- 
 er's cough is, or something like that, wouldn't 
 it — wouldn't it nearly kill you, Carroll?" 
 
 We stopped our sewing and looked up to 
 see how she took it. It seemed a brutal 
 thing to have said, although she had almost 
 invited it. • 
 
 Carroll shook her head, slowly. 
 
 "Of course I don't know what I'd say," 
 she replied. "One never can forecast the 
 words one would use; but I am sure it 
 wouldn't hurt me any more than it would 
 Mrs. Royce if a friend asked her some such 
 thing about Mary. 
 
 " 'Why, didn't you know Mary's gone to 
 Germany to study?' she'd naturally reply. 
 And then the other person would remark, 
 'How nice for Mary!' and would probably 
 add, 'But it must be awfully lonely for you, 
 Mrs. Royce!' and she would say, 'Yes, of 
 course it is ; I miss her all the time, for Mary 
 [89] 
 
is such a dear girl.' — I don't see why peo- 
 ple shouldn't talk in that same natural, 
 pleasant way about their friends who are to 
 be away longer than Mary. I think there's 
 more of death in the awful silences about 
 them, than there is in their going itself." 
 
 "I'll tell you why I should wear mourn- 
 ing," I said to Carroll, on our way home. 
 "It is just because it is the customary thing 
 to do, and I think you are looked at and 
 talked about more if you don't do it than 
 if you do. So I'd wear it in self-defense." 
 
 "How many unnatural things connected 
 with death seem to be 'customary!'" Car- 
 roll stormed, quickening her pace. "Isn't 
 it curious that at the time of all times when 
 people should be free and untrammeled, 
 they are fettered by rites and ceremonies 
 and fashions stronger than iron chains? 
 That when one would elect quiet and oppor- 
 tunity for thought and memory of the one 
 [90] 
 
G&e Gtreat Bfotientute 
 
 who has gone on, one's whole attention is 
 required for irrelevant details in regard to 
 decking the body of the living, or burying 
 the body of the dead?" 
 
 "But the dead have to be buried, and the 
 living have to be dressed." 
 
 "Not with pomp and ceremony and 
 parade of grief, if one really believes that 
 what is left is but the empty shell; and not 
 with the particular color and texture pre- 
 scribed by fashion-books, if one's thought 
 is of life, not death. No, Theodora, I don't 
 believe these things 'have to' be done, any 
 more than Chinese women have to torture 
 their feet, or Indian widows to be burned on 
 the funeral pyres of their husbands." 
 
 [91] 
 
£faa§Ijt w Biuret aa mflanrffalg,— Burtok 
 
 XX 
 
 ONE of the funniest Carroll-incidents 
 I ever knew about was connected with 
 the last illness of our friend, Mrs. Crumb. 
 
 The poor old lady had been half dead for 
 years; literally, for half her body was com- 
 pletely paralyzed; and she was weak and 
 fragile, so that when a severe cold assailed 
 her, that year of the blizzard, there was 
 nothing left in her to resist its onslaught. 
 Finally, when the doctor told someone she 
 could not live more than two or three days 
 longer at the utmost, Mrs. Crumb somehow 
 heard of it; and so, when her friends came 
 tip-toeing in to see her, they had a most dis- 
 mal time of commiseration and leave-taking. 
 
 Carroll had been one of Mrs. Crumb's 
 [92] 
 
C5&e Gtreat Bfotoentute 
 
 faithful servitors for years, going every few 
 days to read aloud to her, or to take her a 
 leaf or a flower, or, better still, a nosegay 
 of gossip; so of course, as luck would have 
 it, she happened in at this very time when 
 the doctor's verdict had wrought its havoc. 
 The room was pervaded by an atmosphere 
 of heaviness and gloom, damp handker- 
 chiefs were in use, and speeches of consola- 
 tion and resignation, in turn, were being 
 made, when Carroll came briskly in and said 
 "Good-morning!" in her gay, bright way, 
 just as usual. 
 
 Everyone looked at her in scandalized dis- 
 approbation, and as soon as was decent after 
 the greetings, Mrs. Crumb asked, with ill- 
 concealed importance, "Hasn't anyone told 
 you what Dr. Brown gave out about me, 
 this morning?" 
 
 Handkerchiefs ostentatiously in use 
 again, throughout the room. Carroll ad- 
 mitted her ignorance. 
 [93] 
 
CD&e Gtreat BotieMure 
 
 "He says I can't live more than a few 
 days longer," announced the afflicted one, 
 with the air of one hurling an explosive 
 bomb at the newcomer, and then standing 
 back to watch the effect. 
 
 "Oh, Mrs. Crumb!" cried Carroll, joy- 
 fully, "How lovely for you to be almost 
 through with this troublesome body that 
 won't do what you want it to! Aren't you 
 delighted?" 
 
 There was such consternation in the room 
 that people forgot their handkerchiefs en- 
 tirely and just stared at the intruder, open- 
 mouthed. The fact that they, every one of 
 them, in their secret souls, wondered "what 
 on earth Mrs. Crumb should want to live 
 for" did not mitigate their horror at this 
 undisguised cheerfulness in meeting the 
 situation. It seemed like an "affront to 
 Providence," as someone said about it after- 
 wards. 
 
 "And just think of the wonderful things 
 [94] 
 
C56e Gtteat Sfowntute 
 
 you'll be knowing all about, in a few days," 
 went on Carroll, happily unconscious, "while 
 we shall still be guessing! Oh, I envy you, 
 Mrs. Crumb!" 
 
 The funny part of the incident lay in 
 Mrs. Crumb's being so injured, and almost 
 insulted, at having her tragic eminence as- 
 sailed, that she dropped her mournful tones 
 and solemn, hushed manner, and became 
 quite commonplace and peppery in her re- 
 marks. If it had not been a physical im- 
 possibility, she would have stiffened with 
 indignation. In lieu of this, her old eyes 
 snapped, and when she told Carroll that she 
 had long been a subject of prayer with her, 
 her manner almost suggested that of the 
 prophet of old, on the occasion of his deal- 
 ing with certain garrulous and irreverent 
 children. Mrs. Sanborn, who was there, 
 and who told me about it, has very little 
 sense of humor, but even she had to smile, 
 as she recalled the change from the manner 
 [95] 
 
©&e ©treat Sfotoenture 
 
 of a pious saint raising brimming and re- 
 signed eyes to heaven as she suffered mar- 
 tyrdom, to that of a cross old woman child- 
 ishly indignant at being envied instead of 
 sympathized with, and having sunshine per- 
 vade her sick-room instead of thunder- 
 storm gloom and wax tapers. 
 
 [96] 
 
5fa ttrtnb ran bloat tmj bark airtrag.— John Burroughs 
 
 XXI 
 
 HS we emerged from girlhood into 
 young womanhood, the peculiarity of 
 that side of Carroll's ideas which we vaguely 
 termed her "religious beliefs" set her more 
 and more in a class by herself. I do not 
 mean that she was not one of us in every 
 outward sense; for, just as in her childhood, 
 she was always in the very center of all 
 things light-hearted, and "fun" was just as 
 dear to her as ever. But it seemed curious 
 to me then, it seems strange to me now, that 
 just because a human being's ideas about 
 death were unique and decided, that indi- 
 vidual should seem so completely different 
 from his fellows. For that was the way it 
 was with Carroll; the rest of us were like 
 a herd, and she was an individual apart. 
 I do not think she was more perfect than 
 [97] 
 
C5&e Gtreat Bfotienture 
 
 the rest of us; her impulsive nature led her 
 into many small pitfalls and one very large 
 one; she was always falling, in the march 
 of life, but she always picked herself up 
 with a laugh, and trudged brightly on as if 
 there were no possibility of her ever repeat- 
 ing the accident. Her nature was so happy 
 at the core that gloom and depression had 
 positively no chance with her; and the sad 
 things of life — the things we of the rest of 
 the world call sad — had for her no horrors, 
 because they had no foundation. 
 
 If Carroll's ideas had not been an actual 
 and unassumed part of her, we, with the 
 arrogance and brutality of youth, should 
 have had no patience with them, and open 
 ridicule would have been her portion. But 
 whatever she might not have been, we knew 
 she was genuine ; so we accepted her "queer- 
 ness," respected it to a certain extent, and, 
 as the years went on, it became in a way 
 even an unacknowledged comfort to us. 
 [98] 
 
O&e ©treat Stotoenture 
 
 Of course, it was almost immoral for one to 
 be so untouched by solemnity and gloom in 
 respect to the most serious facts of exist- 
 ence; but still, when "dreadful" things hap- 
 pened, in times of sickness and mortal anxi- 
 ety and death, the knowledge that to her 
 they were not "dreadful," but natural, in- 
 teresting, and sometimes even happy, often 
 sent us to her just to be inconsistently 
 warmed by the brightness and cheer which 
 we did not believe in, but which we found, 
 nevertheless, strangely comforting at such 
 times. 
 
 But the really curious aspect of the situa- 
 tion lay in the fact that it was not alone in 
 times of illness and suffering, and of those 
 great crises where the heart almost stops 
 beating and the whole world is suddenly 
 changed, by one's being brought face to face 
 with the tremendous fundamental problems 
 of existence — it was not at such times alone 
 that Carroll's buoyancy and assurance set 
 [99] 
 
C5&e Gfceat Bo&enture 
 
 her apart from others. That would have 
 been merely what one would have expected. 
 But that one's confident feeling about what 
 we call "the end," the end that comes in the 
 always vaguely remote future, and that 
 seems so shut away from our outer con- 
 sciousness and voluntary contemplation as 
 to be, almost, a matter of theoretical and 
 academic interest only, should reduce to a 
 beautiful simplicity and irradiate with 
 brightness every step of the way towards 
 it — that was something we never should 
 have believed possible, if we had not seen 
 repeated proofs of it in Carroll's life. Out 
 of scores of incidents which I recall even 
 yet, I will mention just one, for it is fairly 
 typical in showing the dissimilarity of her 
 habitual attitude from ours in the daily hap- 
 penings of life, as well as in its great 
 tragedies. 
 
 Several of us, "our crowd," had gone off 
 on the train, on a day's excursion. We 
 [100] 
 
C56e Gfreat Efttoenture 
 
 were in the long tunnel under the river, on 
 the return trip, when the train came to one 
 of those sudden, dead stops, followed by ab- 
 solute silence, which brings such a feeling 
 of blankness and finality. An unscheduled 
 stop, especially in a tunnel, is always to the 
 timorous suggestive of danger. For a few 
 minutes we kept on with our gay laugh- 
 ing and talking, the six of us, trying not to 
 notice that we were not speeding along as 
 we ought to be doing. Then something 
 happened that made me throw aside the 
 flimsy pretense and give an exclamation of 
 alarm. It was merely that the rear-end 
 brakeman passed through our car to- 
 wards the front of the train, his lantern in 
 his hand. 
 
 "Why isn't he back on the track, with 
 that light?" I asked. "Do you suppose we 
 are stopping here, where we ought not to 
 be, without any signal behind us to announce 
 it to an oncoming train?" 
 [101] 
 
G&e Gtreat Sfotienture 
 
 "He certainly is the one that should at- 
 tend to the signaling," said Kate Pearson. 
 "In this short local train there isn't anyone 
 else who could possibly have gone ; it means 
 that no one is there." 
 
 "Let's leave the train men to manage 
 their own business; they ought to know as 
 much about it as we do," someone suggested. 
 "Probably we are going to start right 
 away." 
 
 But we did not start, and we heard the 
 men working at one of our wheels, even as 
 she spoke. Of course we could see noth- 
 ing, for it was perfectly black outside, and 
 we could not open a window to look out, as 
 the tunnel was full of choking smoke. 
 
 "It must be a hot box," said Anna, "and 
 no one knows how long we shall have to 
 stay here." 
 
 We were all nervous. In fact, everyone 
 in the car seemed to be, though all tried not 
 to show it. With that superficial optimism 
 
 [102] 
 
D&e Gtteat BDtoenture 
 
 that seems to be in order when, in times of 
 possible danger, the demand of decorum 
 for outward composure still dominates the 
 inward fear, we began to offer stout- 
 hearted suggestions. 
 
 "Those in charge of this train couldn't 
 be so careless as not to post a signal be- 
 hind," said one. 
 
 But countless times they do forget, and 
 countless accidents happen that way, the in- 
 ner thought of all of us made answer. 
 
 "There may not be a train due for hours, 
 and they may know it, and so not need to 
 signal," said another. 
 
 We all thought of the possibility of extra 
 trains and unscheduled "freights." 
 
 "Well, worry won't help matters, and it 
 isn't a bit likely that anything really will 
 run into us," argued another voice, the qual- 
 ity of the tone belying the confident words. 
 
 Then up spoke Carroll. 
 
 "Well, what if it should?" she said, and 
 
 [103] 
 
<3&e ©treat Bfotienture 
 
 we saw that her face was as bright and com- 
 posed as usual. 
 
 "What if it should?" I cried, turning on 
 her, and letting off some of my bottled nerv- 
 ousness; "why, if it should, we'd all be 
 ground to atoms in an instant, that's all!" 
 
 Carroll shook her head, smiling a little. 
 
 "Carroll Page, aren't you the very least 
 little bit afraid?" asked Kate. 
 
 "Why, no," Carroll replied, simply. "It 
 couldn't hurt us." 
 
 That was all; but after that the tension 
 loosened. The would-be cheerful view we 
 had tried to take had not lightened our anxi- 
 ety nor lessened our fears, for we had 
 known beneath it all the time that there 
 was danger, and that an accident might 
 come. But with that undramatic accept- 
 ance of it, that tranquil "What if it should?" 
 the burden of clenched-handed resistance, 
 and something of our fear itself, seemed to 
 fall from us. 
 
 [104] 
 
<5&e Great Botientur 
 
 I think this little incident is an illustra- 
 tion of the way in which Carroll took life 
 in general ; and it was by watching her, and 
 noticing these things, that I began to sus- 
 pect that to be without, absolutely without, 
 that unspoken, unacknowledged, perhaps 
 unrealized fear of death, at many turns, to 
 be able to bring to every exigency in life a 
 light-hearted "Well, what if it should?" at- 
 titude — not from fatalism but from a serene 
 sense of unassailable security — must mean 
 to have a very different view of "things 
 present" as well as of "things to come," from 
 that of most of us. 
 
 [105] 
 
3t araa aa on tl|* opening of a door 
 $g ont wljo in I|iB Jjano a lamp onto. nolo. 
 — R. W. Gilder 
 
 XXII 
 
 X REMEMBER well— which one of 
 the group that was there does not? — ■ 
 the time when Carroll conceived and an- 
 nounced her surprising plan. 
 
 It was a Saturday morning in mid-win- 
 ter. Several of us in the little room down- 
 town rented by the "flower mission/' were 
 arranging from the masses of cut flowers 
 which had been sent in by florists and 
 friends, for the purpose, the individual bas- 
 kets and bouquets that were presently to be 
 taken to the various hospitals and tenement- 
 houses on our list for that morning. The 
 talk embraced things pleasant and unpleas- 
 ant, and gossipy in general, as such talks 
 will, and in time it touched upon the recent 
 funeral of our minister's wife. There was 
 [106] 
 
G&e Gtreat Efttoenture 
 
 a difference of recollection about some de- 
 tail — what hymn was sung at the close, or 
 some such matter — and Carroll, who had 
 been silent, was appealed to, to settle the 
 dispute. 
 
 "I wasn't there," she said. 
 
 "Carroll never goes to funerals," I ap- 
 pended, half complainingly. 
 
 "Well," said Anna Everett, "I've noticed 
 that, and I'd really like to know why not? 
 I should think you would be just the one 
 to go, Carroll, since you feel so sure about 
 death." 
 
 "Oh, I don't like to go," replied Carroll, 
 easily, "because they are so gloomy, and I 
 get tired of seeing people so melancholy 
 and hopeless who profess something quite 
 different." 
 
 "Don't you think," suggested Kate, 
 "that that's just a little bit selfish, Carroll? 
 As a mark of respect ought you not to sac- 
 rifice your feelings at such times?" 
 [107] 
 
C56e Gfreat BDtienture 
 
 "No, it doesn't seem to me that it is really 
 selfish. I don't know any better guide than 
 the Golden Rule, and in this matter, at 
 least, I follow that." 
 
 "Golden Rule?" echoed Edith Styles, 
 who had come among us recently, and prob- 
 ably had not had time to learn of Carroll's 
 "queerness." 
 
 "I mean, you needn't feel obliged to come 
 to my funeral, and have a ceremony over 
 this thing I'm going to part with. I don't 
 see why you should make a function at that 
 time, anyway, any more than you would 
 make one over my old clothes which I shall 
 leave at home, next week, when I go visit- 
 ing, and take my best along with me." 
 
 "But it isn't the custom to have functions 
 over old clothes, and it is, over bodies," ob- 
 jected Eunice Sanborn, who was growing 
 into Carroll's way of looking at things, but 
 growing step by step. "And we don't have 
 funerals so much for the sake of those who 
 
 [108] 
 
<3&e ©treat ElDtoemure 
 
 have gone as we do for those who are near- 
 est them. How would your Aunt Sophy 
 feel, if not a person came to your funeral?" 
 
 One or two of the girls giggled, but Car- 
 roll propped her chin on her hand and gazed 
 thoughtfully at the speaker. 
 
 "And yet, upon whom does this funeral 
 business fall hardest?" she said, slowly, 
 thinking it out, in her way. "For whom 
 is it the greatest horror and nightmare ? In 
 my case it will be Aunt Sophy. She will 
 shudderingly go through the ordeal because 
 you expect it, and you will shrinkingly 
 come to the function because she expects it; 
 it will have no effect whatever upon me, ex- 
 cept to make me weep at so much unhap- 
 piness — and what good will it do anyone? 
 Worse than none, for it will do positive 
 harm to each one present because of its em- 
 phasizing the wrong thing. Girls — " she 
 paused, weighing the matter before decid- 
 ing, and then speaking in her quick, posi- 
 [109] 
 
tD6e Gtreat BDtienture 
 
 tive way, — "I'm not going to have a fu- 
 neral!" 
 
 Some of us laughed. "What are you go- 
 ing to do — be translated, as Enoch was? 
 'He was not, for God took him'?" 
 
 "Yes, just that way," she answered gaily, 
 "exactly that way! And all my friends and 
 my blessed aunt have got to be glad about 
 it, and weep nary one foolish and mistaken 
 tear!" 
 
 "I think," said Kate, "that you are going 
 a little too far, Carroll. This is too serious 
 a matter to jest over. Funerals are dread- 
 ful and harrowing and all that, I know, but 
 so is death; and so long as there is death in 
 the world there will be funerals; so it does 
 no good to gird at the custom, nor even to 
 talk about it." 
 
 "Kate," Carroll said, gently and seriously, 
 
 "I'm not jesting; I'm absolutely in earnest. 
 
 Why have funerals got to be? It's only 
 
 a custom, and I'll bet it isn't a Christian 
 
 [no] 
 
G&e Gtreat BDtientute 
 
 custom, at that! Death is dreadful, in the 
 way most people take it, but I truly believe 
 it would lose a great deal of its horror if 
 we did away with all that happens between 
 the actual passing of the spirit, and the 
 grave. Think a minute of the death of any- 
 one you have known, of Mrs. Beebe, whom 
 you have just been talking of, what does 
 your mind image, first of all? Not her real 
 going, not her life now, not even her fam- 
 ily's loss — but that painful, emotional, 
 stereotyped ceremony you attended ! Death 
 means sorrow, because it means partings; 
 but why do we persist in adding a difficult 
 and gloomy burden to that sorrow? When 
 the parting actually has come, why do we, 
 by custom, force several days of heartrend- 
 ing ceremonial, for it is all ceremonial, 
 every bit of it, upon those who are often 
 worn out physically, and who are mentally 
 unfitted for complying with this last exac- 
 tion at the hands of society?" 
 [in] 
 
<5&e Gtreat Bfotoenture 
 
 "I can see," agreed Anna, "how it would 
 be a great relief not to have to go through 
 certain things. I remember when my father 
 died, how heart-breaking seemed the place 
 in which he lay, those two intervening days 
 before the funeral ; and what a strain it was 
 to mother to see the friends that came and 
 talked in hushed voices, and wanted to go 
 for a minute into that cold room. We were 
 conscious of that part of the house and what 
 it held, every moment; and the memory of 
 those days and of what happened last of 
 all does stand out, as you say, Carroll. 
 Yet how can such a custom be changed? 
 Who would dare to go against it?" 
 
 "I would," said Carroll, "because I be- 
 lieve in changing it, and of course one dares 
 do what one believes in ! But you girls will 
 have to do your part, too, if it ever happens ; 
 you'll have to help Aunt Sophy!" 
 
 Then she evolved a plan, rilling in the de- 
 tails as she went along. We listened, half 
 
 [112] 
 
<5&e ©[teat Bnuentute 
 
 captured, half scandalized, but somehow 
 there was no really escaping her magnetism 
 and her joyous assurance. 
 
 "Oh, I do hope I shall go first, so you can 
 see how much better that way will be," she 
 said, at the end. "Of course I'd like to be 
 here and have one of you do it; but then, I 
 guess I can imagine it well enough, and I'd 
 just love to demonstrate it myself!" 
 
 [113] 
 
Snttht that % pompr ran fill tlj* Ijrart tijat tyij 
 pamtv t xpanda ? — Browning 
 
 XXIII 
 
 CARROLL was one of those rare per- 
 sons who can possess vital convictions 
 and ideas without the desire of foisting 
 them upon the whole community, through 
 a mistaken hope of reforming the world. 
 Without any feeling at all that death was 
 too solemn to talk about — for to her it was 
 just as simple and natural a matter as any 
 of the things in our daily experience — her 
 respect for other people's traditions and in- 
 stincts led her to a reticence maintained 
 with perfect sweetness, except when the 
 subject was broached or invited by others. 
 Consequently it was in a natural and un- 
 forced way that she came to outline to me 
 some of her imaginings about what comes 
 after "the end"; for it was a time of real 
 
 [114] 
 
Otz ©[teat BDtientute 
 
 need in my own life, and I turned to her 
 instinctively for help. 
 
 It was just before I was to have a sur- 
 gical operation performed at a hospital, 
 and as the case was considered serious and 
 the outcome very uncertain, I found myself 
 full of foreboding and anxiety. 
 
 Carroll spent the day before the opera- 
 tion at the hospital with me. Her sym- 
 pathy for my state of mind was genuine, 
 and it helped me, but even then it was the 
 knowledge of her own "queer" convictions 
 that was most comforting. 
 
 "Do you suppose I'll live, Carroll?" I 
 asked, in the futile way one does, because 
 of the desire to hear reassuring words, 
 though one knows they can be words only. 
 
 "Yes, I do, Theodora. You're strong 
 and sturdy, and I don't believe you'll let go 
 your grip," she encouraged me, staunchly. 
 
 "I suppose you, in my place, wouldn't 
 mind a bit?" I asked, weakly smiling. 
 
 [115] 
 
O&e Gtreat HDttenture 
 
 "Oh, yes; I'd mind the discomfort, and 
 the sickness — and the expense!" she added, 
 ruefully. Carroll always had to think of 
 expense. 
 
 ' 'But, if the worst should happen — Oh, 
 Carroll, I am not ready to leave this beauti- 
 ful world, this beautiful, beautiful world, 
 full of its human joys and hopes and aspira- 
 tions ! There are so many things I want to 
 do and accomplish, so many lovely things 
 I want to take part in and experience. I 
 have hardly begun to live yet; I can't bear 
 to think of leaving it all!" 
 
 "But you won't have to leave it all; not 
 in any case !" urged Carroll. "You are you, 
 and you'll always be you, and you'll keep 
 your ability to live and enjoy to the full, 
 even if you don't come out of the ether into 
 this world." 
 
 "Oh, of course," I said, drearily, 
 "Heaven, and that sort of thing; but I want 
 the gaiety and joy of the flesh — of this life." 
 [116] 
 
©&e ©treat Sfotienture 
 
 Carroll looked at me with those thought- 
 ful, puzzled eyes, trying to get just my 
 point of view, so that she could put her own 
 more clearly. 
 
 "By 'Heaven' do you mean something 
 vague and hazy and wishy-washy?" she 
 asked, as usual failing to temper her words 
 to the shorn lamb which I had been brought 
 up to consider all "religious" subjects. 
 "You don't imagine that we'll be less gay 
 and light-hearted than we are now, do you? 
 That having once been vivid in experience, 
 we shall attain to a featureless, flaccid ex- 
 istence? How could we? It is because we 
 are vivid, because we have that wonderful 
 sense of undying aliveness that we are jus- 
 tified in believing that sense is indestruc- 
 tible." 
 
 I agreed, but still half-heartedly, resign- 
 edly, as we do, perforce, at mortal crises of 
 our lives. 
 
 "Yes, I suppose that is so; and that we 
 [117] 
 
C56e Great Stoemure 
 
 shall be blessed, which Carlyle says is better 
 than being merely happy, and all that. 
 But, Carroll, though you'd think I would 
 be glad at the idea of rest and peace, yet 
 somehow — " 
 
 " Why, of course you aren't!" she inter- 
 rupted. "Who that is full of life is enam- 
 ored of the idea of perpetual inaction? I 
 am sure that's not what I want. I want 
 life, activity, problems, — yes, even perplex- 
 ities and puzzles and bufferings — every- 
 thing that makes up the round sum of real 
 living; and there will be plenty of these, 
 I'm sure, all the way along." 
 
 "Oh, Carroll, you make it sound almost 
 interesting; but how could there be prob- 
 lems up there?" 
 
 "Oh, Theodora, I don't make it sound one- 
 millionth as 'interesting' as I know it is go- 
 ing to be ! What makes you think it is 'up 
 there,' at all? And who would care a rap 
 for it if the answers were all given bef ore- 
 Ins] 
 
C5fte Gtreat Stotoentttre 
 
 hand, or if we were going to hibernate or 
 turn into a kind of sanctified jelly-fish?" 
 
 "Well, granting even that," I said, after 
 a pause, "activity is not all I want. I have 
 to confess to desires and satisfactions that 
 lie on a lower plane. I want to be gay, as 
 I am here, in this world ; I want to sing and 
 dance and ride horseback and skate and go 
 to the theater and read books! I suppose 
 you can't understand such a groveling list 
 of pleasure and state of mind, when I ought 
 to be repeating the Penitential Psalm; but 
 I'm trying to speak the truth for once, the 
 poor, real, miserable truth." 
 
 Carroll laughed. "I don't see why you 
 should call those things of a low order. 
 Who knows what is high or low? For my 
 part, I'd hate to pull everything to pieces 
 and decide, for they're all lovely, though so 
 different. It's enjoyment that counts — 
 whether it comes from looking at a wonder- 
 ful prospect from a mountain top, or hear- 
 [119] 
 
Gfie ©[teat fifotientute 
 
 ing a symphony, or walking in a splendid 
 wind, or swimming in the big sea, or mov- 
 ing to music in a ballroom, or touching the 
 hand of a friend who loves you. Every 
 single one of them makes your eyes shine 
 and a glow come to you at the thought of 
 the beauty of life, and causes something in 
 you say and to feel 'Thank God!' And 
 that is the root of the whole matter," added 
 Carroll, meditatively. "God, or whatever 
 you may call the splendid Intelligence that 
 devised all these things — soft air and moun- 
 tain tops, and wind and water and snow and 
 ice, and human throat instrument for sing- 
 ing, and ear for music, and pleasure in 
 rhythm, and joy in exercise and games and 
 striving, and heart for loving — that Intelli- 
 gence is at the bottom of it, and has proven 
 such a marvelous Originator and Inventor 
 and Planner for possibilities of enjoyment, 
 right now, that I don't see how we can, in 
 reason, distrust His ability to keep on. I, 
 
 [120] 
 
C5fce Gtteat fifoaenture 
 
 for my part, am willing to risk it, and just 
 expect fine and splendid surprises — as that 
 first northern winter was full of undreamed 
 of sports and pleasures for my little cousin 
 John, when he came up from Cuba." 
 
 "But spirit — spirit can't enjoy the things 
 I mean; spirit couldn't!" 
 
 "How do you know? It's spirit that does 
 the enjoying now, isn't it? And it's rather 
 dangerous to say what can or can't happen 
 beyond the limit of our own experience. 
 That, too, reminds me of John's precon- 
 ceived ideas, and how they were upset. Do 
 you remember about him?" 
 
 "Not in any such connection as this," I 
 answered, listlessly. 
 
 "Well, you know his father was a planter 
 there; and when he and my aunt took vaca- 
 tions and came up to "the States," they al- 
 ways left the children at home, so that John 
 was twelve when he first went to Canada for 
 the winter. 
 
 [121] 
 
<5&e Great Httoenture 
 
 "They had told him how in the north- 
 ern winter the water becomes solid, so 
 that it would bear one's weight. He has 
 told me since how he used to puzzle over 
 that one statement, and think, 'Why, it 
 can't be so; at least, not our kind of 
 water; it stands to reason it isn't so!' 
 And yet his parents, who made the asser- 
 tion, had actually been there and seen it ! I 
 suppose he would have been more skeptical 
 still if they hadn't seen it themselves, and 
 had only deduced it from their knowledge 
 of physics. Then, John loved his home and 
 didn't want to leave it for the northern 
 school at all. He says he just knew that 
 would be the end of his fun. He used to 
 ask if the northern boys went swimming all 
 the year round, and had coral to dive for, 
 and could go barefooted all the time, and 
 had the same tropical fruits to eat that he 
 had in Cuba: and when he was told they 
 didn't do and have exactly these things, 
 
 [122] 
 
<5&e Gtreat Btotoentute 
 
 but had just as much fun in other ways — 
 sleighing, snow-balling, tobogganing, skee- 
 ing, and so on — he was awfully melancholy, 
 and felt exactly as you do now, Theodora; 
 said he s'posed he'd enjoy it, but that was 
 because he would be older and different and 
 wouldn't expect to have fun any more. 
 
 "And he was the most surprised boy, when 
 he found that 'up north' he was just as much 
 of a rollicking harum-scarum as ever — 
 really more so, because the bracing air 
 whipped his blood into circulation and gave 
 him a zest and keenness for enjoyment he 
 had never known before, and life was jollier 
 than he had ever dreamed." 
 
 "That's very nice," I said, half sadly, "if 
 it were a true analogy. But of course you're 
 only imagining there's any similitude." 
 
 "Why, of course I am!" said Carroll, 
 brightly. "I don't know what it's going to 
 be. All I mean by speaking of John is, 
 that our experiences right now are full of 
 
 [123] 
 
£5&e Gtreat Htttenture 
 
 surprises and apparent contradictions to 
 reason, and so we needn't, if we don't want 
 to, assume that existence without the flesh 
 means some kind of blessed, impersonal in- 
 anity! I expect the kind of happiness that 
 you call gayety, of course. Is that big ele- 
 ment of my nature going to be dropped, all 
 at once — that almost nicest part of it, that 
 God put there Himself? Then I wouldn't 
 be Carroll Page!" 
 
 That evening several different people 
 came in to see me, and they all talked kindly 
 and encouragingly. And my mother was 
 tender and consoling and hopeful, and the 
 nurses were angels of sweetness and light. 
 But none of these had so much effect in re- 
 moving apprehension and dread from the 
 dark hour into which I walked the next day, 
 as had that thought given me by the "athe- 
 istic" Carroll — of the originality and com- 
 petence of the "Splendid Intelligence" that 
 had made my life here so sweet. 
 
 [124] 
 
Art than poor, unb tjaat tljmt yalbm Blumbtts. 
 (3 amppt (EontPttt 
 — T. Dekker 
 
 XXIV 
 
 JX^HEN I said that Carroll's impulsive na- 
 VL/ ture led her into one serious pitfall, I 
 was thinking of her marriage. She never 
 by word or sign acknowledged that it had 
 been a mistake, and out of loyalty to what I 
 know would have been her wishes I must 
 touch as lightly as I can on this experience 
 of her life. 
 
 It is sufficient to say that he was a cripple, 
 and that this affliction served to Carroll as a 
 veil hiding his moral unsoundness, and elic- 
 iting her headlong, all-giving sympathy, and 
 all her tenderness. He was also a musician, 
 and had the articulate artistic temperament ; 
 so that he undoubtedly made the most of the 
 fact that his deformity cut him off from 
 
 [125] 
 
<5&e Gtreat Boaenture 
 
 many of the natural pleasures of life, and 
 did it with a poignant dramatic force that 
 must especially have appealed to the girl 
 who so loved life in all its fullness and rich- 
 ness. All this I merely guess at, having 
 known her as I did, and so having been able 
 to picture the kind of man who would nat- 
 urally have won her heart. What everyone 
 knew about the matter was that she started 
 by being his champion against the rest of 
 us, feeling that our judgments were harsh 
 and unjust, and ended by marrying him. 
 
 They began housekeeping on the out- 
 skirts of the town, and Carroll carried into 
 the poverty of this new life the same light- 
 heartedness and capacity for enjoyment 
 that had marked her girlhood. I remember 
 going to her one morning to carry some 
 message or invitation from "the old crowd," 
 and finding her flushed, and a little tired- 
 looking, hammering away at some boxes in 
 the middle of the kitchen. She sank down 
 [126] 
 
O&e Gtteat Bitoentute 
 
 on the floor, Turk fashion, as I entered, and 
 pushing back the damp rings of hair from 
 her forehead, looked up with the old re- 
 doubtable smile. 
 
 "Oh, Theodora!" she exclaimed, in a nice 
 way she had that seemed to say my coming 
 was the one thing she most wanted, "it's 
 wonderful, the things one can do with boxes 
 and barrels! This is a dressing-table that 
 I am fabricating now. Isn't it going to be 
 a darling? And just come and see the 
 book-cases I've made, and the barrel chair!" 
 
 She led me into the small parlor, and gaily 
 indicated the results of her labors. 
 
 "This I actually made all myself," she 
 said, pointing with pride to a very good- 
 looking library table, and running her hand 
 caressingly over its smooth brown surface. 
 I did every bit of it, planning and planing, 
 sawing and finishing; and I'm prouder of it 
 than of any canvas I ever dabbled paint 
 over!" 
 
 [127] 
 
Otis ©treat Bfotienture 
 
 "But you are tired, Carroll, dear!" I ex- 
 postulated, as I had done when we were lit- 
 tle girls and she was stacking wood. "You 
 work all the time, now, and don't ever give 
 yourself recreation. Oh, if you only had a 
 little more of this world's goods!" 
 
 "Stuff and nonsense!" scouted Carroll, 
 briskly. "People who have money to go 
 and buy whatever they fancy, all made, 
 don't get half the pleasure that those do 
 who have to contrive. It's such fun to 
 make something out of nothing!" 
 
 "You're a hopeless optimist!" I laughed. 
 "If you had lots of funds, I know you 
 would think that that was the best thing on 
 earth!" 
 
 "Well, I daresay I should try to look on 
 the bright side of it," admitted Carroll, with 
 one of her contagious chuckles, "but I can 
 be just exactly as happy looking on the 
 bright side of this. So what's the differ- 
 ence ?" 
 
 [128] 
 
Branttful UjUtga mao* txtw, for tlf* sttrprfB* 
 
 m tilt Bky-rljU&rwt. 
 
 — Keats 
 
 XXV 
 
 i^vHERE had been a peculiarly atrocious 
 ^^ murder committed in Detroit that year. 
 The criminal had been tried and convicted, 
 and was sentenced to be hanged "sometime 
 in the week beginning December 13." It 
 was during that week that some of us were 
 sitting together, one day, in Carroll's little 
 box of a parlor, embroidering towels for 
 Kate Pearson's trousseau, according to the 
 unconventional but helpful custom of our 
 little group; and, in a lull in our desultory 
 talk, Eunice sighed and said: 
 
 "I wonder if that man Morrison was ex- 
 ecuted to-day?" 
 
 "Hope not," responded Kate; "I hope 
 [129] 
 
C56e Great Etoenture 
 
 he's got another day or two to dread it in. 
 Nothing could be bad enough for him!" 
 
 "It must be the worst punishment possi- 
 ble, though," I ruminated, "to be sentenced 
 in that way, with no definite time men- 
 tioned; to wake up each morning wonder- 
 ing, 'Will it be to-day ?' — to live through 
 each waking minute and hour, not knowing 
 how many more there will be before one is 
 led off to the block and the black cap." 
 
 "I read somewhere," contributed Anna, 
 "that in a way we are all sentenced crimi- 
 nals, all doomed to death, only not knowing 
 the appointed date. And it's so, girls, isn't 
 it? We've all got to pay the penalty just 
 as surely as this Morrison has, and we and 
 he are almost equally in the dark as to the 
 exact time — the only difference being that 
 he knows it must come this week, and we 
 don't know whether for us it will be this 
 week or next, or later." 
 
 "I never thought of it that way before," 
 
 [130] 
 
<5&e Sxtat Eftmenture 
 
 I reflected. "Isn't it a wonder we can be 
 so happy and cheerful when we know this 
 sentence is hanging over our heads?" 
 
 "I suppose Carroll doesn't feel that way 
 at all?" questioned Eunice, looking up wist- 
 fully. 
 
 Carroll did not seem inclined to talk. 
 
 "Well, naturally," she said, finally, as we 
 all waited for her to answer, "it wouldn't 
 make me perfectly miserable to know, each 
 morning when I woke up, that I might be 
 going that day on a new expedition — to 
 have an interesting adventure. It all de- 
 pends on the way you look at it. You can 
 call it a 'sentence of death,' and be lugu- 
 brious, or you can call it the promise of a 
 matchless excursion, and be gay." 
 
 "Carroll is cross," said Kate. 
 
 "I don't mean to be," Carroll replied; 
 "but it seems to me that people go out of 
 their way trying to make that whole sub- 
 ject painful. Whoever it was that thought 
 
 [131] 
 
<3&e Gtteat Bfoaentute 
 
 out the metaphor Anna just quoted, that 
 we are 'all sentenced criminals, not knowing 
 the date of our execution' — I read it, too — 
 must be a morbid neurasthenic, and ought 
 to be ashamed of himself for putting one 
 more stumbling-block of melancholy sug- 
 gestion in his fellow-mortals' way." 
 
 "Bravo!" applauded Kate. "If it's only 
 a matter of words, and not facts, he deserves 
 your censure." 
 
 "Facts!" exclaimed Anna, impatiently. 
 "Even the word is an impertinence in this 
 connection. The whole thing is nothing but 
 conjecture, and is bound to be so to the end 
 of time!" 
 
 "I'll tell you what I wish," said Kate. 
 "I wish the idea of Heaven seemed at least 
 desirable to me. It doesn't, and I can't 
 make it." 
 
 "Well," Eunice advanced, with unusual 
 independence, "did you ever happen to 
 think how much more beautiful it may be 
 
 [132] 
 
C56e ©[teat HDtienture 
 
 than we can even guess at? I heard a ser- 
 mon not long ago that gave me a new idea. 
 The point of it was that we haven't any 
 means of comparing this life and the life to 
 come; that all our objects for making the 
 parallel are probably entirely inadequate. 
 The illustration given was of a boy born 
 in a mine. When they tried to tell him 
 about the world above the air shaft his 
 conception of it would have to be formed 
 by picturing such images as he was familiar 
 with in the only place he knew — the dark 
 and gloomy cavern, thousands of feet away 
 from light and pure air and sunshine. 
 They would tell him that overhead was a 
 sky of shining blue, with the glorious sun 
 for its light; and he would imagine some- 
 thing like the dim shadowy arches of the 
 mine, with the smoking yellow mine-lantern 
 giving off its murky rays. They would 
 tell him of a carpet of green, soft grass, 
 and of growing flowers; and he would pic- 
 
 [133] 
 
G&e Gtreat Eftmenture 
 
 ture the damp, cold floor of the mine, with 
 its slippery green slime, and its tufts of fun- 
 gus here and there in the ooze. They 
 would speak of rivers and brooks and of 
 the sea; and the only water he could use for 
 comparison would be the dank, poisonous 
 pools in the bottom of the mine. So you 
 see, no matter how faithfully he tried to 
 multiply his dimensions and beautify his 
 images, his picture would be a vague replica 
 of the world under the surface of the earth ; 
 absolutely and entirely different from the 
 beautiful glowing world up here that he had 
 never seen." 
 
 "That must suit you down to the ground, 
 Carroll," I said, as no one else spoke for 
 a minute after Eunice finished. 
 
 "Well," Carroll had dropped her work, 
 and sat still, thinking; "I like the cheerful- 
 ness of it, but it suggests an idea of remote- 
 ness that doesn't quite appeal to me. I 
 hope he meant it only figuratively; that he 
 
 [134] 
 
 
O&e ©(teat Sfotienture 
 
 wasn't thinking of the beauties of any actual 
 distant and unknown place, when he spoke 
 of that Heaven so unlike this earth. Per- 
 sonally, I don't think of the life that simply 
 goes on as being so different as that from 
 the life we are now living, or of the place it 
 goes on in as being so far away. The eyes 
 of the spirit may see it as being more beauti- 
 ful than it is to us, but I always feel, some- 
 way, as if it were likely to be right here. 
 Why shouldn't that be the natural thing?" 
 
 "How could it be?" I remonstrated. 
 Then I laughed a little. "Spirits would be 
 awfully crowded and elbowed if they set- 
 tled down amongst so many objects and 
 commodities as this earth is full of. I 
 should think they'd need more room — that 
 they wouldn't want to be jostled!" 
 
 "Frivolous!" said Kate, sotto voce. 
 
 "We don't know much about spirit and 
 its laws," persisted Carroll, "but we do 
 know something about material bodies; and 
 
 [135] 
 
©&e Gfceat Btotienture 
 
 among other things we know that many- 
 forms of animal life exist here, side by side, 
 and go their separate ways and live their 
 whole lives, utterly unconscious of each oth- 
 er's presence. We are not 'crowded and 
 elbowed' by millions of tiny living things 
 which we know of only theoretically ; and 
 as for them, I don't suppose they ever dream 
 that they aren't the only inhabitants of the 
 earth and air. Very likely even that big 
 little animal, the ant, never thinks of us as 
 fellow beings; if we enter its life at all, it 
 is as unconquerable forces — as when one of 
 our feet crushes out a hundred of them at 
 once; and the ant, in turn, is an inconceiv- 
 able giant to myriads of smaller creatures 
 invisible to our eyes. And so, if unknown 
 to each other there exist so many different 
 worlds of animal life, all about us, it seems 
 the simplest thing possible that still another 
 world may be right here, unseen, as we are 
 unseen by the creatures of the microscope 
 [136] 
 
C5fie Gtreat Botoenture 
 
 — perhaps sometimes dimly felt. I like 
 that idea better than that of a distant 
 Heaven; though I'm not afraid of being 
 lonesome, wherever it is, for it's sure to be 
 interesting!" 
 
 [137] 
 
Borne jsmtttg aprll 
 Qto fttBatpat? Hit sijafaroia. 
 
 — Keats 
 
 XXVI 
 
 j^^HIS was during the first year of their 
 ^**r marriage. The next, they went 
 " 'way out west" to live, in a town in Ne- 
 braska. Richard had relatives there, and 
 it was one of the traits of his unstable na- 
 ture to love change. I always thought, 
 too, that he was jealous of Carroll's pleas- 
 ure in her friends, and that he wanted to 
 get her away from the place she knew and 
 loved. If that was so, it showed how little 
 he really knew Carroll, for no transplant- 
 ing could crush her sense of pleasure in her 
 surroundings; that she carried with her and 
 it was indestructible. 
 
 We heard little about them. Carroll's 
 
 [138] 
 
C5&e Gfteat Bntientute 
 
 letters gave almost no information as to the 
 outward circumstances of her life. Two 
 years after they went away I visited them, 
 unasked. I was saddened by the great 
 change in Carroll's looks. She was pale and 
 thin and almost wan ; but there was a steady 
 brightness in her eyes, she was childishly ex- 
 cited over my visit, and she gaily brushed 
 aside all my anxious inquiries. On Rich- 
 ard's appearance, too, I saw with almost 
 equal concern, because of his connection 
 with my friend, his sins had begun to make 
 deep impress. In the clouded eyes, the 
 shaking hand, the mottled complexion, I 
 saw evidences only too clear of the life he 
 had been leading; and still Carroll was si- 
 lent, even with me, the friend who loved her 
 best. 
 
 Only once during my visit did she give 
 any hint of the uphill road she was travel- 
 ing, and that was the morning after a dread- 
 ful night when he was brought home help- 
 [139] 
 
©fie Gtteat Efotientute 
 
 less, bestial. On that morning she asked 
 me to cut my visit short and go at once. 
 She made no flimsy excuses; she knew I 
 would understand, and I suppose she hoped 
 I would hold my peace about it. In this 
 she was disappointed. 
 
 "Oh, Carroll!" I cried, "why did it have 
 to be this way? Why couldn't life have 
 been beautiful for you, as it is for me?" 
 
 "Why, Theodora Starkweather, life is 
 beautiful for me ! The little flecks — I don't 
 have to hold them between me and the sun 
 all the time, do I? And then," she added, 
 smiling, "the nicest thing of all I can never 
 lose; the consciousness, at the background 
 of all my thoughts — especially if I ever get 
 a little discouraged or upset by things that 
 seem to go wrong — that something nice is 
 going to happen further on; that no one 
 can keep me from that, anyway! Just as, 
 when I was a little girl, if I knew that I 
 was to go to a party or a picnic later in the 
 
 [140] 
 
(5&e Gxtat Eftroenture 
 
 week, I could do all the small, irksome 
 'chores,' and run the endless errands, and 
 work at the stupid lessons, quite cheerfully, 
 because of the pleasant thing in store." 
 
 "And the pleasant thing in this case is 
 Heaven ?" 
 
 "Well, not in the sense of something sur- 
 veyed, mapped out. No. I think rather 
 of the unknown Afterwards, the next 
 Event, the Land of Finding Out — the 
 Great Adventure that's before us all." 
 
 [141] 
 
£foti*r Btrtk? sail in a f*ar — 
 <&amt ttttn port gtiailg. 
 
 — Emerson 
 
 XXVII 
 
 gFTER that, we heard almost nothing 
 from them for six years. Now and 
 then there floated to us some rumor about 
 Richard, that his weaknesses were growing 
 upon him, that he was sinking lower and 
 lower in the scale of being, becoming more 
 and more the slave of his appetites. Now 
 and then came a disturbing report in re- 
 gard to Carroll's health; that over- work and 
 deprivations and neglect were taking their 
 toll of her. Then came news of Richard's 
 death; and after that Carroll came back 
 to us. 
 
 It is with a strange commingling of 
 
 [142] 
 
O&e Gtreat Btotoentute 
 
 eagerness and reluctance that I approach 
 the account of those last happy months of 
 Carroll's life, when, worn out and poor and 
 mortally ill, she came back to Detroit to 
 be with her own again. The eagerness 
 comes from a deep desire to share with oth- 
 ers that happy memory ; the reluctance, from 
 a fear that I may not be able to portray 
 exactly as it was the atmosphere of whole- 
 someness and sunshine that pervaded that 
 entire time, and makes it look, in the retro- 
 spect, like a bright Indian summer. Car- 
 roll did not convey the slightest idea of the 
 dying heroine; there was, in fact, such an 
 unsentimental every-dayness about her, that 
 when we speak to each other now of that 
 wonderful time, we would explain, if ques- 
 tioned, that the wonderfulness lay in the 
 naturalness of it all — in our entire free- 
 dom from any sense of approaching calam- 
 ity, in the absence of gloom, of conventional 
 slurrings over, of euphemistic phrases, of 
 
 [143] 
 
C5&e ©treat Hotienture 
 
 thin disguises. Carroll had come home to 
 die, and we knew from the first that the time 
 could not be far off. But it was the most 
 marvelous time of waiting conceivable, be- 
 cause it was from beginning to end so un- 
 affectedly pleasant and so full of simple 
 good-cheer. 
 
 [144] 
 
An& not from East* m mmiiotoa oalg . • • • 
 
 — Clouoh 
 
 XXVIII 
 
 ^T^E were shocked at first, when we saw 
 \!l/ the plain little face so colorless and 
 worn, as if the iron gauntlet of cruel cir- 
 cumstance had passed over it, erasing all the 
 girlish contours and tints. But the eager- 
 ness remained; Carroll's eyes, even though 
 set in that dimmed, whitened face, were the 
 same expectant, interested eyes as of old; 
 observing alertly the details of the passing 
 panorama of life, searching for its gay and 
 cheerful things, finding each new page as 
 full of charm and novelty as they had twenty 
 years before. 
 
 Almost immediately upon her return she 
 took to her room, at Miss Sophia Page's, 
 and even to the couch, under the window. 
 
 [145] 
 
©Be ©fceat BDtientute 
 
 Our tender pity, our aff ectionate solicitude, 
 fell back shamefaced and embarrassed be- 
 fore her gay courage and commonplace ac- 
 ceptance of facts. She found her lack of 
 strength amusing but not sad. 
 
 "Isn't it too funny for me to be lying here 
 in elegance, like a veritable Camille?" she 
 said, by way of breaking the ice, at the first 
 visit of "our crowd" ; women, now, of thirty 
 and over, with families and cares, and some 
 crows' feet and grayness, but "girls" still to 
 one another. 
 
 Carroll's room was such a cheerful place 
 that it became at once a favorite gathering- 
 point for us all. Invalids, especially those 
 who are known to be almost through with 
 life, are often the objects of tender devo- 
 tion, and the recipients of kindly calls and 
 loving attentions; but such visits are likely 
 to be made from a sense of duty, and in 
 the face of an instinctive feeling almost of 
 reluctance. To Carroll's room, on the con- 
 
 [146] 
 
Gfie Gtreat BDtoemure 
 
 trary, we flocked, not from altruism, but 
 because it gave us pleasure. We were 
 merry there, and yet it was not because of 
 dodging the facts of the case. That would 
 not have been Carroll's way. 
 
 "Isn't it wonderful," she said to us, in 
 her old, underscoring manner, "isn't it won- 
 derful to think how soon it's really going to 
 happen, and to me ! Girls, can you actually 
 believe it?" 
 
 I recalled a time when, long ago, she had 
 said that she could "hardly wait"; the 
 "hardly wait" look was in her face now. 
 
 "Oh, Carroll," said Kate, "you talk as if 
 you were in a hurry to leave us!" 
 
 "I don't mean it that way," answered 
 Carroll, with quick compunction. "You 
 know I've always said I'd be in a hurry if 
 I weren't having such a good time here that 
 I didn't want to miss any of it. But now 
 it seems, by the way Dr. Brown shakes his 
 head and looks at Aunt Sophy and won't an- 
 [147] 
 
O&e Gfceat Sfotienture 
 
 swer my questions — funny old thing! — as 
 if I'd had about all of it that is allotted to 
 me; and I'm just enough of a little girl yet 
 to be curious and eager about the 'what 
 next?' When it's decided that you're really 
 going somewhere, you know, and you are 
 all packed and waiting on the station plat- 
 form for your train, it's natural, isn't it, to 
 be looking up the track to be getting the 
 first glimpse of the locomotive? But of 
 course," she added, smiling, "you're just as 
 interested in the friends who have come to 
 the train with you, as ever you were; and 
 you love them more than ever, if anything!" 
 
 [148] 
 
$0ttt $nab \s man's l\U t tift mtrt linUto.— Browning 
 
 XXIX 
 
 ONE day when I was with her alone, 
 someone downstairs — it was Mary 
 Royce, who used her great musical gift gen- 
 erously for her friends' pleasure — began to 
 sing that little song of Riley's — "There, lit- 
 tle girl, don't cry" — that is a favorite with 
 most people, and the words came up to us 
 distinctly, as we listened, in the room above. 
 I considerately refrained from looking 
 Carroll's way, while the song was in prog- 
 ress, it seemed to fit her so perfectly — the 
 broken doll, and the promise of the better 
 things of youth; the broken slate, and the 
 hope held out of compensating life and love 
 to come; and for fulfillment of all hopes 
 and promises — what? 
 
 [149] 
 
05&e ©treat Efotoenture 
 
 There, little girl, don't cry ! They have broken your 
 heart, I know, 
 
 And the rainbow gleams of your youthful dreams, 
 
 Are things of the long ago. 
 But Heav'n holds all for which you sigh. 
 There, little girl, don't cry! 
 
 I glanced shyly, almost apprehensively 
 towards her, when the last notes had been 
 sung. To my surprise, instead of being 
 immersed in the gentle melancholy that I 
 felt sure the tender little song must have 
 evoked, I found a frown on her forehead, 
 and a very unspiritual expression on her 
 face. 
 
 "What an absurd song!" she said, impa- 
 tiently. "Why on earth do people choose 
 to sing such gloomy, depressing things, let 
 alone write them?" 
 
 "Why," I exclaimed, aghast, "it isn't 
 meant that way, Carroll!" 
 
 "Well, it's sung that way, anyway," she 
 insisted, "with the most dribbling sentimen- 
 tality in voice and inflection. I'll bet there 
 
 [150] 
 
C)&e Gtreat Bttoenture 
 
 are tears in Mary's eyes now, while she is 
 closing the piano!" 
 
 "But it tries to be hopeful, religious," I 
 argued, idiotically. ' 'Heaven holds all for 
 which you sigh'; that's what you say, Car- 
 roll." 
 
 "No, I don't," Carroll said, stubbornly. 
 "I don't say Heaven holds all; I say earth 
 holds loads of good things, and Heaven 
 only keeps on. And it isn't 'religious' to be 
 dissatisfied with the things we have right 
 now; it's unappreciative and ungrateful. 
 If I were as disappointed in all the experi- 
 ences of earth as that song indicates, I'd 
 have little hope of attaining happiness in the 
 Keeping-On Land. The analogy in it is 
 awful. The little girl is broken-hearted— 
 but youth is going to make up; youth dis- 
 appoints her — but love will make up; love 
 proves a fiasco — but Heaven will make up. 
 You see what Heaven is going to do, to be 
 logical!" 
 
 [151] 
 
G&e Gtreat Bouentute 
 
 "Well, it's so, of the earth part, any- 
 way," I insisted. 
 
 Carroll laughed. "You're a goose, Theo- 
 dora. I don't think it is so, even of the 
 earth part. Of course the doll gets broken; 
 why shouldn't it? Childhood tires of dolls 
 and throws them away for more grown-up 
 things to play with. The child in this song 
 is like a chicken sighing because it has left 
 the shell!" 
 
 Of course I had been talking merely for 
 the sake of talking. Now, however, when 
 I became really serious, and expressed the 
 platitudinous "lesson" in words, I said, it 
 seemed, the very worst thing of all. 
 
 "You know as well as I do, Carroll, that 
 the meaning of the little poem is absolutely 
 incontestable: that the things of earth are 
 not really satisfying ; that we must wait for 
 another life for unalloyed enjoyment and 
 happiness." 
 
 "Oh, bosh!" she exclaimed, with more ir- 
 
 [152] 
 
C5&e Gtteat Efotoenture 
 
 ritation than she often showed; "if we can't 
 enjoy the lovely things of now, how can we 
 hope to enjoy the things of then? One has 
 got to get fun as one goes along, and we're 
 just as surely going along now as we shall 
 be going along then. That's a silly song!" 
 
 [15$] 
 
Me ttti lijat mt are greater ttjatt tn* know. 
 — Wordsworth 
 
 XXX 
 
 [OMETIMES one human being may 
 suppose, for a score of years, that he 
 knows another well, and then only by chance 
 find out that he has been living all that time 
 in complete ignorance of that other's real 
 interests and vital problems. I never 
 guessed that Anna Everett's fear of death 
 as the end of all things had been the under- 
 lying horror and dread of her whole life, 
 until it came out one morning in Carroll's 
 room, when we had all been talking and 
 laughing for an hour like foolish school- 
 girls. Then, suddenly, little Ellen White 
 sobered down and exclaimed, 
 
 "Oh, Carroll, you must get well! I can't 
 give you up and feel that you are really 
 going to leave us! You seem the most 
 
 [154] 
 
<5&e Great Sfotoemute 
 
 alive person I ever knew ; I can't even think 
 of you as being any other way." 
 
 "You don't have to, and won't have to, 
 Ellen dear," Carroll replied, deeply touched, 
 as she always was, at the exhibition of any 
 personal feeling towards herself. 
 
 "Do you mean you think you can get 
 well, even yet?" asked Ellen, eagerly. 
 
 Carroll made a wry little face and shook 
 her head. 
 
 "Not the way you mean. This body, I 
 guess, is too ragged and faded and worn 
 thin in spots, for me to be able to do much 
 more with it. But look here, Ellen," she 
 said, holding out her hand, "if this hand 
 were to be cut off, here at the wrist, and 
 carried out of the room, would you follow 
 it sadly, thinking it was any part of me?" 
 
 "Of course not," answered little Ellen. 
 
 "Well, if it were taken off at the elbow, 
 would you? or at the shoulder? No? I — 
 the I that you think of as being alive, as 
 
 [155] 
 
Cfte ©treat HDtienture 
 
 you say^ — am something quite distinct from 
 hand or arm or foot or any other part of 
 this anatomy, am I not? So why are you 
 so over-anxious about this old body's get- 
 ting well? Though I don't want to speak 
 of it disrespectfully; it has done me many 
 a good turn, first and last." 
 
 Little Ellen pondered, gazing at her 
 friend. 
 
 "The real You," she said; "it's the ques- 
 tion of the ages. When I say or think You, 
 I have the image of this form of yours, and 
 your face and eyes and smile; as you say, 
 each one or all might be eliminated, and 
 You would not be touched; and yet, how 
 we love the visible presence of those we 
 care for!" 
 
 "I often wish our eyes were provided 
 with more powerful lenses," said Carroll; 
 "think how inferior their scope is even to 
 that of the camera! If they were a million 
 times stronger than that, very likely the 
 
 [156] 
 
C56e ©treat Bfotientute 
 
 real You could see the real Me. I wonder 
 what it would be like?" 
 
 "Nothing I'd like to look at half so much 
 as I do this that I see right now; I know 
 that!" Ellen replied, doggedly. 
 
 "Pooh!" scoffed Carroll, "I suppose that's 
 what a caterpillar may say to a caterpillar 
 friend, but I'll bet when he sees him later 
 as a golden-winged butterfly they both have 
 a laugh over his former absurdity." 
 
 "Carroll, leave off romancing," Anna 
 broke in, out of a brown study, "and talk 
 to me about something that has always 
 troubled me. I've never been afraid of the 
 place of torment and eternal punishment 
 that my creed dwells upon; I feel sure such 
 things can't be, if there's a good God. 
 But it seems to me all analogy points to an 
 end, at the end of life; to our little breath 
 of individuality and consciousness going out 
 altogether, like the life of a plant or an 
 animal." 
 
 [157] 
 
©fie Gtteat Boaenture 
 
 "Like the life of a plant or an animal," 
 Carroll repeated slowly, to herself. 
 
 "Why, yes; they die — and that's the end 
 of them. You admit that, don't you?" 
 
 "I don't know," she answered, still 
 thoughtful. "How can we tell?" 
 
 "Oh, well, that's foolish!" Anna cried, 
 impatiently. "Why should we think, then, 
 that we alone keep on, when everything else 
 lives its little span, and then perishes? 
 There's a terribly weak spot in what you've 
 just been saying to Ellen; and at that spot 
 lies much of my doubt and fear about the 
 continuance of life. The hand may be re- 
 moved, the foot, large portions of the body, 
 as you say, without affecting the identity; 
 but how about the brain? Each tiniest 
 thought is represented by a corresponding 
 change in the brain matter; without the ac- 
 tion of the brain, where would be that T 
 you were speaking of? Injure the tissues 
 of the brain in a certain way — and though 
 
 [158] 
 
C5&e Gtteat Htoenture 
 
 life may keep on, one's individual conscious- 
 ness is lost. What is the T but the mind, 
 and what is the mind but brain-process? 
 And brain is as material as the dust, and it 
 will return to dust!" 
 
 "Then I am my brain?" asked Carroll, 
 interestedly. 
 
 "Well, if thought has its origin in cellu- 
 lar changes in the brain? And if its origin 
 is a cell, its life ends with the cell's life, 
 doesn't it?" 
 
 "I don't believe anyone alive knows which 
 comes first, the brain-process or the 
 thought," said Carroll, taking the bit in her 
 teeth. "They must be so nearly simultane- 
 ous that very likely it can't be proven, either 
 way — which is the cause, and which the ef- 
 fect." 
 
 "But if it is proven — if it should be — " 
 urged Anna, with a lingering hope in her 
 friend's ability to "see through" things. 
 
 "I— I— I—" Carroll repeated softly to 
 
 [159] 
 
G&e Gtteat HDtoenture 
 
 herself, as if she were trying, by audible ex- 
 pression, to straighten things out and 
 properly to locate this mysterious and elu- 
 sive personality. 
 
 Then her face cleared and she looked up 
 smiling. 
 
 "Well, Anna," she said, "I don't see such 
 an immense stumbling-block there. T am 
 not my hand, but I use my hand ; I couldn't 
 hold this material book without it. T am 
 not my heart, but I use my heart ; I couldn't 
 pump the blood through this physical body 
 without it. I use my lungs; I couldn't 
 aerate and purify this blood without them. 
 And so, in the same way, it seems to me, 
 T am not my brain, but I use my brain; 
 probably I couldn't get thoughts to this 
 physical consciousness without it. But I 
 believe it does the machine part of the 
 thought merely; that 'I' am the owner of 
 the brain, and the author of the thought; 
 that, though the brain and the other bodily 
 [160] 
 
C&e ©treat Bfotientute 
 
 organs seem essential to my perfect adjust- 
 ment to this physical world, yet above and 
 behind all these organs and processes sits 
 the T enthroned, — imperishable, undying! 
 Most likely not scientific, O Anna of little 
 faith, but satisfactory to me!" 
 "But— if the brain is injured — " 
 "Machine out of order," interrupted Car- 
 roll. "Here, I'll tell you what it's like. 
 It's like a telegrapher's outfit in a pioneer 
 country far from supplies. The instru- 
 ment and the wires are indispensable in get- 
 ting a message to the outside world. The 
 wires, however, can be injured, and even 
 broken, without necessarily cutting off the 
 usefulness of the apparatus; for they can 
 sometimes be mended or replaced, or the re- 
 ceiver may make connection at a nearer 
 point. But injure the sending instrument 
 itself, and no correct messages will go un- 
 less it can be repaired, which often is im- 
 possible, owing to the lack of facilities in 
 [161] 
 
CD&e Gtreat BDtientute 
 
 that crude country. The operator may try 
 to tap out the words and sentences he wishes 
 to send, but the machine is out of order — 
 they won't go at all, or they'll go all mixed 
 and garbled. Do one thing more: remove 
 the electricity, and not even a garbled mes- 
 sage can be sent. The apparatus is of no 
 further use. But what argument is there 
 in that, that there are not hundreds of mes- 
 sages lying ready to be sent, or that the 
 operator himself is not as hale and hearty 
 as ever ? He may have to wait until he can 
 deliver those messages in person — that is 
 all. 
 
 "Just suppose, of two operators who have 
 never seen each other, one grows to love 
 the messages and the thoughts that are 
 tapped out to him by the other, becomes 
 quite bound up in the sense of companion- 
 ship they have over the wires. Then some- 
 thing happens; dots and dashes that come 
 to him are all blurry and illegible, and finally 
 [162] 
 
(56e ©treat Sfofcenture 
 
 cease. He can't get the other instrument 
 to answer. He wrings his hands. He 
 says, 'My friend is broken and spoiled and 
 destroyed! I shall never hear from him 
 again!' Foolish! Oughtn't he to know 
 that, as he himself is not identical with his 
 instrument, but is its master, the person who 
 'uses' it — so his friend also is not a helpless 
 mechanism, but is the living operator on it? 
 And instead of deducing from the fact that 
 the instrument has ceased to respond to 
 him that his friend has perished, ought he 
 not rather to surmise the truth — that that 
 friend has been released from the necessity 
 of expressing himself by means of steel, 
 and copper wire, and may soon now com- 
 municate with him face to face; as soon as 
 he himself, in turn, is released from service 
 at his own post of duty, for freer and 
 larger self-expression?" 
 
 [168] 
 
3 htttU mg aattl a InrhlQ plramir* IfirttH*.— Tennysoh 
 
 XXXI 
 
 ONCE, in those last days, I remember 
 saying to her, after some trifling mis- 
 hap to certain plans I had made, 
 
 "Oh, well, that is always the way! One 
 ought to learn 'never to expect anything, 
 and one will never be disappointed.' " 
 
 "I never agreed with that," she replied. 
 "My motto is, 'Expect everything of every- 
 thing, and you won't be disappointed!' 
 Because something is always bound to come 
 true, you see!" 
 
 "Oh, Carroll!" I cried, in a sudden gust 
 of passionate pity for her, who cherished 
 so loyally and wore so gallantly the rags 
 and tatters of life that had been her por- 
 
 [164] 
 
<3&e Glteat Boaentute 
 
 tion, "can you say that, sincerely? Have 
 you always been so happy?" 
 
 She looked at me thoughtfully, chin 
 propped in hand, in the old way. 
 
 "I know what you mean, Theodora," she 
 said, "and perhaps it is just as well not to 
 ignore it, this once. 'Happy' is a badly 
 used little word," she went on, after a 
 pause. "When one speaks of a happy life, 
 one almost invariably means a life sur- 
 rounded by outwardly harmonious circum- 
 stances. Looked at in that way, possibly, 
 my life wouldn't be reckoned a particularly 
 happy one. But can you truly say it has 
 not been so? To me, to be interested is to 
 be happy; and I've always been interested, 
 always looking forward to something. I've 
 never got over thinking life is wonderful. 
 I almost believe I've been the very happiest, 
 really, of all our crowd." 
 
 "You have been so because you have 
 taken things that way," I retorted. "If 
 
 [165] 
 
©6e Gfeeat ElDtietmire 
 
 beautiful realities had been given you, 
 don't you think they, with your contented 
 spirit, would have made you doubly blest?" 
 
 "Contentment! That reminds me of a 
 browsy little lamb, nibbling in a pasture! 
 My kind of happiness seems to me a very 
 different thing from that; it means looking 
 over all the fences and between all the 
 bars, and being immensely interested in 
 every surrounding meadow and distant 
 mountain and flying bird. It's positive en- 
 joyment, not negative passivity. Of 
 course, Theodora, I don't know what 'might 
 have been' ; I only know this — that so far as 
 my observation goes, we'd be just about as 
 happy as we are, no matter how differently 
 we'd been placed!" 
 
 "I'll grant that riches and poverty are not 
 the gauges of satisfaction," I conceded. 
 "But — forgive me, Carroll — but don't you 
 think everyone is agreed that an ideal mar- 
 riage is essential to a woman's inmost sense 
 [166] 
 
C56e Gtreat Bfotienture 
 
 of fulfillment? That there is all the differ- 
 ence in the world between having that one 
 perfect, congenial companionship — and be- 
 ing without it?" 
 
 "I should think," said Carroll, with her 
 infectious laugh, yet thoughtfully, too, "it 
 might be easier to be happy, with such a 
 big stepping-stone to it. But I doubt if 
 the quality of the happiness, once attained, 
 is not just as livably satisfactory in one case 
 as another. Why, Theodora — I don't us- 
 ually like to be personal — but look at Kate 
 Pearson, with her nice husband and her 
 beautiful home and those darling children; 
 wouldn't anyone say she must be flawlessly 
 happy? And yet I truly don't believe she 
 ever knows a really satisfied hour. She is 
 annoyed because Jack has to be away so 
 much, worried to distraction about the chil- 
 dren's small ailments, uneasy even when she 
 looks in the glass for fear she'll see a line 
 or a gray hair!" 
 
 [167] 
 
O&e Glreat Botoentttre 
 
 "But those are such little things! Un- 
 derneath she has the solid foundation of joy 
 itself." 
 
 "That's just the point. She has the 
 thing you say is the foundation, but — is she 
 happy? What is happiness? Having a 
 reason for it, or being so? Wouldn't you 
 rather, if the choice were given you, feel 
 light-hearted all the time, as I do, than al- 
 ways be distressed and harassed and nerv- 
 ous, even if there were ten thousand 'solid 
 foundations' underneath?" 
 
 [168] 
 
3 wmxlb Irate tljat btutif btmbuQtb utg egrii 
 
 Attb baite m* rmp past! 
 
 •-Browning 
 
 XXXII 
 
 eRADUALLY and quite uncon- 
 sciously, we grew more and more into 
 Carroll's way of looking upon the time that 
 for her was now coming with swift feet, 
 and, later on, for us all. So that when one 
 day the minister, old Mr. Beebe, told her 
 that he thought her bright way of talking 
 about her death was sacrilegious, there was 
 not one of us who did not smile a little, and 
 feel that we understood her better than he. 
 Her "queerness," in fact, was beginning to 
 permeate our own attitude. 
 
 But those who did not know her so well 
 were still shocked by her gaiety and light- 
 headedness. I remember Helen Dean's 
 [169] 
 
O&e ©treat Btotienture 
 
 bewilderment when she came in one day, 
 towards the last, and found Carroll propped 
 up against her pillows — she could no longer 
 get to the couch by the window — her cheeks 
 flushed, and her hands hot with the fever 
 that was consuming her, looking with eager, 
 absorbed attention at dozens of bright sam- 
 ples of silk, from which one of the girls 
 was trying to select a gown. 
 
 "Oh, my dear Mrs. Kennedy, how sweet 
 of you to try to show an interest in these 
 trivial things when you are so ill!" cried 
 Mrs. Dean, glancing towards the rest of us 
 with meaning disapproval. 
 
 "Sweet of me? Not a bit!" was the char- 
 acteristic answer, given with all the old em- 
 phasis. "I think it's fun to be right in the 
 midst of things, up to the very last J" 
 
 [170] 
 
Na Hadttm* nf Unwell . . . 
 — Tennyson 
 
 XXXIII 
 
 ONE afternoon several of us walked up 
 to the house together. We were very 
 silent and looked apprehensively at the door 
 as we approached, fearing, as we had feared 
 each day for a week, that the nameless 
 thing had happened. Miss Page met us in 
 the hall. 
 
 "Don't stay long, girls," she said, in a 
 low tone. "She must not talk very much. 
 The doctor thinks she cannot last through 
 the night." 
 
 We went upstairs with a strange feeling, 
 strange because it was not terrified, nor 
 even wholly sad. We knew we should find 
 her smiling, as usual, and that there would 
 be no solemn hush, no mournful recognition 
 of a tragic end. 
 
 [171] 
 
"Oh, girls!" she called out, before we 
 fairly entered, "have you heard? Has Aunt 
 Sophy told you?" 
 
 "Yes, Carroll, dear," I answered for us 
 all; and then added, because I could not 
 help it, "and you are not a bit sorry — nor 
 afraid — even now?" 
 
 She smiled at me, a gay twinkling smile. 
 
 "You know better than to ask that, Theo- 
 dora! But I'll tell you the way I do feel. 
 I feel awfully, tremendously excited! I 
 never dreamed I should be so stirred up 
 about it; but it does seem so incredible, and 
 so splendid, that I am actually just about 
 to start, at last, on the Great Adventure!" 
 
 "If you could only be here, yourself, to 
 cheer us up after you go !" cried Eunice, in 
 sudden realization of our coming need. 
 "There's no one else can comfort us about 
 it, as you could!" 
 
 "What a dear, funny thing to think of!" 
 Carroll said, brightly. "I certainly am 
 [172] 
 
<3&e ©treat Hotienture 
 
 glad you girls think you will miss me; it's 
 lovely to be missed. But please don't do 
 it with lowered voices and averted eyes ; and 
 don't do it in the past tense when it isn't 
 absolutely necessary; 'Carroll was' sounds 
 so — so dead and gone!" 
 
 We talked a little more, then, heeding 
 Miss Page's sign that we had stayed long 
 enough, we rose to go. It was hard; yet 
 in spite of our sadness she had communi- 
 cated to us something of her own feeling of 
 elation and expectation. 
 
 Then, as we stopped to say good-bye, she 
 said, looking up at us with shining eyes that 
 I shall never forget: 
 
 "You know, girls, that I shall be gone 
 away before you come to the house again. 
 This is the last time I shall see your faces, 
 and this is the last time you'll see mine, for 
 awhile. And you know I am going to 
 throw something away — something that is 
 worn out, and that I've no more use for — 
 [173] * 
 
<3&e Gtreat Efttoenture 
 
 and it is beautiful, the way things are go- 
 ing to be; for Aunt Sophy has promised, 
 like the precious old darling she is — haven't 
 you, dear? — to do things just as I want 
 them. Do you remember what I decided 
 about this, years ago? Well, you just see 
 if you don't like it! You'll come to see 
 Aunt Sophy to-morrow, won't you? And 
 please think of me, and please talk of me, 
 as having just gone around the corner to 
 find my Great Adventure!" 
 
 [174] 
 
.... With morning farrfl ana mitt; morning 
 Ijearta . . 
 
 — R. L. Stevenson 
 
 XXXIV 
 
 ©ECAUSE she had requested it, we 
 went together to the house the next 
 day. No crepe was on the door; the cur- 
 tains were drawn back, as usual. Miss 
 Page met us, with a still, white light on her 
 face. 
 
 "Come up to her room," she said. "She 
 wanted you to come up there to-day." 
 
 The doors into the parlor were open; we 
 saw no dreadful thing within. We went up 
 the long staircase, and into the bright place 
 where we had seen her last — and wondered. 
 The room was full of Carroll's presence; a 
 pleasant, sunny room, with the muslin cur- 
 tains fluttering softly in the spring breeze. 
 
 "Oh, Miss Sophy," I cried, "where is 
 she?" 
 
 [175] 
 
C5&e Gtreat Btotoemute 
 
 "She isn't here," she replied, "and neither 
 is that which she called the 'cast-off gar- 
 ment' which she left behind. She said you 
 would all understand." 
 
 We asked her to tell us what she could, 
 and she seemed glad to talk about it. 
 
 "She herself went last night, at about 
 eight o'clock," she began. "She had told 
 me exactly what she wanted done after- 
 wards, so we kissed each other at the last, 
 and then she left, for her 'journey.' It al- 
 most seems to me now as if the carriage or 
 something came for her then; I can't think 
 of it in the ordinary way. And very soon 
 I left the room, as she'd made me promise 
 to do. — The rest was done quietly, with- 
 out my presence or help, in the night, and 
 that which she had left behind was taken 
 away. This morning when I came down 
 here I found the room as it is now. — It 
 was a strange way to do; I only did it to 
 please her; but someway it does make it 
 [176] 
 
C56e Gtreat HDtoenture 
 
 seem as if she had just gone off on a trip. 
 I remember her, and I suppose I always 
 shall, lying here and smiling, and talking 
 about it exactly as if her trunk were all 
 packed and she were just waiting for the 
 time to start. — And this morning she is 
 gone." 
 
 So Miss Sophia Page talked on, in a 
 strange, subdued excitement; it all did not 
 seem like death. I looked at her and 
 thought of her attitude, many years before, 
 when her brother, Carroll's father, had died. 
 
 "Then there will be no funeral?" asked 
 one of "the girls," hardly able to take it in. 
 
 "No funeral," replied Aunt Sophy. "She 
 said I must think of her just as Mrs. Royce 
 did of Mary when she went to Europe to 
 study music. And she laughed — you know 
 that laugh of hers, girls — and said, wouldn't 
 Mary have been provoked if they'd had a 
 funeral over her after she'd sailed away! 
 'Why, that would make it seem as though 
 [177] 
 
O&e Gtreat Botoemure 
 
 I were dead, Aunt Sophy!' she said. Oh, 
 girls, do you believe she knew, and was 
 right?" 
 
 "I know, at least," said Kate, "that she 
 has made death seem a different thing to 
 me. I don't believe I shall ever feel about 
 it in the old way again. She was so sure." 
 
 "She is so sure!" I corrected softly. 
 
 [178] 
 
s 
 
 in Hi* gUam of ilj* Hfjtmng rainbow .... 
 
 — E. A. PlTTINGER 
 
 XXXV 
 
 ES, her wish was carried out. There 
 was no dark pall over the house for 
 two days thereafter ; no sadness and gloom ; 
 no service, in darkened parlors, amidst a 
 hushed gathering of suffering friends 
 around a long dark object — with hopeful 
 words spoken, glorious promises read — and 
 broken-hearted, unbelieving tears falling 
 fast; no hymns of poignant sweetness to 
 stir the depths of emotion; no dreadful 
 drive, slowly, mournfully, to the city of the 
 dead, beyond the confines of the living city; 
 no despairing ceremony and tragic last 
 rites, before an open grave — "dust to dust, 
 ashes to ashes" — words to pierce the very 
 heart of hearts. 
 
 [179] 
 
O&e 6(reat BDtienture 
 
 As Carroll had said, our final parting 
 with her came that afternoon in the sun- 
 set glow; her leave-taking of the aunt who 
 had been to her like a mother, when the 
 last tender kiss was given and returned by 
 living lips; and after that — we missed her; 
 I have missed her ever since ! But no dark 
 and pagan ceremonies stand out in my mem- 
 ory between me and the living Carroll. In 
 my mind the thought of her is connected 
 with no grave. It is easy, it is necessary, 
 to think of her as simply having left us, 
 that day, to encounter new interests, new 
 phases of life and experience. For no 
 doubts or fears of my own can permanently 
 stand their ground against the picture of 
 her happiness at the approach, at last, of 
 her "Great Adventure," and of her going 
 forward to meet it, so joyous, so eager, and 
 so unafraid. 
 
 THE END 
 
 [180] 
 
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