THE LIBRARY 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 "SHILOH" is not a creation, but a growth. Begun 
 with no other design than to furnish a few sketchy, ram- 
 bling articles to a weekly paper, it grew partly in .virtue 
 of its own vitality, partly in obedience to the wishes of 
 the friends which it made into a connected story, with 
 some shadowings forth of a plot and a purpose. Had such 
 an end been contemplated from the beginning, a different, 
 certainly a more direct, road, would have been taken to 
 reach it. 
 
 The reader, therefore, will not look for a novel nor a 
 romance in the present work ; but simply a story of com- 
 mon life, as life commonly runs, without intricate plot, 
 strict unity, or close sequence. Its object is twofold, to 
 make real and vivid to the apprehension the continual 
 struggle between Good and Evil, in the human heart, and 
 to give some quiet pictures of New England farm and 
 parish life. To these last, some persons have insisted upon 
 assigning an actual locality and living models. Recogniz- 
 ing certain of the natural features of a hamlet familiar to 
 the author's youth, and a few outlines of actual event, 
 they have yet failed to see that both have been left so far 
 
 2047312
 
 IV PREFACE. 
 
 behind, by the constant change of a half-nomadic life, as 
 to have slidden into that fair border-land between memory 
 and imagination, where the Real and the Ideal become in- 
 distinguishably blended. Each lends to each, in a suffi- 
 cient degree to give life-likeness to the one, and unreality 
 to the other. It were a hopeless task, therefore (for the 
 author, not less than for others), to attempt to decide in 
 what proportion Fact and Fiction should divide the 
 sketches between them. Let " Shiloh " be read, then, 
 especially in the quarter alluded to, as a work of pure 
 fiction, in the letter, however truthful in the spirit. 
 Any other course would be a grievous wrong to the 
 fanciful part of the narrative, by forcing it into harsh 
 contact with present realities; while it would inevitably 
 lead to mistakes more or less unjust to a community which 
 the author holds always in kind remembrance. 
 
 An acknowledgment remains to be made. Having 
 imagined an artist's studio, it became necessary to hang 
 its walls with suitable pictures. These were found in a 
 certain New York studio, and quietly appropriated. The 
 owner will be surprised to see them transferred to these 
 pages ; others will observe how much they have lost in the 
 transference. Those who know him best, will be first tc 
 testify that* no liberties have been taken with the artist's 
 personality, but that the appropriations have been confined 
 wholly to his- pictures ; and these are hereby returned to 
 him, with thanks. 
 
 HUDSON, Oct., 1870.
 
 COSTEOTS. 
 
 I. PITCHING TENT, 7 
 
 n. A NEW ENGLAND TEA-TABLE, 17 
 
 III. THE WARRENS, . .25 
 
 IV. THE VIGIL, 80 
 
 V. SETTING THE EARTHLY HOUSE IN ORDER, . . 42 
 
 VI. THE REACTION, 55 
 
 VII. EXPLORATIONS ; RURAL, MORAL, AND PAROCHIAL, . G3 
 
 VIII. THE SEWING SOCIETY, 77 
 
 IX. IN OFFICE, . 89 
 
 X. THE MORNING SERVICE, 104 
 
 XI. THE SERMON, 117 
 
 XII. WOUNDS AND BALMS, 124 
 
 XIII. THE DOVE BEFORE THE ALTAR, .... 131 
 
 XIV. DUST TO DUST, 142 
 
 XV. HERE AND THERE, 148 
 
 XVI. RUTH WINNOT, 161 
 
 XVII. A HISTORY, 170 
 
 XVIII. THE Music LESSON, .182 
 
 XIX. ALICE PRESCOTT IN A NEW LIGHT; .... 200 
 
 XX. THE GWYNNE PLACE, 211 
 
 XXI. SETTING TO RIGHTS WITHOUT AND WITHIN, . . 219 
 
 XXII. DISCORDS, 227 
 
 XXIII. LEO, 240 
 
 XXIV. LIFE'S QUIET FLOW, 247 
 
 XXV. AMONG THE BRYERS AND THORNES, .... 263
 
 VI CONTENTS. 
 
 PACK. 
 
 XXVI. SUNSET PICTURES, 279 
 
 XXVII. IN THE BOWER, . .286 
 
 XXVIII. DREGS, 297 
 
 XXIX. AN AFTERNOON AT THE SEWING SOCIETY, . . 308 
 
 XXX. GATHERING IN, 318 
 
 XXXI. THE STOLEN SKETCH, 334 
 
 XXXII. AN ARTIST'S STUDIO, 847 
 
 XXXIII. THE UNOPENED LETTER, 359 
 
 XXXIV. DAISY, 370 
 
 XXXV. A VISIT TO THE CITY, . . . . . .381 
 
 XXXVI. THE TRUTH AT LAST, . 387 
 
 XXXVII. THE SUMMER'S WORK, 392 
 
 XXXVIII. IN ST. JUDE'S, . .401 
 
 XXXIX. A REFLOW OF TROUBLE, . .... 412 
 
 XL. THROUGH SHADOW TO LIGHT, . 426 
 
 XLI. THE EMPTY CHAIR, . 434 
 
 XLII. THE TREACHEROUS FLOWERS, 444 
 
 XLIII. THE FINDING OF THE CLUE, 451 
 
 XLIV. A NOTE OF WARNING, 461 
 
 XLV. THE SPIRIT OF HEAVINESS 463 
 
 XLVI. THE CRY IN THE NIGHT, 471 
 
 XLVII. STRIKING TENT, . . .480
 
 SHILOH. 
 
 i. 
 
 PITCHING TENT. 
 
 HAVE turned a leaf in my life's book, 
 dear Francesca. The last paragraph broken 
 short off in its joyous, triumphant flow, and 
 blurred and blotted with tears is covered from 
 sight. Let it rest in peace. 
 Here begins a fresh page. 
 We were leaning over the gate, Bona, Mala, 
 and I. Do you need to be introduced to these 
 persons of the drama ? Bona is my alter ego, my better 
 self, my Mentor, my counsellor, my consoler, or, to speak 
 more to the purpose, the grace of God working within me. 
 So Mala is my worst self, my evil genius, by turns my 
 tempter, flatterer, tormentor, betrayer, that part of me 
 which Holy Writ declares to be deceitful above all things 
 and desperately wicked. And the entity here represented by 
 the pronoun " I " is the arbiter between the two, influenced 
 by both, alternately swayed by each, yet to whose decision 
 either must submit with what grace she is able. In brief, 
 "I" repi-esents the Will-Power of the concern. 
 
 They who know me best, never behold either of these 
 characters per se, but a mixture of the three, seen darkly 
 through a veil of reserve which is common to all, and fur- 
 ther colored by their own prejudices and prepossessions.
 
 3 SHILOH. 
 
 Nevertheless, these personages do exist ; leading a distinct 
 and highly belligerent existence in one fleshly tabernacle, 
 and making themselves manifest through one set of human 
 organs. Occasionally, one sinks into a state of passivity, 
 and' leaves the other queen regnant ; but their normal con- 
 dition is struggle, conflict, hand-to-hand fight, and no quar- 
 ter. I lead an unquiet life between them, made endurable 
 chiefly by the reflection 'that things might be worse. If 
 Bona were to depart, and leave Mala triumphant, there 
 would be dreary deterioration, and sliding down slippery 
 places, for me here, and a fearful record to face hereafter ; 
 while that Mala will ever go forth, shaking "the dust from 
 her feet, and leave Bona and me to keep quiet house to- 
 gether, is not to be hoped for until " this mortal shall have 
 put on immortality." 
 
 I make no apology for thus taking yo\i into the heart of 
 things. You and I believe that no chronicle of human life 
 is complete, which deals not with the inner strife as well as 
 with the outer circumstance. 
 
 Neither Bona nor Mala was rampant as I leaned on the 
 gate, and looked out over this sunset-reddened Shiloh ; the 
 sweet signification of whose name had so touched my jaded 
 heart as I ran over the boai'ding agent's list. I had such 
 sore need of a " Place of Rest ! " 
 
 " Is it hill country or plain ? " I asked the man. 
 
 " Hill country, ma'am. You climb straight up, from 
 Shiloh Bridge, for three miles and a half. When I went 
 there, I had a mind to settle, for fear I'd never get any 
 nearer heaven." 
 
 " Is it quiet ? " 
 
 " Quiet as a graveyard. You'd think 'twas Sunday all 
 the time." 
 
 So it was settled. Aunt Belle was most graciously ac- 
 quiescent, after a polite remonstrance or two; doubtless, 
 she was charmed that I should thus voluntarily remove my- 
 self from her orbit, for awhile. Flora pouted and gibed.
 
 SHILOH. 9 
 
 Uncle John growled good-naturedly from the mist of busi- 
 ness cares and projects that always enveloped him ; 
 
 " Nonsense, child ! go to Saratoga with your aunt and 
 cousin, and enjoy yourself." 
 
 " But, uncle, I am as tired of enjoying myself as ever 
 was a convict of the treadmill. I want quiet and rest." 
 
 Surprised, Uncle John came out of the mist, and, for 
 the first time in six weeks, brought the eyes of his mind to 
 bear on me. 
 
 " I should think you did ! " he muttered, after a brief 
 inspection. " What on earth have you done with your 
 roses ? Why, Belle, the child is as pale and thin as a 
 ghost ! What is the matter with her ? " 
 
 " Nothing, uncle," I hastened to say, " but too much of 
 Madame La Mode, and too many calls and balls and recep- 
 tions. Only let me go to Shiloh for the summer, and I will 
 bring you back my roses, in the fall." 
 
 " Be off with you, then ! and mind you keep your 
 promise." 
 
 Nineteen twentieths of my journey were performed 
 swiftly by rail, the remaining fraction slowly in the farm- 
 er's wagon. If I saw anything on the way, I forget what 
 it was ; my mind was still wandering, in a dazed and aim- 
 less manner, among the ruins of the Past. 
 
 The first object that made any impression on my con- 
 sciousness, was the cheery, kindly, sensible face of Mrs. 
 Divine, framed in the dark doorway of the venerable old 
 farm-house, to whose gate the lapse of an hour had brought 
 me. She led me to a large, airy chamber, fragrant with 
 cleanliness, and of a most comfortable aspect, and left me 
 to myself. Which opportunity I improved by taking my- 
 self to task for my moodiness and apathy. " That dream 
 is over," I said, giving myself a moral shake ; " no amount 
 of brooding will bring it back. Now you have to do with 
 realities." And then Bona, Mala, and I, strolled out to 
 the gate, and looked about us.
 
 10 SHILOH. 
 
 Evidently, Shiloh was neither town nor village, as it 
 presented to view no public-house, nor store, nor contigu- 
 ity of roofs ; but merely an ancient neighborhood of well- 
 to-do farm-houses; each standing apart within its own 
 principality' of orchards, gardens, cornfields, meadows, 
 barns, stacks, and whatever gives the broadest idea of rural 
 plenty; and all with a certain freshness and peacefulness 
 about them, as not- being touched by the dust, nor the tur- 
 moil, of the highway. Right before me rose a huge ram- 
 part of a hill ; steep, but smooth and grass-grown to the 
 top ; where its vivid green met the rosy horizon-line of the 
 sky. 
 
 On its left crest, a farm-house, painted red, dazzled me 
 with the splendor of its sun-gilded windows ; and be.low it 
 was a long slope covered with mosaic work of corn -and 
 potato fields and orchards ; falling off siiddenly to a deep 
 dell or ravine, I concluded, for I saw the bossy tops of 
 large trees just beyond the corn, and, apparently, on a level 
 with it. On the right crest, a small white church lifted a 
 square yard of belfry and a modest triangle of spire into 
 the rose-ripples of the sky; and a bowed and decrepit 
 school-house crept humbly close to the hill's foot, other 
 shade being inscrutably withheld from it and its sun-burned 
 occupants. 
 
 " A cosy and a peaceful spot," said Bona. " Brimful of 
 the goodness of God, and nowise spoiled by man. There 
 can be no excuse for sinning here." 
 
 MALA. And every excuse for rusting and rotting ; not a 
 soul worth speaking to ; none of that inspiring contact 
 with refined and cultured minds, which is the great advan- 
 tage of city life. 
 
 I (sarcastically). Such as a morning spent with Madame 
 La Mode, settling about the width of our flounces ! 
 
 MALA (taking no notice of the interruption}. To be sure, 
 these woods and rocks are well enough in their way, and 
 you had better content yourself with their society.
 
 SHILOII. 11 
 
 BOITA (in dismay). I hope you have brought no phari- 
 saical that is to say, aristocratic notions hither. Why, 
 every leaf, laying its cheek softly to its neighbor leaf, every 
 dew-drop, caring not whether it falls on rosebud or potato 
 stalk, so it refreshes something, will be a sharp rebuke to 
 you. 
 
 I. Be easy, Bona ; I never had less of the not-as-other- 
 meii spirit. 
 
 MALA (soothingly). But you are weary, and sore, and 
 sorrowful, and have no heart for society. And society in 
 Shiloh, surely, has no claim upon you. It did without you 
 before you came, and need not miss you when you go. 
 Lead as idle and isolated a life as you please, free from all 
 bonds and burdens, and so gather strength for the future's 
 needs. 
 
 BOXA. An idle, isolated life never gave strength to any 
 human soul. Bonds and burdens are ordained of God ; and 
 strength is found in bearing, not in shirking, them. It is a 
 good and safe rule to sojourn in every place as if you meant 
 to spend your life there, never omitting an opportunity of do- 
 ing a kindness, or speaking a true word, or making a friend ; 
 seeds thus sown by the wayside often bring forth an abun- 
 dant harvest. You might so spend your summer among 
 this people, that they and their descendants should be bet- 
 ter and happier, through time and eternity, for your works 
 and your example. 
 
 I (uneasily). Let me alone, both of you. I do not mean 
 to make a fool of myself, Mala, by putting on airs in this 
 out-of-the-way place. Neither, Bona, did I come here with 
 any Quixotic idea of reforming or elevating a community 
 which has gotten on thus far without me ; and will, doubt- 
 less, till the end of time. I came here for rest, and I must 
 have it. Such persons as I meet I intend to treat civilly 
 kindly, if you will have rt so, but I will not be drawn 
 into any relations which must force me into action now, 
 and may be inconvenient entanglements hereafter, I cle^
 
 12 SHILOH. 
 
 sign to make friends chiefly with woods, and meadows, and 
 brooks ; to study good Mrs. Divine, who is as original a 
 character as can be found outside of Dickens' s stories ; and 
 to lead a leisurely, thoughtful, restful life under this moss- 
 grown old roof 
 
 I turned to get a clearer idea of the gray, quaint, weather- 
 beaten dwelling, and forgot to finish my sentence. Its side 
 was turned toward the street, showing the long slope of 
 the back roof, coated all over from high ridge-pole to 
 low eaves with a soft, verdant mossiness, and mottled with 
 the greenish-gray growth of scaly lichens, all fed, doubt- 
 less, by mouldy accretions from the breath of bygone gen- 
 erations. The ridge-pole was somewhat depressed in the 
 middle, and one corner-post bulged out noticeably ; as if 
 these portions of its framework had grown a little weary 
 of their age-long task, and did not set themselves thereto 
 with all the vigor of youth. A wide-open door, in the 
 lean-to, gave the passing wayfarer a pleasant look right 
 into the heart of its domestic life, viz., the low-studded, 
 time-darkened kitchen with its bare floor, scrubbed white ; 
 its old-fashioned dresser, displaying orderly rows of pol- 
 ished pewter plates, and dark blue cups and saucers ; its 
 grim old clock, in a tall case of carved oak, whose loud, 
 slow tick seemed to mark the tread of inexorable Fate ; 
 and its enormous fireplace, in the corners of which one 
 could sit on a chilly night, between a dusky jamb and a 
 pile of blazing logs, and watch the slow march of the stars 
 across the mouth of the huge, irregular, stone chimney. He 
 could see, too, the brisk, blithe mistress, passing to and fro 
 between pantry and oven, with scant skirts and flying cap- 
 borders ; or pausing in the doorway, and lifting her specta- 
 cles, the better to see if he were likely to prefer any claim 
 upon her acquaintance or her charity. 
 
 The whole place was thickly and lovingly shaded. A 
 grand old maple, of whose birth Time had lost the record, 
 flung a broad shadow over the gate and the lean-to door ;
 
 SIIILOII. 13 
 
 a group of gnarled, knotty, vagabond cherry-trees made a 
 quivering network of sunlight and shade at one corner ; 
 and a century-old pear tree, whose fruit was famed in all 
 the country round, darkened the front roof and the second 
 story windows, up to whose worm-eaten sills thick clumps 
 of lilacs lifted their pointed leaves and odorous" blossoms. 
 
 Looking at the old house thus narrowly, it was difficult 
 to regard it as an inanimate object. It seemed to have a 
 life and history of its own ; more placid, meditative, and 
 enduring than any human existence; but sympathetic 
 and kindly still; rich with long experience of sunshine, 
 shadow, and storm, bii'th, marriage and death, where- 
 with it had rejoiced and sorrowed., and whose memories 
 made fragrant its atmosphere and sweet and mellow its 
 ripe old heart. The combined physiognomies of a whole 
 acre of city houses could not give one so much of a home 
 feeling ; nor so subtly infect one with a sense of some 
 mysterious, sympathetic friendliness and companionship in 
 mere stone and timber. 
 
 My description would be incomplete without due notice 
 of a sunny square of garden, upon which the house front- 
 ed, a sort of cultivated wilderness, inhabited by scattered 
 tufts of marigolds, peonies, sweet-williams, and other old- 
 fashioned favorites, a small clique of sage, thyme, and 
 summer-savory, a riotous rabble of raspberry and goose- 
 berry bushes, a few scared strawberry plants, hiding in 
 the grass, a knot of quince trees, drawn apart in a cor- 
 ner, some sturdy ranks of homely vegetables^ and guarded 
 all round by a row of currant bushes, that had miraculous- 
 ly preserved some notion of order and discipline. And it 
 would be an unpardonable omission, on the side of the pic- 
 turesque, were I to forget two wells, one, at the front, 
 and another, at the rear, of the house, each with its 
 weather-beaten curb, its lichened crotch, its long, stone- 
 weighted sweep, and its pole, from which depended one of 
 that family of oaken, iron-bound, moss-grown buckets, im- 
 mortalized in song.
 
 14: SHILOH. 
 
 My further inspection was cut short by one of those 
 curious intuitions of the presence of another human soul, 
 which prove that we are not wholly dependent upon our 
 senses for knowledge. Facing about, I saw a 'black-eyed, 
 bold-faced urchin, on the other side of the gate, with his 
 hands thrust deep into his pockets, regarding me attentive- 
 ly from beneath the shadow of a torn straw hat. As he 
 evinced no intention of opening the conversation, I ac- 
 costed him with, 
 
 " Well, my boy, what can I do for you ? " 
 
 "I ain't your boy," was the matter-of-fact rejoinder. 
 " And I want Aunt Hannah." 
 
 " I do not think she lives here," I replied, after men- 
 tally running over the inmates of the house, to see whom 
 this appellation might fit, and deciding that it belonged to 
 none of them. 
 
 " Don't live here ! " exclaimed the small imp, with his 
 nose in the air, and a rising inflection of unutterable con- 
 tempt; "why there she is now!" pointing straight over 
 my shoulder. 
 
 Looking around, I saw my hostess in the doorway, 
 peering out at us from under her raised spectacles. 
 
 " Mrs. Divine, here is a boy who says he wants 'Aunt 
 Hannah' ; and he avers, furthermore, that you are the per- 
 son meant," I said, opening the gate for the urchin to 
 enter. 
 
 " Oh ! you are not used to that yet," said Mrs. Divine, 
 good-humoredly. " Everybody about here calls me Aunt 
 Hannah, all the big boys, all the little girls, all the mar- 
 ried women, old maids, idiots, and farm-hands ; and, likely 
 enough, the cows and hens, too, if I understood their sort 
 o' language. It's a way we have, and means nothing but 
 friendliness; at least, we find it out quick enough, if any 
 disrespect is meant. I remember a young city chap, brim- 
 ful of airs and conceit (no offence, I hope), once came up 
 to my father, and said, in a pompous kind of a wqy, < I
 
 SIIILOH. 15 
 
 don't see how you manage to exist in such an out-of-the- 
 way hole as this, Uncle Ben.' And my father who was a 
 fine, tall, portly man drew himself up proudly, and an- 
 swered, ' I didn't know before that I was uncle to every 
 fool in the country ! ' "Well, Jack, what do you want ? " 
 turning to the boy. 
 
 " Ma wants to know if you'll come and sit up with Mag- 
 gie to-night? she's awful poorly." 
 
 Mrs. Divine took off her spectacles and wiped them 
 thoughtfully. " Well, no, Jack, I'm afraid I can't. I have 
 been baking and cleaning up to-day, and there are twenty- 
 four separate aches in my old back, one for every j'int. 
 Can't you get Mis' Carter?" 
 
 " No, marm, she's been a-washing." 
 
 " Well, then, there's Mis' Brown." 
 
 " Her baby's sick, and old maid Mercy's got the mumps, 
 and Mis' Peck's got company, and Aunt Sally Ann's gone 
 to Roxbury," returned Jack, rattling off his catalogue of 
 excuses with infinite relish, and refreshing himself there- 
 after with a prolonged stare at me. 
 
 " Oh ! then, I suppose I must go," said Mrs. Divine. 
 " Tell your mother I'll come, if she don't hear of anybody 
 else." 
 
 BON A (in my ear). You might go as well as not. You 
 have done nothing to-day but ride up from the city. And 
 it is a shame to let that old lady watch all night after her 
 hard day's work. 
 
 MALA (in the other ear). Don't be such a goose as to 
 take that trouble for people you never saw, and catch a 
 fever for your pains. Let the old lady do it, they are her 
 neighbors, not yours. 
 
 BONA. " Which now of these three, thinkest thou, was 
 neighbor to him that fell among thieves ? And he said, He 
 that showed mercy on him. Then said Jesus unto him, go 
 thou and do likewise." 
 
 MALA (jiersisting) . More likely than not, you will get 
 no thanks, except to be called " stuck*-up city folks."
 
 16 SHILOII. 
 
 " Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the 
 least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto Me." 
 
 I laid my hand on the boy's shoulder, as he was turning 
 away. " No, Jack, tell your mother that I, Winnie Frost, 
 Mrs. Divine's summer-boarder, will come and watch with 
 Maggie to-night, if she will let me. Will she ask for refer- 
 ences ? " I added, turning to Mrs. Divine, with a sudden 
 perception of a latent ludicrousness in the scene. 
 
 " Of course not ; we country folks don't look at the hand 
 that is held out kindly to us, to see whether it's red or blue 
 blood that runs in its veins. But, Miss Frost, aren't you 
 too tired to go ? " 
 
 " Tired ! the air of these hills has made me forget the 
 meaning of the word ! But I have a distinct notion of 
 what intoxication implies. I feel as if I had been drinking 
 wine." 
 
 The kind old woman looked pleased with my enthu- 
 siasm. The place where she was born and reared, where 
 she had loved and wedded, and given birth to children and 
 buried them, was dear to her. " Ah, yes," she answered, 
 " the air here is as pure as air can be, there's neither city to 
 foul it, nor ocean to salt it, within many miles. And you 
 see, my dear, we are situated on the southern slope of the 
 hill, Chestnut Hill, we call it, midway between tho 
 winds that whistle over its top, and the fogs that rise from 
 the valley. All our neighbors are not so well off. There's 
 the Warrens where you're agoing to watch to-night, 
 they live right on the edge of a swamp, and there's where 
 the fever comes from, I guess. Sam the eldest was taken 
 last week, and now, Maggie's got it. I shouldn't wonder if 
 it run through the family. But tea is ready, Miss Frost ; 
 come in."
 
 II. 
 
 A NEW E^GLA^fD TEA-TABLE. 
 
 TRAVELED friend once said to me, " To 
 enjoy the day's meals in perfection, one 
 should breakfast in England, dine in Paris, 
 and sup in New England." Mrs. Divine's 
 tea-table where my last letter left me abun- 
 dantly verified a part of the assertion. It 
 stood in one end of the long, shadowy kitchen, 
 in front of the lean-to door, commanding a 
 visw of orchard and hillside ; and was, in itself, as pretty 
 a bit of color as tin artist, curious of such matters, might 
 hope to find in a long day's journey. There were biscuits 
 of the whiteness and lightness of new fallen snow, and but- 
 ter glowing with the bright yellow of early cowslips 
 transparent jellies and preserves, of rich, deep tints of 
 scarlet and purple clear, -amber-hued honey, still undis- 
 turbed in its close waxen cells pink slices of tongue- 
 crimson shavings of dried beef creamy, crumbly cheese 
 emerald pickles golden custards a pair of pies a bewil- 
 dering variety of cakes and a glass of roses in the midst 
 the last being a contribution from Mrs. Divine's pretty 
 granddaughter Alice. Over this bright picture, Bona and 
 Mala had a ^characteristic " brush." 
 
 "How wonderfully has God contrived even the common- 
 est details of life for enjoyment, if one stops to think of it," 
 said the former. " For example, in this matter of eating." 
 MALA (indifferently). I don't see it. Of course, He must 
 provide some method of sustaining the life He has created.
 
 18 SIIILOH. 
 
 BONA. But He might have done it so differently ! For 
 instance, we might have had a hole in the top of our 
 heads, or between our shoulders, with a lid to it, wherein a 
 servant, hurrying by, should drop a piece of raw meat, and 
 a few earth-incrusted potatoes, just as he would fling coals 
 on a fire. Whereas, in a family meal, the eye is fed with 
 beauty, the body with strength, the affections with loved 
 companionship, the mind with cheerful interchange of 
 thought, and the soul with content and thankfulness to 
 God! 
 
 MALA. Umph ! I think your supposed arrangement 
 would have suited me as well ! It would have saved a vast 
 deal of time and work. 
 
 BONA. And of refinement and sympathy, and labors of 
 love, and social culture, and delightful memories. No 
 prodigal son, feeding on husks in a far country, would have 
 thought longingly of the abundance and delights of his 
 father's table ; and there would have been one tender, 
 touching parable the less, to lead men's wandering, hungry 
 souls back to the Universal Father ! 
 
 As I seated myself at the table, I bent my head for a 
 moment, according to my wont, which the keen eye of Mrs. 
 Divine did not fail to observe. " If you'll say that aloud, 
 Miss Frost, I'll be much obliged to you," she said quickly. 
 " As there's only women folks here, perhaps you won't 
 mind doing it." 
 
 The grace being said, I inquired, " But why should I 
 mind if there were men here, Mrs. Divine ? That is, of 
 course, if none of them would assume the duty." 
 
 The good old lady looked at me sharply over her specta- 
 cles. " I have lived sixty years in this changing world," 
 said she, " and seen the coming-up of a good many neAv- 
 fangled things, but I never heard a lady say grace aloud 
 before. Not but that it seems right and proper enough 
 among women but I cannot conceive what would make 
 her do it before a tableful of men."
 
 SHILOH. 19 
 
 " The grace of God, I hope," said I, meditatively. " Or 
 it might be that mushroom, courage which springs up to 
 the help of most people in an emergency ; yet is neither 
 Divine inspiration nor strength of will. At least, I am by 
 no means certain that it was not that, in mv case." 
 
 Mrs. Divine looked a mute inquiry. 
 
 " It never happened to me to officiate as chaplain for a 
 ' tableful of men ' more than once," I answered, " though I 
 have done it, several times, in the presence of a masculine, 
 or two ; who, by reason of his youth or irreligion, could not 
 be expected to say grace himself. That once was in Mich- 
 igan. Travelling in a sparsely settled portion of the State, 
 it befell me to stop for a night at the house of a devout 
 Methodist sister ; who, having satisfied herself that I was 
 not altogether a ' dweller in the tents of Kedar,' to use 
 her own expi-ession, entertained me with a lengthy account 
 of her religious experience, and beset me with questions 
 of doctrine and duty. Among other things she bewailed 
 herself that the family meals were eaten unblessed, as she 
 was a widow, and none of her sons ' converted.' ' For, of 
 course, I could not ask a blessing myself,' she concluded. 
 ' Why not ? ' said I, ' I do not see the impropriety.' ' But 
 I have five grown up sons and two farm hands ; they 
 would laugh at me ! ' 'I think not,' said I ; ' certainly not, 
 when they were once accustomed to it.' ' Would you do it, 
 in my place ? ' ' Without a doubt.' And I thought no 
 more of the matter until, at the table, with the five stal- 
 wart sons on the one hand, and the farm hands and female 
 ' help ' on the other, I was called upon by my hostess to 
 ' ask a blessing.' I confess I was slightly disconcerted, for 
 an instant ; but I said the grace composedly enough, nev- 
 ertheless, and the five unconverted sons did not laugh." 
 
 " And that reminds me," said Mrs. Divine, " of an inci- 
 dent a pretty little incident in one of Sir Walter Scott's 
 novels, I think it's in ' Redgauntlet.' It's your turn to 
 look surprised now ; but, really, it's the only book where I
 
 20 SIIILOII. 
 
 ever read of a lady's saying grace before men, and I've 
 read a good many books in my day." 
 
 There was no doubt she had. Her talk was full of 
 chance allusions, and odd scraps of information, that showed 
 a confirmed, though desultory, habit of reading. Yet the 
 desultoriness was probably less a matter of choice than a 
 necessity of the case, for the family library contains little 
 beside a heap of old almanacs and newspapers, yellow as 
 ancient parchment, a set of Hannah More's works, that 
 mio-ht have crossed the Atlantic with the first Divine 
 
 o 
 
 that settled in America, a " Scott's Commentary," well 
 thumbed, a " Josephus," : a " Pilgrim's Progress," minus 
 one cover and some leaves, a " History of the United 
 States," and the "Statutes of Connecticut." So that 
 Mrs. Divine must have satisfied, or appeased, her intel- 
 lectual hunger with such miscellaneous books as chance 
 has flung within her reach. 
 
 She presided at her tea-tabie in the most cheery, hearty, 
 and informal way ; often beginning a sentence in her chair, 
 and finishing it, in a raised voice, from the pantry, whither 
 she had strayed in search of a knife or spoon, or an addi- 
 tional viand wherewith to allure my slow appetite. Oppo- 
 site to her sat an upright, angular, severe figure, which I 
 took to belong to the respectable sisterhood of old maids, 
 until it was introduced to me as Mrs. Prescott, a widowed 
 daughter of the house ; my own vis-a-vis being the only 
 child of the same, Alice Prescott, a shy, blue-eyed maiden, 
 who never once ventured to look me in the face, and only 
 answered me, when I spoke to her, in nervous monosylla- 
 bles. The " men folks," I was informed, would sup later ; 
 and would have laughed to scorn an invitation to satisfy 
 their labor-whetted appetites with the cates and dainties 
 whereon we had feasted. " No, indeed," said Mrs. Divine. 
 " The cold boiled pork and beef and potatoes, left from din- 
 ner, with plenty of bread and butter and apple pie, is what 
 they want."
 
 SHILOH. 21 
 
 Tea over, I was kindly advised to prepare for the night's 
 vigil, by getting an hour's rest. So I underwent a kind of 
 figurative burial in a huge heap of downy feathers, let my 
 head sink into a soft unsubstantiality of pillow ; and, while 
 listening to a rambling talk between Bona and Mala, slid 
 into a confused and stifled sleep, perturbed with dreams 
 of a time and a person that it is the business of my waking 
 hours to forget. 
 
 A little before nine, I rose, donned a loose, thick wrap- 
 per, best adapted of anything in my wardrobe to the chill 
 watches of a night near the end of May, up here among the 
 hilltops (yet not without misgivings lest its bright hue 
 and flowered border should seem incongruous with the 
 place where my watch was to be kept), and went down to 
 the kitchen. It was a cheery picture upon which I entered. 
 The weather was still cool enough for an evening fire on 
 the hearth, arid its dancing blaze reddened the dingy walls 
 and. the dark oaken ceiling, played at hide-and-seek with 
 the shadows in the corners, laughed at its own reflection 
 in the pewter plates of the dresser, and lit up with a 
 ruddy glow the sun-browned, strong-featured faces around 
 it. Mrs. Divine sat at one corner of the hearthstone, mend- 
 ing certain coarse garments by the light of a tallow candle ; 
 the candlestick being upheld by a quaint, primitive piece 
 of furniture which she called a " candle-stand ; " consisting 
 of an upright post, on three legs, with a cross-bar at top, 
 capable of being raised or lowered at pleasure ; to one end 
 of which cross-bar the candlestick was hung, and to the 
 other the snuffers. Opposite to her sat a white haired, 
 dreaniy-visaged personage, known universal] v as "Uncle 
 True," who merits a more extended description, and shall 
 get it in some future epistle. In a shadowed corner, Mrs. 
 Prescott sat and knitted with the grim energy that charac- 
 terizes all her movements ; and by the table, two young 
 men were amusing themselves with a game of checkers. 
 But all these were subordinate to the centra.! figure of the
 
 22 SHILOH. 
 
 picture, Farmer Divine himself; in a wide arm-chair; 
 shirt-sleeved and loose-vested ; with the full light of the 
 fire shed upon his large, portly frame, and good-humored, 
 intelligent face; and talking cheerily in a loud, hearty 
 voice, that had not a trace of insincerity nor of reticence 
 in it. Obviously, the farmer kept open house, open heart, 
 open mind; whoever would, might enter and partake 
 freely of such entertainment as was to be found. Nothing 
 would be concealed, nothing made to show falsely, nothing 
 tricked out in unaccustomed finery. Sundays and week- 
 days the fare would be the same, never, delicate, nor 
 luscious, nor high-seasoned; but always substantial and 
 wholesome; and offered with a simple heartiness that 
 would be better than any studied refinements of courtesy. 
 
 He rose, and greeted me cordially, taking my hand in 
 his broad, brown palm where it looked as pale and unsub- 
 stantial as if it had been cut out of French paper and 
 smiling down upon it from his noble altitude of six feet, 
 with a half amused, half pitying expression. 
 
 " It's high time you came to Shiloh, Miss Frost," said he. 
 " A little longer stay in that smoky Sodom, where you 
 come from " (pointing over his shoulder with his thumb), 
 " would have made you something like the old woman that 
 dried up and blew away. But do you s'pose you can put 
 up with our plain country ways ? " 
 
 " Better than you can put up with my lazy city habits, I 
 suspect. For example, I never rose at five o'clock in my 
 life. I hope Mrs. Divine will not think it too much trouble 
 to give me my bread and milk a little later, for the 
 present." 
 
 " Bread and milk ! " exclaimed Mrs. Divine, " you can 
 have that at any hour in the day you like, by just' stepping 
 into the pantry and helping yourself. But your breakfast 
 will be ready when you're ready for it, and not a minute 
 before. I can clap down a bit of chicken to the fire when- 
 ever it's wanted."
 
 8HILOH. 23 
 
 " Thank you ; I will try not to tax your indulgence long. 
 Mr. Divine, is it far to the Warrens ? " 
 
 " Oh, no, only a step the first house beyond the church 
 you can't miss it. But as. you' re a stranger in these 
 parts, mayhap you wouldn't like to go alone ; Alice shall 
 go with you." 
 
 " But Alice will haVe to return alone." 
 
 " Well, where's the harm ? " 
 
 " Why, is it the custom here for ladies to go about by 
 themselves, in the evening ? Are there no thieves or des- 
 peradoes about ? " 
 
 " None that trouble anything but the henhouse. Why, 
 you might walk off for two mile, or more, without meeting 
 anything worse than Bill Somers's old white horse, that 
 Mis' Burns took for a ghost the other night, and was fright- 
 ened clear out of her wits." And the farmer chuckled in- 
 wardly. 
 
 " Then I will not trouble Miss Alice, thank you. I shall 
 really enjoy finding my way by myseli; There will be a 
 pleasant spice of adventure about it. But, Mrs. Divine, I 
 should like more minute travelling directions, in a way. 
 What sort of people are the Warrens ? " 
 
 " Poor folks enough, I guess. But people think they've 
 seen better days. They're new comers here that is, 
 they've only lived here going on three year." 
 
 " I do not mean that. I merely want to know if there 
 are any domestic or individual pitfalls to be avoided." 
 
 " Oh ! Well, Mrs. Warren's one of the prettiest " (pretty 
 beingjiere used in its Xew England signification of pleas- 
 ant, agreeable) " little women in the world you can't miss 
 your way with hei'. But her husband's a pitfall, sure 
 enough : only I don't see how you're to keep clear of him. 
 He likes to talk, when the fit's on ; and he's got a special 
 gift of talking to little purpose, or to evil purpose. HC'B 
 an infidel, Miss /Frost and that's saying enough that's 
 bad about a neighbor, for once." 
 
 The farmer followed me to the door, with the instinct -it
 
 24 siiiLoii. 
 
 politeness. On the threshold, he turned as if struck with a 
 sudden thought. 
 
 " Wait a moment, Miss Frost. I guess, after all, I can 
 furnish you an escort jest to your mind one that won't be 
 in your way, nor bother you with talk." And he gave a 
 low whistle. 
 
 An enormous dog, hitherto coiled up in some dark cor- 
 ner, rose and came majestically forth. A noble animal, of 
 pure Newfoundland breed, coal black, and with a face of 
 rare intelligence. 
 
 " There ! " said Mr. Divine, with pardonable pride, " that's 
 the finest dog you ever saw, ma'am, if I do say it. I don't 
 believe there's his match, for sense and faithfulness, in the 
 whole world. He understands what you say to him jest as 
 well as you do yourself. See if he don't. Leo, sir ! this 
 lady is Miss Frost." The farmer laid his finger on my 
 shoulder and repeated the name twice, slowly and distinct- 
 ly. The dog looked at me attentively. 
 
 " Now," continued Mr. Divine, " he knows who you are. 
 He's hung up your name in his memory. If I pick up 
 your handkerchief, or your glove, or anything that belongs 
 to you, I've only to say, ' Leo, carry this to Miss Frost,' and 
 he'll bring it to you, anywhere within three mile. Shake 
 hands with Miss Frost, sir ! " 
 
 The dog came to me, and, with ineffable dignity, uplifted 
 a great, black paw. 
 
 "And now he knows you're to be put on his list of 
 friends," pursued Mr. Divine. " We never tell him to 
 ehake hands with any one we don't want him to trea> like 
 one of the family. But you're in a hurry to be off. Leo, 
 show Miss Frost the way to the Warrens do you hear, 
 sir? to the Warrens ! " with an appropriate gesture. 
 
 The dog looked from his master to me, and went forward 
 to the gate, in token that he heard and obeyed. 
 
 " When you get there," said Mr. Divine, "just tell him 
 to come home, or he'll wait outside for you till morning. 
 Good night."
 
 III. 
 
 THE WABRENS. 
 
 [Y spirits rose as I closed the gate behind 
 me, and looked down the lonely, moonlit 
 road. The prospect of a silent evening 
 walk, by an unknown path to an unknown 
 goal, in such strange companionship, too ! 
 was not without its exciting charm. The dog 
 kept a few paces in advance ; grave, dignified, 
 and sombre, as an usher at a funeral. Once, 
 I spoke to him. He stopped a moment, put his nose into 
 my hand, and then went on again. 
 
 At first, the road was flooded with moonlight, and my 
 shadow glided silently beside me, sharply defined, but never 
 at rest, and leaving no trace of its passage behind. It oc- 
 curred to me that the time might come when most earthly 
 shadows should be seen to have been as much a necessity 
 of life's conditions, and as transitory. Beyond the church, 
 the road slunk under the gloom of a dense piece of woods ; 
 and when I emerged from that, the house which I sought 
 was close at hand. It was a small, low, unpainted struc- 
 ture, with only the merest shred of a yard between it and 
 the road ; and the door was wide open, giving a full view 
 of the kitchen, or living room ; for one glance sufficed to 
 show that it must serve every domestic purpose, save that 
 of a bedroom. 
 
 Leo paused at the gate, waited for me to enter, and 
 then, obedient to a word and a gesture, turned homeward. 
 Jack was seated in the doorway, busy with some mys- 
 2
 
 26 SIIILOH. 
 
 terious complication of sticks and strings, which might, and 
 might not, have been a kite. He announced my coming, 
 in his own laconic fashion. 
 
 " Ma, here's your watcher." 
 
 A meek-faced woman immediately came forward, and 
 received me with a gentle ease of manner that would not 
 have been out of keeping with far more sumptuous sur- 
 roundings. Plainly, her soul's education had begun in 
 some place nearer to the world's great centres than Shiloh ; 
 and God was only finishing it here, amid such tribulations 
 as would help her to the most abundant entrance into the 
 Kingdom of Heaven. 
 
 " Thank you very much for coming, Miss Frost," said 
 she, hi that low monotone of voice which speaks so un- 
 mistakably of pain outworn, and hope and disappointment 
 both left behind, " and yet I am afraid that I ought not 
 to have let you come, either ; it is too much to ask of a 
 stranger." 
 
 " If I am a stranger now," I replied, " I hope I shall 
 not seem one long. I know it was taking a liberty to 
 proffer my services in such an off-hand way, but I could 
 come much better than Mrs. Divine. And I am tolerably 
 well-skilled in nursing ; my father was an invalid for many 
 months." 
 
 " Miss Frost is a student of human nature," interposed 
 a deep, gruff voice, behind me, " and she would not miss the 
 chance of finding a new variety in this poor, miserable, 
 fever-stricken hut." 
 
 The tone of his voice gave me a creeping of the flesh ; 
 such as one might experience, who, in feeling round a dark 
 vault, should suddenly put his hand upon a chill, slippery, 
 sliding reptile. Turning quickly, I met the derisive,, cyni- 
 cal smile of the " infidel," of whom Mrs. Divine had spoken 
 with such noticeable abhorrence. His body was massive, 
 his shoulders broad and powerful, his head large and 
 covered with shaggy, iron-gray hair, his eyes deep-set and
 
 SIIILOH. 27 
 
 piercing. But this Titanic trunk was planted on a pair of 
 legs that would better have suited the boyish stature of his 
 son Jack, so that he was not so tall as myself. It is impos- 
 sible, dear Francesca, to give you any adequate idea of the 
 harsh repulsiveness of this strange man, not because of 
 his deformity, but on account of the sneering rudeness of 
 his gaze, and the lawless, almost impertinent, freedom 
 of his expression ; as if he cared not who saw the evil 
 in his soul, nor what sentiment of disgust it inspired. Not 
 that his face seemed vulgar. There was even a look of 
 quickness and acuteness of intellect about it ; but there 
 was no corresponding fineness of nature. There was also 
 a latent morbidness in his expression ; as if his deformity, 
 or something else,, had put him at cross-purposes with life. 
 
 His rude accost made me color, in spite of myself; 
 there was just truth enough in it to give it a sting. Cer- 
 tainly this man had a wonderful power of discerning what- 
 ever grain of selfishness might be hidden at the bottom of 
 a good deed, and of putting his cynical finger on it. 
 
 "A good student loves the subjects of his study," I an- 
 swered, after a moment's pause of embarrassment. " And 
 if I had not a real love of humanity and of Christ in my 
 heart, I should not be here to-night." 
 
 MR. WARREN. Oh ! you're one of that sort, are you ? 
 You don't look: like it ; I should say there was more fire 
 than frost about you (with just enough emphasis on the 
 words to make me aware of the pun). Well, madam, I will 
 undertake to convince you, if you will listen, that 
 Christ was only a man like myself, or if you don't like 
 the pattern (looking down at his shrunken legs with a 
 terrible irony) then, like William Herman in there, watch- 
 ing with my so*n Sam. 
 
 I. And if you could, sir, what help in life, or comfort in 
 death, should I derive from that conviction ? 
 
 He stared at me, for a moment, with an utterly blank 
 look. He had expected denial, or argument, not a prac-
 
 28 SIIILOH. 
 
 tical question of valuation. Then, suddenly quitting the 
 subject, and changing his tone to one of more courtesy, 
 he said, 
 
 " Well, Miss Frost, I am obliged to you for coming here 
 to-night, whatever was your object, or your motive. It is 
 more than we expected from a city-bred lady -or deserved," 
 he added, with an affectation of humility that was haugh- 
 tier than any outspoken pride. " But please to step this 
 way a moment." 
 
 He opened a door into a pantry near by, and motioned 
 me to enter. Then, holding the door in his hand, and half 
 closing it behind him, he said, in a low voice, " I bring you 
 here, that Maggie may not hear us. I wish to ask you to 
 refrain from any preaching, or exhorting, during your watch 
 with her. I don't want her to be frightened into the next 
 world by being told to 'prepare for death'; that's the 
 cant phrase, isn't it ? " with a sneer. 
 
 MALA. Tell the old bear that you'll do as you think 
 right, and if he does not like it, you can go home again. 
 
 BONA. No, no, if you want Mr. Warren to go a step 
 in your way, you must first go a step in his. Get a hold 
 on him by kindness, it is your only chance of doing him 
 any good. 
 
 I (speaking partly from the influence of one, and partly 
 of the other). Mr. Warren, you have a right to dictate, in 
 this house. And if you choose to send your child into the 
 next world, without the needful preparation, it is your re- 
 sponsibility, not mine. 
 
 MB. WABBEN (with flashing eyes). But Maggie isn't 
 going into the next world ! She won't die, I tell you, she 
 shan't die ! But she is weak and nervous, and you would 
 scare her to death, if you hinted that the're was even a 
 chance of her dying ; and that would be your responsi- 
 bility. You won't do it, will you ? (icith a mixture of en- 
 treaty and fierceness, impossible to describe.} 
 
 I (coldly). Sir, I will try to remember your wishes.
 
 SHILOH. 29 
 
 The old sinister look settled back on his face. " Well, 
 that's settled," said he, throwing wide open the door, " and 
 I shall be near enough to see how the promise is kept. Xot 
 that I doubt your word," with a half bow. 
 
 Mrs. Warren had listened to this conversation with a 
 pained and anxious look ; now she seized the opportunity 
 to say, 
 
 " Will you come into Maggie's room, now, Miss Frost ? " 
 pointing to an open door, where I had already caught a 
 glimpse of a bed, and a young, fever-flushed face. 
 
 " I shall be glad to do so. And you had better give me 
 your dii'ections for the night, and go to bed at once, you 
 look thoroughly tired out. As I am here to watch, the 
 sooner I am made of use, the better." 
 
 I followed her into the little room so small that there 
 was barely a passage-way between the walls and the bed. 
 Here lay Maggie, a fine-looking girl of fifteen or sixteen ; 
 whose hectic cheek, and large, restless black eyes, lit up 
 with the unnatural brightness of fever, gave her a strange, 
 wild beauty. She looked at me curiously and intently, let- 
 ting her eyes rest with evident pleasure on the bright tints 
 of my wrapper ; but she said nothing, not even in answer 
 to my greeting. The few necessary directions were given, 
 the whereabouts of pills, drops, and refreshment tray, 
 pointed out, and then the mother bade us good night, 
 and withdrew.
 
 THE VIGIL. 
 
 HAVE received your letter, Francesca mia, 
 but do not ask me yet, to enter upon the de- 
 tails of the separation of Paul and myself. Thank 
 you for your offer of friendly service, but the break 
 is past mending; neither explanation nor me- 
 diation could avail aught. The parting is final 
 let that suffice for the present. Not until grief 
 has become subdued and softened by time, can 
 we stand by the grave where hope and faith lie buried, 
 and talk calmly of our loss. Before then, sobs or silence 
 must speak for us. I scorn to give way to the sobs ; you 
 must try to iinderstand the silence. 
 
 " Forgetting the things which are behind " or doing 
 my best to that end, I continue the narrative of my 
 strange vigil with Maggie Warren. Seated by her bed- 
 side, fan in hand, I heard the slow footsteps of the weary 
 mother ascend the creaking staircase, move about overhead, 
 for a brief space, and then cease ; conjecturing, meanwhile, 
 what curious links of circumstance had bound that gentle, 
 refined woman to that morose, sneering, repulsive hulk of 
 a man. I wasted no wonder on the union itself, the story 
 of Titania and Bottom has been so often acted on the 
 stage of life, since Shakespeare's time, as to have grown 
 commonplace. But I began to wonder, ere long, what Mr. 
 Warren was about, in the kitchen, and when he would
 
 SIIILOII. 31 
 
 withdraw, and leave me to myself and the sick maid- 
 en ? - 
 
 The query was soon answered. I heard him rise, open 
 a door, drag something forth, with a soft, rushing sound, 
 and then he presented himself before me. 
 
 " Are you ready, now, for the argument about the di- 
 vinity of Christ, Miss Frost ? " 
 
 " No, sir, I am content to let it rest where we left it 
 just now." 
 
 " I see you have no taste for argument. Women sel- 
 dom have," with a sneer. 
 
 I was foolish enough to be stung by the imputation. 
 " I am not averse to argument," I retorted, " when there is 
 anything to be gained by it. But I know you can do me 
 no harm, and I suspect I can do you no good." 
 
 " You might, at least, try," arching his eyebrows. 
 
 I kept silent. The man repelled me so, that I would 
 not enter upon a discussion with him. 
 
 " Miss Frost," he persisted, " you are afraid that your 
 faith will be shaken." 
 
 " Not at all, sir. I am already tolerably well ac- 
 quainted with the infidel writings from which you must 
 needs draw your arguments, since in infidelity as in the 
 earth there js nothing new under the sun." 
 
 "Which means, I suppose," said he, looking at me 
 keenly, " that you are a little better provided with counter 1 
 arguments than most young women. I am glad of it ; I 
 like a ' foeman worthy of my steel.' " Here Maggie turned 
 her head with an uneasy and peevish movement. The 
 symptom of weariness caught the father's eye, and his 
 love for his child proved more potent, even, than his love 
 of discussion. "I see that my talk worries Maggie," he 
 said, hastily, " and we will leave the subject till another 
 time. Miss Frost, I hope you will excuse it, if I quarter 
 in the kitchen, to-night. Our sleeping accommodations are 
 scant enough, at best ; but now with Sam taking the
 
 32 SHILOH. 
 
 whole of one bed, and Maggie in another, there is nothing 
 left for me but a buffalo skin, and the kitchen floor. 'You 
 need not mind me any more than an old log, I'm a sound 
 sleeper." 
 
 And to my surprise, and almost horror, he wrapped a 
 coarse, shaggy buffalo skin around him, stretched himself 
 upon the floor, in a position to command the small interior 
 of the sick-room, and was soon, to all appearance, sound 
 asleep. This was what he meant when he said he " should 
 be near enough to see how my promise was kept ! " I re- 
 called the words with exceeding indignation, and Mala 
 made them the text upon which she discoursed furiously 
 for the next five minutes. 
 
 At first, his presence was an annoyance and a restraint 
 to me. I moved carefully, and almost held my breath 
 when it was necessary to pass him, so exceedingly reluct- 
 ant was I to bring upon myself the keen, merciless scru- 
 tiny of his deep-set eyes. Finding, however, that his sleep 
 was heavy and unbroken, I came gradually to feel more at 
 my ease, and moved about with greater freedom. In one 1 
 of my visits to the fireplace, where certain broths and de- 
 coctions were kept hot for the sick ones, I encountered my 
 fellow watcher the William Herman before mentioned 
 a tall, light-haired, light-eyed man, of a whimsical and hu- 
 morous cast of countenance ; and with a noiseless, almost 
 womanish, way of handling cups and saucepans, that testi- 
 fied strongly to his fitness for his office. He nodded to me 
 familiarly, with an evident understanding of the " situation," 
 asked after my patient, told me that his own was " coming 
 along bravely ; " and went on tiptoe back to his post. 
 
 The slow moments crept on for an hour. The sick girl 
 turned her head restlessly on her pillow, the clock ticked 
 noisily, the firelight gleamed and flickered on the walls, 
 the tallow candle burned dim, and a great, black accumu- 
 lation of cinder hung to its wick. By and by, I found 
 myself observing the scene in the most abstract manner,
 
 SIIILOII. 33 
 
 with a keen appreciation of its artistic effects of light, and 
 shade, and color. I perceived what an effective picture it 
 would make in the hands of a skilful artist, the dingy, 
 low, bare rooms, lit up with the fitful glow of the fire, 
 the youthful, fever-intensified beauty of the sick maiden on 
 her coarse pillow, the prostrate figure of the father^ a 
 mixture of the grotesque and the demoniac in its uncouth 
 shaggy wrappings, with its strongly marked features seen 
 half in red glow, half in deep shadow. I even regarded 
 myself in a purely objective way, as a mere accessory of 
 the picture, well pleased to see what a spot of warm, 
 bright color that deprecated wrapper would make amid the 
 prevailing sombreHess, and how effectively the soft richness 
 of its material, and the general refinement of my dress 
 and figure would contrast with the rudeness and squalor 
 of my surroundings. 
 
 But while I looked around, Maggie gazed at me with a 
 curious intentness that I could only account for by the sup- 
 position that strange faces were rare to her. She took her 
 medicines from my hand, at the stated moments, without 
 demur, but replied to the questions I addressed to her only 
 by gestures. Finally, after a long, unwinking scrutiny of 
 my face, she suddenly flung herself on one side and said, 
 pettishly, " I want mother." 
 
 " My dear child," I answered, gently, " your mother has 
 great need of rest, let us not disturb her. I can do for you 
 all that she could, I think,-^-at least, let me try. What is 
 it you want ? " 
 
 " Nothing, only I'm so tired," with a wailing intona- 
 tion, pitiful to hear. 
 
 I had already exhausted my invention in ringing the 
 changes upon a thin bolster and two small pillows, to afford 
 her some little change of position. There was nothing 
 more to be done with that material. So I lifted her light 
 form, pillows and all, and sitting down on the bed, laid her 
 on my lap, with her head resting on my bosom. She 
 2*
 
 34 SHILOH. 
 
 yielded passively to the arrangement, and gave a low sigh 
 of satisfaction as she felt the relief of the entire change of 
 posture, while a pleased and restful expression brightened 
 her face. Then she raised her eyes, with a still curious, 
 but a softer, look, to mine. 
 
 " You ain't afraid of me," she said, in a half assertive, 
 half interrogative tone. 
 
 The question made me smile. " Why, no, my dear, I 
 cannot say that I am," I answered. " I do not know how 
 formidable a personage you may be, when you are well ; 
 but now, certainly, I am the stronger of the two, and if we 
 should happen to differ, which is not likely, I think I could 
 carry my point." 
 
 " Oh, I don't mean that," she returned, after a little be- 
 wildered stare, as if she were puzzled to understand the 
 drift of what I was saying. " I mean that you ain't afraid 
 of catching the fever. All the folks who have been here 
 before have been careful not to touch me, or come near me, 
 when they could help it. I s'pose they thought I didn't 
 know it, but I did, and it made me hate them ! " (with 
 a gleam of her father's fierce, vindictive spirit.) "They 
 wouldn't have held me like this for a million of money." 
 
 " I am not sure," I said, bitterly, answering to my own 
 thoughts, rather than to her, " but that to take the fever, 
 and die quickly and quietly, would be the best thing which 
 could happen to me." 
 
 Maggie opened her eyes with extreme surprise. " Why, 
 ain't you afraid to die ? " she asked, simply. 
 
 " No, I think not," I began, but Bona sternly inter- 
 posed. 
 
 " If you are not, you ought to be," said she. " No one 
 has the right not to be afraid of dying who is not content 
 to do and suffer all God's will, in living. Weariness of life 
 is poor ground for fearlessness of death. ' Perfect love,' 
 only, * casteth out fear,' and he who longs for death, for any 
 reason stronger than his love of Christ, and his desire to
 
 SIIILOH. 35 
 
 be lifted into ' heavenly places in Him,' has great reason 
 for shame and confusion of face, if he is not afraid of 
 dying." 
 
 I hesitated, abashed and confounded. But Maggie still 
 looked and waited for my answer. So, in a far different 
 spirit, I finished the sentence " I think not ; at least I 
 should ask our Saviour to give me the victory over death." 
 
 She repeated the words after me, as if she were saying 
 a lesson. " The victory over death, I don't under- 
 . stand." 
 
 " I mean, Maggie, that inasmuch as the soul is capable 
 of a richer and more enduring life than the body, they who 
 have a good hope, through Christ, of escaping the death 
 of the soul,need not fear the death of the body." 
 
 " But I am afraid of death," she said, excitedly. 
 
 You will not be surprised, Francesca, that the answer to 
 this came in another voice than mine, if you have formed 
 any correct conception of the impressionable and suspicious 
 character of the father, and of his tireless watchfulness 
 over this favorite child, who seemed to have concentrated 
 upon herself all the tenderness of his natnre. I had seen 
 his eyes open soon after she began to talk, and my last 
 sentence had been uttered in the full consciousness that 
 he was listening. Now he called out, in a voice wherein 
 the effort to render it hearty and cheery was very percep- 
 tible, 
 
 " Nonsense, child, you are not going to die there's 
 plenty of strong life in you yet. You'll live to be a gray- 
 haired woman, and bury your old father long before you 
 go. Why, I can see you are getting better already. You 
 feel better, don't you ? " the last words being spoken at 
 the bedside, with her hand in his. 
 
 " I guess so, father ; I feel easier. Miss Frost holds me 
 so nicely. She isn't a bit afraid of touching me. And her 
 dress is so soft and pretty ! " said Maggie, nestling her 
 cheek against my wrapper, with a childlike enjoyment of
 
 36 SHILOH. 
 
 its brightness and softness, and a look that was half affec- 
 tionate in her dark, inquisitive eyes. 
 
 Mr. Warren looked at me with real gratitude. " Thank 
 you," said he, "I will never forget your goodness to my 
 child." 
 
 MALA (instantly alert, and whispering in my ear). See 
 what a pleasant, winning way you have, when you choose ! 
 Already this girl, who, an hour ago, only looked at you 
 suspiciously and curiously, as at some wild animal, begins 
 to show you confidence and affection. Already that cross- 
 grained father speaks to you gratefully. What tact you 
 have ! How good you are ! It is something to be proud of ! 
 
 I (in an agony). Get thee behind me, Satan! Can I 
 not do one little thing for Christ, but you must needs spoil 
 it with your miserable self-righteousness ! With you for- 
 ever at hand, it is useless for me to try to do right. 
 
 MALA (insinuatingly). So it is. Give up trying, then. 
 
 BONA. If St. Paul had occasion to say, " To will is pres- 
 ent with me, but how to perform that which is good, I find 
 not ;" you, certainly, have no cause for discouragement. 
 For " the Spirit helpeth our infirmities." And God, seeing 
 your good will, will pardon the shortcomings of your per- 
 formance. 
 
 " Maggie is really better," persisted Mr. Warren ; 
 " don't you think she is better, Miss Frost ? " 
 
 I looked down at the thin face, noted that it was less 
 flushed than it had been, marked the short, faint breathing, 
 and could not say that I discerned any sign of betterment. 
 Mr. Warren saw my hesitation, and made an irritated ges- 
 ture. " You see she has less fever," he urged. 
 
 I did see it ; but I also saw that she seemed weaker. 
 
 " Will you hand me that glass of brandy and water ? " 
 I asked, by way of creating a diversion, and with a sudden 
 perception that' a spoonful of the stimulant would not be 
 amiss. Then the father went back to his buffalo-skin, and 
 soon after, Maggie fell asleep in my arms.
 
 SHILOII. 37 
 
 Another hour crawled on, lame and leaden-footed, in- 
 deed, for my position became absolutely painful, after a 
 time ; but my charge slept quietly, and I would not disturb 
 her by moving. Thus Mr. Herman found me, long past 
 midnight, with benumbed muscles and a contorted face. 
 
 "This won't do," he said, decidedly. "You can't 
 stand that many minutes longer, and she may as well be 
 waked up now as ever. I'll lift her, while you crawl out." 
 
 He put his strong arms under her with a woman's gen- 
 tleness. Pier dark eyes opened with a bewildered look, 
 that did not become intelligent until the change was ef- 
 fected. Then she murmured, " Isn't it morning yet ? " 
 
 " Not yet," I answered. And she slept again. 
 
 To restore the circulation to my torpid limbs, I began 
 pacing slowly through the rooms ; sometimes brushing the 
 sleeper on the floor with the skirt of my dress, as I passed 
 him, but without visible effect. Plainly, his senses were 
 fast locked against everything not immediately affecting 
 the state of his daughter, to her voice only was he ever 
 awake and responsive. Seeing what treasure of love his 
 uncouth frame held, I began to feel a little more kindly to- 
 ward him. 
 
 Up and down I paced slowly, stopping at every turn to 
 observe Maggie narrowly ; and noticing with real sorrow 
 so quickly is human sympathy transfigured into the like- 
 ness of affection! that her pulse grew ever fainter, and 
 her cheek more wan. I increased the prescribed quan- 
 tity of stimulus, by way of disputing every inch of 
 ground with the Dread Encroacher, answering, mean- 
 while, her oft-repeated question, " Isn't it most morning ! " 
 with a soothing, ." Not quite yet, dear ; it will be morn- 
 ing soon." 
 
 At last, in the chill hour preceding the dawn, there 
 came upon her face that indefinable look, which shows that 
 the " earthly house of this tabernacle " is being dissolved, 
 and the imprisoned spirit is beating against the weakened
 
 38 SHILOH. 
 
 * 
 
 bars. I went to the door of the other sick-room, and mo- 
 tioned to Mr. Herman to join me. He detected the change 
 at once. 
 
 " It's coming, sure," he said with deep gravity. " I'll 
 call her mother." 
 
 Maggie caught the tone of his whisper, though not the 
 words, and opened terror-stricken eyes upon \is. 
 
 " Am I going to die ? " she gasped. 
 
 I am no mystic nor spiritualist, yet I do sometimes 
 question if the soul is not endowed with some finer sense 
 than the body, which comes to its aid in life's critical mo- 
 ments. That sleeping father was on his feet almost as 
 soon as the words were out of her mouth ! 
 
 " Of course not," he began, " you'll be all right in a 
 few days, and " But, as he neared the bed, and saw his 
 daughter's ashy face distinctly, he faltered, paused, and 
 dropped into a chair as if he had received a sudden, severe 
 blow. 
 
 Maggie fixed her eyes on him, and repeated her ques- 
 tion. 
 
 " No, child," he replied, making a Herculean effort for 
 composure. "Don't be afraid; you know your father 
 wouldn't deceive you." 
 
 It was terrible to hear the misguided man answer his 
 dying daughter with a lie. It was done in love, I knew, 
 but it was no less awful to hear. Lulled to a momentary 
 security by his encouraging words, Maggie closed her eyes. 
 But some inward trouble, or monitor, would not let her rest. 
 Ere long, she opened them again, and appealed to me. 
 
 " Am I going to die ? " she said, earnestly. 
 
 It was impossible to face the awakened soul in those 
 eyes, and answer it with a falsehood; it was almost as 
 hard to meet the father's stern, agonized face, and tell the 
 whole truth. Vainly, it seemed to me, I groped about for 
 words that should help and satisfy the one, without hurt- 
 ing the other. Finally, I said
 
 SHILOH. 39 
 
 " Only God, Maggie, knows whether you will die or 
 live. You are in His hands, dear. But they are such 
 wise, and strong, and loving hands J You may trust your- 
 self to them without a fear. If you do trust them, you 
 are just as safe in your deathbed, as ever you were in your 
 cradle." 
 
 Her lip quivered. Then she said, faintly, halting over 
 the unfamiliar words, " I wish I knew how to ask Him to 
 give me the victory over death ! " 
 
 I looked at her father. He had turned his face away. 
 Evidently, he left the matter in my hands. 
 
 " Don't you know how to pray ? " I asked. 
 
 " Not much. Mother taught me, ' Now I lay me.' " 
 
 Only that ! A lightning intuition showed me that the 
 sceptical father had forbidden, or laughed at, all religious 
 instruction ; and that the meek, gentle mother had not 
 dared to withstand his authority. 
 
 " That will do very well, dear," I replied. " To God's 
 children, death is only a chamber darkened for a quiet sleep. 
 Ask Him to keep your soul, for Christ's sake." 
 
 She closed her eyes, and I think she uttered the childish 
 prayer, but I do not know. For I bowed my own head on 
 her pillow, heart-heavy with poignant pain and pity, and 
 prayed silently for that poor, helpless, untaught soul, drift- 
 ing affrightedly out into an unknown future, and groping 
 about for some hand unto which to cling, prayed with 
 greater intensity and fervor than ever I prayed for myself, 
 I think, though I need prayer enough, Heaven knows ! 
 And the prayer was not lost ! If it availed nothing for 
 her, it, at least, calmed and strengthened me. Without it, 
 the long strain of that death-scene would have been more 
 than I could bear. 
 
 When I looked up, Mrs. Warren stood near, perfectly 
 calm, patient, and resigned, as seemed her unvarying habit. 
 " I expected this," she said, quietly, taking my place at the 
 bedside, and smoothing Maggie's long, dark hair, with in-
 
 40 SHILOII. 
 
 effable tenderness. The girl opened her eyes, and once 
 more repeated her wailing question " Isn't it morning ? " 
 
 " Almost," answered the mother. 
 
 " I'm so tired ! " she moaned again. 
 
 The father and mother lifted her, but she looked dis- 
 satisfied, and half impatient, with their efforts to relieve her. 
 " Nobody holds me like she did," she said, indicating me 
 with her eyes. 
 
 I came forward. "Would you like me to hold you 
 again ? " I asked. 
 
 Her eyes brightened. I assumed the old position, and 
 received her in my arms. 
 
 " It feels so nice ! " she said, faintly. Her mother sat 
 down beside her, with her fingers on her pulse. The father 
 walked the room, or hung over the bed's foot, with a face 
 of mute misery. 
 
 I cannot tell how long I sat there, watching the slow, 
 almost imperceptible lapse of the stream of life into the 
 ocean of eternity ; it could not have been more than an 
 hour, but it seemed ages, ere the low voice of Mrs. Warren 
 broke the silence. 
 
 " Our Maggie is gone," she said ; adding, almost im- 
 mediately, "Miss Frost, your hard task is over. Thank 
 you," 
 
 She lifted the fair, still form from my arms, and I stag- 
 gered to the window. A bright strip of gold bordered the 
 eastern horizon ; the morning, for which that dead girl had 
 so longed, was breaking. Was there good reason for hope 
 that her eyes had opened upon a morning of more endur- 
 ing glory, a morning of endless light and knowledge and 
 love, in Christ ? 
 
 I grew sick amid the whirling uncertainties of the in- 
 vestigation. 
 
 "Take this, Miss Frost, you are faint," said a quiet 
 voice. 
 
 I drank the water, and then looked at the giver in
 
 SHILOII. 41 
 
 amazement. Mrs. Warren was pale, sad, but quite col- 
 lected, and gentle as ever. If there were tears in her 
 heart, they did not moisten her eyes. A poignant pity 
 smote me. What storms, I thought, must that woman 
 have come through, to have attained to calm such as this ! 
 And what a history of long self-abnegation, and patient 
 doing of " the duty which lies nearest," was discernible in 
 the fact that, after duly closing the eyes and laying straight 
 the limbs of her dead daughter, her first care had been for 
 a stranger, overwhelmed by the woful scene wherein she 
 stood so tranquil ! I leaned my head against the window- 
 frame, and my thoughts went wandering off, lost and be- 
 wildered amid the mysteries not of death, not of revela- 
 tion, but of life of this strange earthly being of ours. Oh, 
 Life, Life ! let us drink reverently of the rich, strong, sweet, 
 bitter cup ! So shall we learn, Thou Cross-Lifted and 
 Thorn-Crowned, to thank Thee for the kingly gift !
 
 SETTING THE " EAETHLT HOUSE 5 ' IN OEDEE. 
 
 NCE more, Mrs. Warren's mild voice recalled 
 me to the present's realities. Looking at 
 her, I seemed to recognize a visible incarna- 
 tion of Duty, treading her narrow path steadily, 
 serenely, unassumingly ; neither turning to the 
 right nor left, neither looking behind nor be- 
 fore ; but keeping her eyes always bent on the 
 ground, to make her footing sure. At least, 
 this was Mrs. Warren's outer seeming ; if the 
 hidden soul walked in white robes of consecration upon the 
 serene heights of faith, or was bound by chains of suffering 
 to some chill rock of despair, I could not tell. From these 
 deeper things of her life, my eyes were necessarily holden. 
 " I have sent," said she, " for some one to lay Maggie 
 out. She will be here soon. I know you are tired, and 
 would like to go home." 
 
 I was tired ; yet I felt a strong reluctance to leave that 
 beautiful piece of" clay, which had so lately given up its 
 vital part in my arms, while any tender or helpful service 
 remained to be performed for it. Those artless words of 
 the dying girl, "Nobody holds me like she did," had 
 touched some very deep-down chord in my heart. It was 
 so long since I had felt myself really of more use than 
 another to any human being ! 
 
 " Is there, then, nothing more for me to do ? " I asked. 
 "Nothing, until Aunt Vin comes, perhaps I should
 
 SHILOH. 43 
 
 say, Miss Lavinia Rust, to you, though the first title is 
 the only one in use among us." 
 
 " She is not a relative, then ? " 
 
 " No ; she is an elderly, and somewhat eccentric, maiden 
 lady ; who has somehow slidden into the office of laying 
 out the dead for this whole neighborhood. Perhaps some 
 secret heart-sore first led her to give herself to the work 
 of nursing, watching, and similar acts of self-devotion ; and 
 so, by degrees, she learned how to do the other sad duty, 
 and does it constantly, chiefly, it appears, because there is 
 no one who can do it any better. She is not even a poor 
 woman; she has a small farm of her own, which she 
 manages with much method and shrewdness." 
 
 " But she will want some help," I said, after a moment. 
 
 " Not much. And if she does, I doubt if you are able 
 to give it. I will help her myself." 
 
 And no doubt she would have done it, as she did every- 
 thing else, submissively and serenely. Neverthless, it 
 pained me to think of it, and I said, earnestly, 
 
 " No, no, let me stay and do it, please. I am stronger 
 than you think. It was not so much the fatigue of holding 
 Maggie that overcame me just now, as sorrowful recollec- 
 tions of another deathbed, which left me alone in the world, 
 my father's. But it would give me real pleasure to ren- 
 der this last service to Maggie, if you will permit me, and 
 if you do not still think me too much of a stranger." 
 
 Just for one moment the mother's voice shook. " You 
 will never be a stranger to me, after this," she faltered. 
 Then, turning instantly from the masterful grief to the 
 waiting, composing duty, she went on. " It is very kind 
 of you to stay, for Sam wants me, I know ; and the break- 
 fast is to be got ready ; and there are so many things to be 
 done, that I cannot see my way clear to refuse your assis- 
 tance, if you really wish to give it." 
 
 " I really do," I answered, heartily. She gave my hand 
 a single, strong pressure, which, from her, was more touch-
 
 44 SHILOH 
 
 ing and significant than any words, and quickly went her 
 way. 
 
 I looked at the corpse. Some one was it the mother? 
 had laid two large copper coins on the eyes, a custom that 
 always seems to me to be a horrible burlesque upon human- 
 ity, so many eyes are holden, all their lives, from the sight 
 of the things which most concern them, by earth's paltry 
 coin. I took them off with a shudder, and seating myself 
 by the bedside, held down the eyelids with a light pressure 
 of my fingers. So sitting, the peacefulness of the corpse 
 seemed to be communicated to me also ; and for the time, 
 earthly anxieties and vicissitudes shrank to microscopic 
 proportions, mere motes in the sunbeams that shine down 
 from God's countenance into the hearts of those who seek 
 to find out His meaning in life, and to let it work all His 
 loving will upon them. Alas! that those motes should 
 ever be magnified, through our unbelief and insubmission, 
 into dense clouds between us and His face ; darkening our 
 hearts, and bewildering our minds, with shadows of doubt 
 and fear ! 
 
 Ere long Miss Rust arrived, and after a brief pause in 
 the kitchen, entered the chamber of death. She merits a de- 
 tailed description ; no queerer character, I think, will ap- 
 pear in this chronicle. She was nearly, or quite, six feet 
 tall; large-framed, bony, and angular. Her dress was of 
 dark, printed calico ; made after some quaint fashion of her 
 own, with reference mainly to economy of material and 
 freedom of motion. On her head was a calico sun-bonnet, 
 of like pattern with her dress, beneath which appeared the 
 plaited border of a muslin cap. Her large, coarse features 
 were strongly expressive of well-founded self-reliance and 
 sturdy sense ; but there was also a grim sternness about 
 them, for which I was Unprepared, after the bit of history 
 that Mrs. Warren had given me, and of which I learned the 
 secret only after a more extended observation. Miss Rust 
 was the victim of some curious nervous or paralytic affec-
 
 SHILOH. 45 
 
 tion, that manifested itself in a slow, spasmodic jerk or 
 shake of the head, repeated at regular intervals. Evidently 
 she strove against this infirmity, which was yet of a nature 
 not to be overcome; and the look of decision and self- 
 control consequent upon that- endeavor, gave to the mo- 
 tion the actual force and character of a voluntary move- 
 ment, though it was really so irresponsible and meaningless ; 
 and impressed the beholder with the idea that she was en- 
 tering a stern and solemn protest against the depravity of 
 the times, or his individual vices and follies. 
 
 But Miss Rust's external singularities shrank into noth- 
 ingness, when once she opened her mouth. Her tongue 
 was of the Mrs. Partington order; apparently well hung 
 in the middle, with free play at both ends ; and aiming 
 continually at high-sounding, unfamiliar words; but sel- 
 dom making a wholly triumphant hit, or a totally incompre- 
 hensible failure. Apparently, she never either accurately 
 remembered, nor altogether forgot, any word once seen or 
 heard ; to her, similarity of sound was identical with simi- 
 larity of meaning, and prefixes and suffixes were supposed 
 to be obligingly interchangeable. The first remark which 
 she addressed to me well-nigh demolished, at one blow, the 
 superstructure of composure which I had reared on the 
 last half-hour's meditations. 
 
 " How d'ye do, Miss Frost ? It's a good while since 
 we've had any extinguished strangers in Shiloh, though 
 there isn't any place where they're better depreciated. Do 
 you mean to stay here long ? " 
 
 I bit my lip. The inclination to laugh was all the more 
 irresistible that it was perplexingly entangled with recol- 
 lections of recent solemnities, and a keen perception of the 
 unfitness of the time and scene for any mirthful demonstra- 
 tion. 
 
 " Mrs. Divine has promised to give me shelter for the 
 summer," I answered, as soon as I could trust my voice. 
 
 " Yes, so I've heerd. And you couldn't find any better
 
 4:6 SHILOH. 
 
 place to take up your adobe in, Aunt Hannah is a woman 
 of imminent virtoos, she's made out of the salt and fat of 
 the land. I understand you come from the great necropo- 
 lis of York ? " shaking her head in a manner to convey 
 volumes of disapprobation of that sombre locality. 
 
 " Yes that is to say, I am from New York." 
 
 " I wonder if you ever came acrost my cousin Hiram 
 there Hiram Rust, his name is. He keeps an expensatory 
 on Derision street." 
 
 " No, I never had that honor." 
 
 " I'm sorry for it ; I should like firstrate to hear how 
 Hiram gits along. He's a young man of uncommon debil- 
 ities, and very examplary, too, leastways he used to be 
 when he lived to home. I hope he keeps right end upper- 
 most speaking figuringly, you know down in that ' sink 
 of moral dilution,' which is Deacon Haineses elias for 
 York." 
 
 " It is to be hoped he does." 
 
 " Your name's Frost, is it ? I wonder if your family 
 came aboriginally from Rixbury ? " 
 
 " Indeed, ma'am, I do not know." 
 
 " Well, I used to know a Frost there, and I really be- 
 lieve I see a likeness to him in your liniments. Poor man ! 
 how he used to suffer with the brown-creeters ! But he's 
 diseased now ; he diseased six years ago." 
 
 " I beg your pardon, but what did you say he suffered 
 with ? " 
 
 " The brown-creeters in his throat. I remember hold- 
 ing his head once, for Dr. Smith to burn them out with 
 acrostics." 
 
 Here abused gravity gave way, and rushing to the win- 
 dow, I leaned far out, and tried to mask my laughter with 
 a cough. 
 
 " Goodness gracious ! " pursued Miss Rust, " I hope 
 you haven't any infection of the lungs, newmony, or 
 what not. But if you have, I've got a proscription that
 
 SHILOH. 4:< 
 
 Dr. Bird calls a ' perfect pacific ' for it ; I'll send it to 
 you. There's nothing like taking a cough by the firelock. 
 I've saved lots of people from digestion of the lungs with 
 that proscription." 
 
 I felt what horrible indecorum it was, but I continued 
 to shake with silent laughter until the tears came/ My 
 gravity would scarcely have been routed so completely, 
 but for the suddenness and unexpectedness of the attack 
 upon it. Not until the paroxysm had worn itself out, 
 could I venture to face Miss Lavinia's vocabulary. Then I 
 turned, and said, " Now, I am ready to help you, whenever 
 you please." 
 
 " Laws ! you don't look as if you could help a butterfly 
 brush his wings. But looks is deceitful ; I've seen a good 
 many women that looked . as if a good gusto of wind 
 would blow them out of consistence, who could stand 
 more than I could. I 'spose it's the sperit that does it. 
 Speritous strength goes a good way sometimes." 
 
 Miss Rust then addressed herself to her task with such 
 vigor and skill, that my share of the labor was next to 
 nothing. Meanwhile, the swift stream of her talk ran in 
 and out among the lights and shadows of Shiloh's social 
 life, bearing an odd company of dismembered and mis- 
 matched derivatives on its meandering flow. It suffered 
 no inteiTuption until seeing her about to uncover the fair, 
 statuesque form of the dead girl more than seemed to be 
 needful I seized her arm with a sudden ejaculation ; when 
 she dropped her napkin, and looked around startled and 
 scared. 
 
 " What is it ? " she faltered. " Have you seen a sperit ? " 
 
 " No ma'am. Pardon me, but is that disrobing really 
 necessary ? Do you think she would like it ? " 
 
 The good woman looked intensely disgusted, and her 
 head jerked violently. " I don't mean to dis-rub her," 
 said she, shortly, " I shall wash her as carefully as if she 
 was a baby. And I never heard of enterring a corpse with-
 
 48 SHILOII. 
 
 out washing it. I think the body ought to be putrified 
 from earthly irruption, after it's dead, just to show that 
 we believe Our Saviour will do as much for the soul." 
 
 I drew back, satisfied to find that there was a latent 
 beauty and fitness in her proceeding, mortified, too, that 
 I had been blind to the spiritual analogy which was so plain 
 to this uncouth, illiterate, absurd, old maid. 
 
 When all was done, and the fair "earthly house" 
 draped in white, to typify those robes of righteousness 
 which, I trusted, Christ would fold around the liberated 
 soul, I went out to a small strip of carelessly-cultivated 
 ground, called a garden, where I had seen, from the win- 
 dow, a few flowers struggling in the embrace of number- 
 less lusty weeds. Near by I discovered Mr. Warren, 
 seated on a fallen fence, with that drooping head, and 
 nerveless frame, so expressive of bitter, hopeless sorrow ; 
 so, after gathering all the white blossoms I could find, I 
 went up to him. 
 
 " May God who has sent this sorrow upon you, sir, send 
 unto you ' also, the Holy Ghost, the comforter ! ' ' 
 
 " What's the use of talking to me in that way ? you 
 know I don't believe it," he answered, without stirring. 
 
 " I am sorry for it, sir. Those who do, never feel such 
 bitterness of grief as you are now indulging." 
 
 " How do you know ? " lifting his head. 
 
 Seeing that he was inclined to talk, I sat down near 
 him, and began tying my flowers together, as I answered ; 
 " I do know, sir. When my father died, he was all that 
 I had ; he had been my mother, and sister, and brother 
 for years. Yet I was helped to see that God did right- 
 eously in taking him \into Himself, and to endure my loss 
 with patience." 
 
 ME. WABBEN (angrily). He did not do right in taking 
 my Maggie ! 
 
 I. It seems to me that even human wisdom might 
 teach you that yoii are possibly wrong there. Has life
 
 SHILOH. 4:9 
 
 been so invariably pleasant to you, that you must needs 
 feel it to be a wrong to Maggie that she is spared the bur- 
 den and heat of its full day ? Have you never seen girls 
 who have lived only to drag on a- blighted, bruised exist- 
 ence, or who have gone grievously astray, or have become 
 neglected, ill-used, cowed, and heart-broken wives?" 
 
 He dropped his face in his hands. Perhaps the crushed 
 and hopeless expression of his own wife's meek face rose 
 befqre him. But he struggled with the feeling, whatever 
 it was, and overcame it. 
 
 " What you say may be true," said he, " but life is very 
 sweet to them all, nevertheless. No matter how bruised 
 and broken the heart, it continually sends forth new shoots. 
 No matter how dark the sky, there is still light enough for 
 us to behold Nature and Art, and to enjoy them. Am I 
 not a striking example of this fact ? Blasted and marred 
 from my cradle, a laughing stock to some, an eyesore to 
 others, a clog and a mortification to myself, I still cling 
 tenaciously to life; tasting lingeringly its sweet, and 
 ignoring its bitter, as best I may. Ah ! why was it made 
 so bitter, when it was forced upon me without my seeking 
 it ! Why was it made so sweet, since it will be taken 
 from me, sooner or later, without asking my consent ! " 
 
 I. The sweet and the bitter have their uses, I think. 
 The bitter helps us to understand what a life of endless sin 
 and woe would be, and leads us to avoid it. The sweet 
 makes us the more eager to lay hold upon that " far more 
 exceeding and eternal weight of glory " that shall be re- 
 vealed. 
 
 MK. W. (looking at me searchingly). Tell me honestly, 
 Miss Frost, do you never have any doubts of the truth 
 of the things that you talk about so glibly ? 
 
 I. Yes, sir, now and then. 
 
 MR. W. (triumphantly}. Ah! I thought so. Well, 
 what do you do with them ? 
 3
 
 50 BHILOH. 
 
 I. Sometimes, I just quietly lay them aside. And on 
 the morrow, when I look for them, lo ! they are gone ! 
 
 MK. W. But that is a pure act of the will. 
 
 I. Well, what was a man's will given him for, if it 
 was not to help him to resist evil, and hold fast that which 
 is good ? 
 
 MK. W. But is not a man's reason that .part of him 
 which constitutes his superiority over the brutes ? 
 
 I. ~No more than his conscience, I think. 
 
 MK. W. Well, I hardly think his conscience would 
 justify him in using his will in opposition to his reason. 
 
 I. Not so fast, sir. You assume that reason and reason- 
 ing are synonyma. If you had heard as many polemics as 
 I have, you would hardly espouse that view of them. 
 And I hold it to be a far more reasonable act for a man to 
 plant himself firmly "on that faith which, in his best and 
 soberest moods, both his reason and his conscience have 
 approved, saying : " Here I stand, though the earth reel, 
 and the heavens fall ," than it is weakly to suffer himself 
 to be knocked about by every wind of doctrine, and every 
 wave of doubt, or to be led by the nose by every wile of 
 the devil. 
 
 MK. W. But how do you know that the doubt is not 
 the true thing ? 
 
 I. Because doubt is not the normal condition of the 
 mind, nor the spirit in which life's economy must be car- 
 ried on. If you doubt your food, you starve ; if you 
 doubt nature, you reap no harvests; if you doubt love, 
 you live and die alone. Moreover, to doubt an error is 
 not to gain a truth. For, when the truth is possessed, 
 error is known for itself, and doubt is gone. This is 
 the weak point in scepticism : it proves nothing, it only 
 denies. There is no rest an it. 
 
 MR. W. (frankly). You are right there. When once 
 a man begins to doubt, there is no telling where he will 
 stop. He doubts his friends, his neighbors, 'himself; he
 
 SHILOH. 51 
 
 doubts motives, means, aims ; he doubts his own senses ; 
 he gets to doubt his own being. The ground slides 
 continually under his feet, like quicksands. But is it 
 always, possible to will doubt away ? 
 
 I. Perhaps not, sir, any more than it is possible to will 
 sorrow away. It is right that some doubts should be 
 solved. Others must be borne for a time, as sorrows must 
 be borne. In such cases, there is the same remedy for 
 doubt that there is for sorrow prayer. And though the 
 prayer may not at once solve the one, or remove the other, 
 since God, seeing not as man sees, but into the depths of 
 life, may discern that it is needful to discipline and to in- 
 struct even by these stern teachers, yet the fervent, hum- 
 ble prayer will sustain the heart under the sorrow, and 
 enable the reason to endure the doubt. 
 
 ME. "VV. (turning away with a disappointed air) . I hoped 
 your remedy Avould be more real and efficacious. 
 
 I. More real ! What would you have ? Is not prayer 
 the one Divine and spiritual instinct which distinguishes 
 man above the brutes ? If ever you owned an intelligent 
 dog or horse, there have been times when you found it diffi- 
 cult to deny him the possession of both reason and con- 
 science ; but you never, for one moment, suspected him 
 of praying. You knew that the idea of communion with 
 God, the Infinite, never entered his head. But all human 
 beings pray ; no race so low, so savage, so brutish, but it 
 makes to itself idols whereunto to pray ! Does this uni- 
 versal instinct of the race teach nothing ? Did you ever 
 know bird, or bee, or fish, or hound, or deer, to be gifted 
 Avith an utterly useless, unmeaning, superfluous instinct? 
 And is man the highest, the mos't perfect, creature of them 
 all the only abortive one ? Given an inherent, universal 
 impulse to pray ; and the necessity and the efficacy of 
 prayer follow as inevitable corollaries. For exercise is es- 
 sential to the maintenance of life. As the disused limb, the 
 muscles never brought into play, become rigid, useless,
 
 52 SHILOH. 
 
 diseased ; so the soul that never lifts itself in prayer the 
 highest expression and manifestation of its life becomes 
 equally torpid, paralyzed, unsound. 
 
 There was no immediate answer. Mr. Warren's eyes 
 were fixed on the blue crown of a distant hill, with a 
 dreary, hopeless expression, unlike anything I had ever 
 seen in his face. Finally, he said, in a broken, disconnect- 
 ed, listless way, 
 
 " I almost wish I could think as you do. The most 
 superstitious belief would be more comfortable than this 
 ever-shifting doubt. But the habits of youth and middle 
 age become fetters to the mind and limbs of later years. 
 I don't know as I could shake them off, if I cared 
 to ; and I don't care for anything much now that 
 Maggie" 
 
 The sentence was left unfinished. 
 
 For grief such as Mr. Warren's, it is hard to find words 
 of comfort. One can point to the soothing power of time, 
 to be sure ; but time, without God, is more likely to harden 
 than to heal. I worked on in silence, therefore, until my 
 floral emblems were finished ; then I held them up for in- 
 spection. 
 
 " I have made these for Maggie, sir. I wish to put this 
 little cross on her bosom, and the wreath in her hand, show- 
 ing thereby that they who patiently bear the cross .shall 
 win the crown. The cross is a tiny thing, you see, not larger 
 than is often worn for ornament, while the wreath is mas- 
 sive, by which I would suggest also that rich, triumphant 
 saying of St. Paul's, ' I reckon that the sufferings of this 
 present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory 
 which shall be revealed in us ! ' These four or five single 
 
 G 
 
 flowers I shall scatter over her feet, to show how few and 
 scattered must have been the joys of earth, even if she had 
 lived to taste them. Have I your permission to place them 
 thus?" 
 
 MR. WARREN (huskily). Do what you like with her,
 
 SHILOH. 53 
 
 now, I know you mean well. And don't think I am too 
 rough and crabbed and sneering, to feel your kindness to 
 Maggie. 
 
 I disposed the flowers around the corpse, according to 
 my design ; their symbolism, you will not fail to see, being 
 intended for the living rather than the dead ; for I knew 
 not if Maggie had ever borne any cross, or aspired to any 
 crown. For her, I had ceased to have either hope or fear ; 
 having left her with a prayer, in God's tender mercy, I 
 felt no disposition to take her thence, even in idea, that 
 being the only safe place in the universe for her benighted, 
 undeveloped soul. Mrs. Warren came in, for a moment, 
 and looked at my work with a face wherein the gravity 
 grew ever sweeter till it bordered on joy. "Aunt Vin " 
 bestowed on it some qualified admiration. 
 
 " It's very statistically done," she remarked, jerking her 
 head at it grimly, " and shows you might be a painter, if 
 you ambitioned it. But isn't it a leetle mite Romanesque ? 
 I hope you don't belong to the Pusseyites or the Jeshuites, 
 or any of those people with queer pigments in their brains, 
 who set more store by the shell of things than they do by 
 the kernel." 
 
 Mr. Warren came, too, after a time, bringing me a deep- 
 tinted, half-blown damask rose. 
 
 "Could you find a place for this ?" said he. "Maggie 
 liked bright colors. And I should like to have something 
 from her father somewhere about her." 
 
 " Certainly ; she shall hold it in her hand with the 
 wreath. You know, Mr. Warren, that red is the color of 
 Love ; so this rose may fitly image, not only your own ten- 
 der affection for your darling, but also that mighty love of 
 Christ, as shown in His precious bloodshedding for us; 
 without which, we should all struggle vainly under the 
 crosses of earth, look for no heavenly crown, and be for- 
 ever buried in the darkness of spiritual death." 
 
 Mr. Warren turned away, looking half displeased. I
 
 54: SHILOH. 
 
 was well aware that this last meaning was alien to his 
 thought, but I was glad that he could not look at his rose, 
 henceforth, without being reminded of it. For, though I 
 expected no swift miracle of conversion to be wrought in 
 him, no one could tell what planting, or what watering, it 
 might please God to bless with slow perhaps almost im- 
 perceptible yet steady increase.
 
 THE REACTION". 
 
 WENT home through the ripened glory of 
 the morning ; noticing with those sharpened 
 and concentrated senses that city-refugees some- 
 times bring to lovely rural pictures the vivid, 
 lustrous green of the turf, t;ie bright hues and 
 delicate odors of the flowers, the sharp, clear out- 
 line of verdure and rock, the soft, pure depth of 
 the sky, the infinite beauty and diversity of form 
 and color that enriched my way. For the first time in 
 many days, my heart was singing within me. I felt well 
 pleased with my night's work: out of that shadow of 
 death, there seemed to have been born unto me new hope 
 and meaning in life. I even fancied that Bona walked hand 
 in hand with me all the way, and that Mala had departed 
 for a considerable time. 
 
 Mrs. Divine met me at the door, and inquired, in her 
 ringing, cheery voice, " Well, how is Maggie Warren this 
 morning ? " 
 
 " She is dead," I answered, briefly. 
 
 Her face grew grave and sympathetic at once. But 
 Mrs. Prescott, busy in the kitchen, caught the words, and 
 delivered herself of a quick, caustic commentary, 
 
 "It's a mercy to her and the neighborhood! That 
 miserable Warren will have one child the less to bring up 
 in infidelity."
 
 56 SHILOH. 
 
 MALA (ironically, through my lips). Thank you, madam. 
 Shall I convey your consolatory message to the afflicted 
 family ? 
 
 MBS. PEESCOTT (with heightened color}. Just as you 
 please. I ain't afraid to stand to it that the less family 
 that man has, to train up in the way they shouldn't go, the 
 letter. 
 
 I (in a cold, hard tone). If that rule operated universally, 
 is is perhaps easier for us to discern the houses which Death 
 would visit, than those which he would spare. Thousands 
 bring up their children in practical infidelity, having less 
 excuse than Mr. Warren has. He teaches what he believes. 
 They believe one thing, and teach by implication an- 
 other. 
 
 BON A (softly, to me). Are you "speaking the truth in 
 love ? " 
 
 I took no notice of her inquiry, but went up to my 
 room, with a mortal fear chilling my heart. Nor was it 
 groundless : I found waiting there, ready for my shoulders, 
 the same old burden which the little excitement of last 
 night, and the hope of doing a good deed, had enabled me 
 transiently to throw off. Wearily I took it up, and a great 
 discouragement came over me. And Mala, of course, took 
 delight in pushing me over the brink of the moral precipice 
 upon which I trembled. 
 
 " You expected a great deal from this ' doing something 
 for Christ,' as you so nicely phrased it, have you found 
 it ? " she asked. 
 
 I admitted to her and myself, that I had not. 
 
 MALA. You even fancied, this morning, that a life of 
 this sort of work would bring you, first healing, then hap- 
 piness ; do you think so still ? 
 
 I confessed that such a fancy, if I had ever had it, had 
 vanished utterly, leaving not so much as the shine of its 
 wings in the distance. 
 
 MALA. And all that very good and proper talk, where-
 
 SHILOH. 57 
 
 with you so abundantly favored Mr. Warren, is it the 
 faithful expression of your feeling now ? 
 
 Moodily I acknowledged that if Mr. Warren were then 
 before me, the chances were that he might utter what 
 blasphemy or infidelity he chose, without much danger of 
 interruption. 
 
 MALA (triumphantly). Perhaps you will take my advice 
 next time, and 
 
 " Miss Frost, your breakfast is ready." 
 
 I looked up. Mrs. Divine was standing in the door, a 
 striking impersonation, I thought, of steady, homely, health- 
 ful Common Sense. 
 
 " Thank you," said I ; " but I am afraid I don't want 
 any, Mrs. Divine." 
 
 She looked at me narrowly, then asked, abruptly, " What 
 did Mrs. Warren give you for lunch last night ? " 
 
 " Indeed, I do not know. I never looked at it." 
 
 " Umph ! I thought so. I suppose the world doesn't 
 look very bright to you this morning ? " 
 
 " No, ma'am, I believe it does not." 
 
 " And a good reason why ! You've been up all night, 
 hard at work ; you've been through with the trying scenes 
 of a deathbed ; and you've eaten nothing to keep your 
 strength up. I was reading in one of your books last night, 
 that 'mind is superior to matter ; ' but the writer forgot to 
 add that mind and matter have a good deal in common. 
 At least, as long as mind is tied to matter, it can't do much 
 business without consulting its partner. And when a per- 
 son's tired and "hungry, or faint, his views of life ain't apt 
 to be bright or correct. Come down stairs, right away, 
 and eat a good breakfast ; and then go to bed, and get a 
 good sleep ; and if things don't look brighter after that, 
 we'll see what's to be done next. One thing you may put 
 down for certain, child that there's no trouble so deep 
 that there isn't some remedy strong enough to reach it." 
 
 I submitted to her guidance like a child. And after the 
 3*
 
 58 SHILOH. 
 
 sleep had been duly sought, found, and let go again, 
 " things " certainly did look brighter. I wondered at my 
 late miserable subjugation to Mala, and called Bona to my 
 side. 
 
 " Tell me, if you can," I said, humbly, " why it was 
 that I fell so completely and helplessly into Mala's hands, 
 just now, when I was so fully persuaded that I had escaped 
 from her, for a time, and was hopefully entering upon a new 
 and better era of my life." 
 
 " The cause was complex," returned Bona. " In your 
 temporary exaltation of mind, you fancied yourself so 
 secure that you forgot to watch and pray, lest you enter 
 into temptation. Mrs. Prescott's harsh, though not alto- 
 gether unjust remark, jarred rudely upon your awakened 
 sensibilities. You were physically exhausted, and as Mrs. 
 Divine told you, body and mind act and react upon each 
 other. Finally, if you want the whole truth, you are still 
 thinking of, and striving for, present, rather than eternal 
 peace, earthly distraction more than heavenly consolation." 
 
 " Oh, Bona ! " I murmured, reproachfully 
 
 " It Is true," she answered, steadily. " I will not say 
 anything about the curiosity, or the sad unrest which 
 helped to induce you to go to the Wan-ens, perhaps hu- 
 man motives can never be quite pure. Your chief mistake 
 was that you thought to earn present peace by doing 
 Christ's work, much as a man means to earn his daily bread 
 by carting sand or laying bricks. Whereas, he who 
 would do our Lord faithful service, must set himself 
 thereto as a sculptor does to Art ; thinking of daily bread, 
 pleasure, fame, only as things which may come to him 
 through his work, but are never to be confounded with its 
 object. Art is dearer to him than they all ; and his work 
 in her service is less a labor than a love ; less a means to 
 an end, than a self-forgetting worship. ! " 
 
 " Was not my work at the Warrens well done, then ? " 
 I faltered.
 
 SHILOH. 59 
 
 " Very well, in the maip. But that was because the 
 Spirit of God worked with you. To Him, therefore, be all 
 the praise ! " 
 
 Her words confounded me. I felt keenly their force 
 and directness. Yet, as I considered them- carefully, pac- 
 ing absently to and fro, I discerned in them quite as much 
 cause for hope as discouragement. For he who knows the 
 exact nature of his disease, has only to set about seeking 
 the remedy. And in this case, there was no mistaking it. 
 " O Christ ! " I murmured, " enter Thou into my secret 
 thoughts, and lead them, as only Thou canst, up their 
 Mount of Transfiguration ! " 
 
 When I recovered consciousness of time and place, I 
 found that I had been standing, nobody knows how long, 
 staring vacantly into my fireplace ; which is filled, accord- 
 ing to the quaint old fashion of the place, with the feathery 
 green of asparagus. Have ^ never described my room? 1 
 I beg its pardon ! it deserved better things of me. 
 
 It is a large, square, low-studded chamber, with a huge 
 beam running athwart the ceiling, calculated to inspire 
 implicit confidence in the building's strength. It has 
 white-washed walls on three sides, and on the other, a 
 dark wainscot of oak, in the midst of which is the queer 
 high mantel, and the fireplace. Its furniture is a study in 
 chronology. A high-post bedstead gratifies no aesthetic 
 need, but, with its snowy linen, homespun blankets, and 
 quilted and stuffed counterpane (a miracle of patience 
 and ingenuity), answers every demand of weariness, and 
 deserves respect, therefore, for fulfilling the chief end of 
 its being, which is more than we humans do, as a rule ! 
 There is a stiff company of antique, straight-backed, ma- 
 hogany chairs, black with age, and shabbily genteel with 
 upholstery of threadbare hair-cloth, and rows of tarnished 
 brass nails, picturesque objects to look at, and with a cer- 
 tain dignity of immemorial descent about them; but a 
 plebeian Boston rocker, brand-new, furnishes more artistic
 
 60 SHILOH. 
 
 curves for use. There is a quaint, dingy,, wizened, stilted 
 table, that irresistibly reminds me of a mummy. There is 
 a very light-colored, modern dressing-table that, not less un- 
 avoidably, suggests a mushroom. Over the latter, an ancient 
 looking-glass is suspended from the wall, at an actite angle ; 
 having, for its upper panel, a curious composition in color, 
 in the Chinese School of Art, whose intent I have failed to 
 discover. There is a cumbrous structure, mounted on slen- 
 der, carved legs, which my hostess calls a " chest of draw- 
 ers ; " whereof the design must have been handed down 
 from the days when " there were giants in the earth," the 
 top drawer being quite out of my reach, even though I sup- 
 plement my height with a chair. There is no carpet ; but 
 the unpainted floor is white with manifold scrubbings ; and 
 after some acquaintance with it, I am growing sceptical 
 whether carpets are, in summer time, the luxuries we are 
 wont to think. Mrs. Prescott the grim embodiment of 
 uncompromising neatness avers that they are only hiding 
 places for dirt, at any time. 
 
 " The dust>," says she, " sinks into 'em, and slinks under 
 'em, to be raised and settled over again, at every sweeping, 
 till both the carpet and floor are nothing but nastiness. 
 No carpet shall ever again be nailed down, in any house of 
 mine; I won't have anything that can't be shaken and 
 aired, and the floor cleaned under it, every day, no matter 
 what the fashion is." 
 
 By way of outlook, my room has two small windows, 
 in time-browned, worm-eaten frames. The panes of glass 
 arc so small and so imperfect, setting the objects seen 
 through them at sixes and sevens, that it is plain they 
 must have experienced the restraint, directly or by heredi- 
 tary transmission, of the old, oppressive tax on glass, 
 which made that commodity a subject of strict economy. 
 All the windows of this ancient structure, by the way, ex- 
 cept on the front, have a curious irregularity of position, 
 seen from the outside ; being subject to no external rule,
 
 SHILOH. 61 
 
 but only obedient to the hidden law of interior fitness and 
 convenience an arrangement which has manifest advanta- 
 ges. How many rooms, in modern dwellings, would be 
 unspeakably more enjoyable, if a certain window could be 
 shoved a yard to the right or left ; but the inexorable ne- 
 cessity of putting it on a line with some other window, ex- 
 ternally, was neither to be set aside nor overcome, in the 
 builder's conventionally moulded mind, and so there is no 
 spot in all their length and breadth pleasantly adapted to 
 piano, sofa, or bedstead. This old manse is hampered by 
 no such arbitrary rule ; consequently, the windows are pre- 
 cisely where they should be, for the highest internal beauty 
 and comfort; and its exterior has, withal, an expansive, . 
 unconventional, hearty, and habitable expression, which is 
 a better thing than regularity of form. When will our 
 domestic architects learn that beauty is far less likely to be 
 found in uniformity than in its opposite, symmetry and 
 balance, which are more essential, being easily attainable 
 without it ! And why must the lives we live, as well as 
 the houses we build, be chiefly directed to the attain- 
 ment of certain external effects ; to gain which, much inte- 
 rior beauty, fitness, and Tightness, must be sacrificed or 
 compromised ? But my windows are giving us a deeper 
 view into things social and spiritual than we had counted 
 upon, let us go back to their material outlook. 
 
 One is thickly shaded by the centenarian pear-tree, 
 aforementioned, and looks to the south, taking in its wav 
 the riotous garden, the farther crest of Chestnut Hill, the 
 white church, the grey school-house, a farm-house, painted 
 red, and a dark border line of forest. The other com- 
 mands a wide view over a varied tract of country ; the 
 nearest feature being a vividly green meadow, dotted with 
 great, gnarled, leafy apple-trees ; through which a brook 
 goes singing and shining, and playing "peep-oh!" with 
 me from among tall grasses, pointed leaves of calamus and 
 iris, and all the lawless and vagrant growths that huddle
 
 62 SHILOH. 
 
 together on its "borders. This view would be one of still 
 life, indeed, only that afar over the meadows there is an 
 opening, where a brown bend of road is seen ; upon which, 
 at irregular intervals, a primitive wagon, attached to a 
 sleepy horse, guided by a sleepier driver ; or a slow-moving 
 cart and oxen ; or a stout countryman with a stick, driving 
 a pig or a flock of sheep before him ; appear suddenly from 
 behind a screen of verdure, glide slowly across the inter- 
 vening space, and vanish behind a similar screen, like fig- 
 ures in a dream. And these ever-recurring glimpses of hu- 
 man life too remote to be intrusive, yet near enough to 
 remind me of the innumerable and secret ties, by which 
 at every moment of our lives, we are bound to a common 
 humanity save the scene from that sad loneliness of ex- 
 pression, which is the inevitable peculiarity of views made 
 up of natural objects only. Yet it seems mournfully 
 enough typical, too, of the evanescence of human life, 
 compared with the works of Nature, hills and dales, 
 rocks and streams, things which change so slowly that 
 they seem to us unalterable and everlasting ; while man's 
 appearance among them is scarcely more enduring or mem- 
 orable than those gliding, panoramic figures in the dis- 
 tance !
 
 VTI. 
 
 EXPLORATIONS KTJRAL, MORAL AND PAROCHIAL. 
 
 ITTING by my western window, after I 
 had written you my last letter, a fever of 
 exploration seized me. That point in the 
 northwestern landscape, where the ground 
 dipped into a dell or a ravine, caught my gaze 
 and my imagination. What sort of a place 
 was it likely to be? Cool and shady, doubt- 
 less, for I could see great balls and cones of 
 foliage, held aloft by sunken tree-trunks. Beautified with 
 the ripple and gleam of water, surely, for the brook plainly 
 knew the way thither, and took it, in its own delightful, 
 meandering fashion. I put on my hat and followed it. Leo, 
 whom I encountered on the way, accepted an invitation 
 to follow me, without the ceremony of putting on the hat ! 
 Having reached the meadow's limit, my tinkling guide 
 darted under a fence, which I was forced to climb. Then, 
 dropping on a soft bank of moss, I found myself in one of 
 the loveliest, dreamiest, shadow-haunted nooks conceivable. 
 The brook flowed suddenly, with a low and liquid note, 
 into a deep, dark, clear basin, bordered, on one side, by a 
 moss-enamelled rock, and on the other by a steep, ferny 
 bank, embossed with black free-roots, all overarched by 
 thickly interlacing boughs of tall trees, through which 
 the sunshine trickled scantily, in shining, golden drops. 
 What a place for a troop of naiads to bathe ! I half ex- 
 pected to see the lovely ^Egle herself rise from the basin's
 
 04 SHILOH. 
 
 clear depths, like Venus of old from the sea. Instead 
 thereof, Leo plunged in, and paddled about with a face of 
 serene enjoyment. 
 
 From this point, the brook's banks continually gained 
 in altitude, taking the form of a rough, rocky, wooded 
 cliff, on one side, and on the other, of a steep, but smooth 
 and green, hillside, shaded here and there by huge, wide- 
 spreading trees, among which I noticed an enormous tulip- 
 tree, a very Anak of its race. Between these curiously 
 diverse banks, the brook ran, crept, sparkled and sung 
 tumbled, too, once and again, but altogether as if it en- 
 joyed it ; for a shout of laughter accompanied its fall, and 
 then it went on, giggling and gurgling to itself, with occa- 
 sional spurts of irrepressible merriment, as if the joke were 
 much too good to be quickly let go and forgotten. I 
 crossed it many times in my progress down the glen, at- 
 tracted by a gay breast-knot of flowers on the hill's green 
 robe, a tiny fern-forest on the brook's border, a mossy, leaf- 
 strewn ledge, all the more fascinating because well nigh in- 
 accessible, or a wild vine flinging an ideal grace over the 
 gaunt, gray outline of some rugged rock, yet without im- 
 pairing any really valuable quality, as a sunny and loving 
 spirit may do over the hardest, homeliest duties of com- 
 mon life. By and by, the hill began to slope off gradually, 
 the cliff terminated in a sharp promontory of rock, and a 
 sinuous rail-fence marked the extreme limit of the glen. 
 Under this fence the brook shrank into the disihal shadow 
 of a dense forest, its song hushed, its gambols all over, 
 and flowed silently through a dead level of damp, black 
 mould, scantily coated with a pale and fungous vegetation, 
 and strewn with dead leaves and dry twigs, seeming, at 
 first, half-sulky, and altogether scared, by the sudden and 
 complete change of its manner of life. Bona, Mala and I 
 leaned on the fence, and looked after it. 
 
 " See ! it is a type of your life," exclaimed Mala, less 
 bitterly than her wont. " Just so, that went singing
 
 SHELOH. 65 
 
 through flowers and sunshine, unsuspicious of change ; 
 just so, without volition or responsibility of its own, it was 
 suddenly thrust out into an atmosphere of impenetrable 
 gloom, and set to flow through earth dank with tears, 
 fruitful only in diseased and depressing imaginations, and 
 strewn with the dry, rustling debris of dead hopes. Ay ! 
 look at the poor little .stream and weep, you have cause ! 
 In its dumb, shadowed, monotonous flow, all your future 
 life is mirrored." 
 
 BOXA (tenderly}. Nay, where there is shadow, there is 
 also shelter; the roof that shuts o\it the sun may shut out 
 the storm as well. And notice how calm, and broad, and 
 sweet-browed the brook becomes, after a while ; with here 
 and there a speck of blue sky reflected in its. depths, like a 
 thought of peace. There are a few low, sweet flowers^ 
 on its bn 1 :*, too; needing its refreshment, and growing 
 brighter and more fragrant for it. And beyond the wood, 
 no doubt, it flows out into the sunshine again. 
 
 I. If I were sure of that, Bona, the thought of that 
 future sunshine would help me so powerfully through the 
 shadow of this Present ! 
 
 BOXA. Have you forgotten the " glory that shall be re- 
 vealed ? " 
 
 MALA. But it looks so far off when it is only the heav- 
 enly sunshine ! 
 
 BOXA. Only? After brief weariness, only long rest ! 
 After swiftly vanishing years of strife, only ever-flowing 
 peace ! After short pressure of sorrow, only eternal weight 
 of joy ! After hard faces of enemies and changeful ones of 
 friends, only the tender, winning, satisfying face of Christ ! 
 After the rough usage of the world, only the Everlasting 
 arms ! After a life-time of desire, only an eternity of love ! 
 Can any dare any, sinful mortal ask for more ? 
 
 For a moment I looked at Mala ; then she somehow 
 disappeared. There is this peculiarity about these strange 
 companions of mine, that whenever I regard Mala steadily,
 
 66 SHILOH. 
 
 trying to see her as she is, she always dwindles, grows 
 vague, and vanishes ; whereas, the longer and more search- 
 ingly I look at Bona, the brighter and better defined she 
 becomes. The first is most powerful when I do not recog- 
 nize her for herself, when she pushes me from behind, or 
 allures me from before, hidden under a mask of self-respect, 
 custom, expediency, necessity, and I know not what beside, 
 "for she has more shapes than Proteus. Bona's efficiency, 
 on the contrary, is greatest when I seek her out, entreat her 
 help, and consciously put my hand in hers. If I grow care- 
 less and off my guard, Mala is nearly certain to be at my 
 elbow, ordering my goings ; but there is little drifting, or 
 going blindfold, under Bona's guidance, she compels me 
 to use my reason and my will. 
 
 I now turned to her, and exclaimed, " Oh ! Bona, if I 
 could always look at Nature thi'ough your eyes ? " 
 
 " Your own will serve you as well," she answered, gen- 
 tly, " if you have the right spirit in your heart. Nature is 
 like a stream ; it has different aspects for different beholders. 
 One sees in it little beside the reflection of his own face. 
 Another, looking closer, discerns the form of its waves, and 
 the grasses, flowers, and other minute objects that float on 
 its surface. Still another discovers fish playing in its 
 depths, and pebbles and roots at the bottom. A fourth is 
 ravished with its graceful curves, its sparkle and play of 
 light, its soft concords of color. A fifth floats into dream- 
 land on its liquid music. A sixth, feeling somewhat of its 
 sentiment as well as of its beauty, finds out subtle analogies 
 to human life. But the divinely inspired heart of a seventh, 
 while it loses none of these effects, swells with rapturous 
 thought of the peace that ' shall flow as a river ; ' or, like 
 St. John in Patmos, looking on the Nile, beholds in a vision 
 the River of Life, ' clear as crystal, proceeding out of the 
 throne of God and the Lamb.' In nature, to-day, you have 
 found a bit of mythology, some analogies, many artistic 
 effects, and a type of your own life. Suppose, now, you 
 peek for the Goodness of God in it."
 
 SHILOH. 67 
 
 I looked, and- lo! the Transfigured Landscape! Every 
 leaf, every flower, every gray rock, every waving line, every 
 bright hue the brook's song the forest's shadow were 
 all alive and aglow with that Goodness. By it the sun- 
 beams shone, the breezes played, the birds twittered, the 
 sky hung soft-eyed over the smiling earth. David saw it 
 when he exclaimed " Oh ! how great is Thy goodness which 
 Thpu hast laid up for them that fear Thee ! " not made visi- 
 ble to every careless gaze, intent on outward things alone, 
 but laid up ; stored richly for the joy and consolation of the 
 searching eye and the prayerful heart. I stood, trembling 
 and tearful, overwhelmed with the sudden, dazzling revela- 
 tion. 
 
 " Just so," said Bona, softly, "just so, though in a 
 deeper and fuller degree, will the awakened soul, one day, 
 stand overjoyed and awe-struck before its sudden dis- 
 covery of God's wonderful goodness in the circumstances 
 of its earthly life. Where it saw only shadow, it shall 
 discern shelter; where it felt only rigour and hindrance, 
 it shall discover the Rock of Defence ; and sorrow, casting 
 off her mask and her mufflings, shall stand forth as the 
 fulness and the graciousness of Redeeming Love ! " 
 
 A deep sigh here broke upon my ear. Leo, faithful to 
 his notions of duty, would not leave me ; but it was plain 
 he thought I took a tiresome time for meditation. He had 
 dropped despondently on the grass, near by, and was look- 
 ing at me with uplifted head and wistful eyes. 
 
 " Thou art right ! " said I, gravely apostrophizing him. 
 " No need, either in thought or act, to go fai'ther and fare 
 worse ! It is the bane of moralists and philosophers that 
 they never know where to stop. We are wiser, Leo, we 
 will go home ! " 
 
 No question but that he understood ! At the first 
 words, he pricked up his ears, and looked at me earnestly, 
 inclining his head to one side. At the last, he sprang up, 
 wagging his tail, gave a bark of joyous acquiescence, and 
 bounded forward.
 
 68 SHILOH. 
 
 He guided me home by a shorter route. It led through 
 a shady, turfy lane, traversed by deep cart ruts, and a sun- 
 ny bit of road, bordered by that queer tangle of creeping, 
 climbing, prickly, vagabond vegetation, which always ac- 
 cumulates by roadside stone-walls, in the country ; sowing 
 its own seed, and reaping* its own harvest, with some little 
 help, in the latter task, from stray cattle and loitering 
 school-children. I soon came upon the" Divines' wood-pile, 
 a domestic institution which, in Shiloh, has the habit of 
 establishing itself by the roadside, in convenient proximity 
 to the house gate, by way of saving the enclosed land, and 
 allowing the wood-chopper to keep au courant des public 
 affairs. There I found Mrs.' Divine's silver-haired bachelor 
 brother, who is so universally addressd and spoken of as 
 " Uncle True," that it seems like unnecessary particularity 
 to mention that he has a claim, by baptism and birthright, 
 to be called Truman Hart. He was sitting in an ancient- 
 looking arm-chair, chopping wood ; with a barrier of logs 
 before him, and a plentiful sprinkling of chips all around. 
 A huge mass of rock jutted up near him, in the top of 
 which was a deep depression, or cavity, half full of water. 
 I looked at it curiously, and inquired if it was an artificial 
 or natural basin ? 
 
 " I guess it's nateral," replied Uncle True, laying down 
 his axe, and wiping his brow. " It's been there ever since 
 I was born ; an'. I've heerd tell that the first Hart settled 
 on this place on account on't ; he saw a fairy pictur, or 
 suthin' or other, at the bottom, when he first looked into't, 
 that took his fancy. Sartain, it couldn't 'ave ben his own 
 face, for the Hart breed never was a harnsome un ! An' 
 people du say, when that holler gits dry (which it never 
 does except in seasons of uncommon drouth), that the 
 Haits can look out for bad luck. An' though I don't 
 b'lieve much in them sort o' sayins, there does seem to be a 
 leetle mite o' truth in that un. Leastways, I've often no- 
 ticed that things are apt to come cross-grained when that
 
 SHILOH. CO 
 
 holler's dry. To be sure, they do other times, too ; so I 
 ain't quite clear Avhether there's anything in't, or not. It's 
 pooty much like an ox-yoke, I guess ; what'll fit into one 
 bow '11 fit abeout as well into t'other." 
 
 Amused by the quaint speech and homely simile, I sat 
 down on the rock, the more comfortably to pursue the con- 
 versation. 
 
 " The place seems to be amply supplied with water, 
 without the help of the hollow," I remarked, prompted by 
 the sight of the aforementioned well sweeps, rising into 
 view, one on either side of the house, and looking much, 
 like an enormous pair of fishing-poles. " May I ask how it 
 happens that you have two wells, in such near proximity ? " 
 
 " Ask all the questions you like," returned Uncle True, 
 benignly ; " they're the short road to larnin', and save makin' 
 mistakes. As for the wells, the one behind the house was 
 dug first, and the water turned out to be so hard and 
 brackish that they concluded they'd try 'tother side. An' 
 that's the best water in Shiloh cool as if it had jest come 
 out of an iceberg, an' soft an' sweet as if it had been stirred 
 up with a rosebud jest afore it started." 
 
 " That seems strange," observed I, " inasmuch as there 
 is only the length of the house between them." 
 
 " Sweet an' bitter waters are nigher together than that, 
 sometimes," said Uncle True, sententiously. " I've known 
 'em both to come out o' the same spot." 
 
 It was plain that his mind had wandered from wells in 
 fact to wells in metaphor. 
 
 " Besides," he continued, after a pause, " though, as you 
 say, there's nothin' but the old house 'twixt 'em, yet that 
 may stand for this world an' all its consarns. An' jest as 
 the old house ain't much compared with this whole hillside 
 an' valley, as fur as you can see, so life isn't much, nuther, 
 when you look at the eternity afore it an' the eternity arter 
 it. But there's jest that, an 'nothin' else, 'twixt the bit- 
 ter waters of earth that we all begin to drink as soon as
 
 70 SHILOH. 
 
 born, an' the river o' life in heaven. "Wall, then, there's 
 another way o' taldn' it. The brackish well, you see, is on 
 the kitchen side o' the house, where all the work an' worry 
 goes on ; an' I suspect that people who dig all their wells 
 amongst the toils an' cares, an' hurry an' skurry, o' this 
 world, thinkin' o' nothiii' but how to make money or save 
 it, needn't wonder if they don't git much out on 'em but 
 bitterness. Whereas, them who dig towards the garden^ 
 that is, as I take it, towards Christ an' His Church ( ' A 
 garden enclosed is my sister, my spouse,' says Solomon V 
 song), them who dig thar, will find livin' waters, sweet to 
 the tongue, an' satisfyin' to the soul. You see, Miss Frost, 
 them wells are among my preachers. But, bless me ! we 
 mustn't be preachiu', nor listenin' to preachin', all the 
 while ! " 
 
 And Uncle True caught up his axe and laid aboxit him 
 energetically, to make up for lost time. I watched the 
 slow, stiff" swing of the axe, indicating somewhat of rusti- 
 ness and infirmity in the joints and muscles that wielded it ; 
 then, my attention became fastened on the chair wherein 
 the old man sat. 
 
 " Your chair has a most suggestive look," I said, at 
 length ; " it seems unctuous with long absorption of life's fa- 
 miliar knowledge and homely interests. Has it a history ? " 
 
 " It's history and mine's pooty much the same," replied 
 he, laying his hand on its arm with a certain fondness. 
 " Me and my old chair's kept company for nigh onto fifty 
 year, and I guess nothin' but Death will part iis now. In- 
 deed, I've some thoughts of askin' to be buried sittin' in 
 it ; I've read somewhere that old Ben Johnson (he's a 
 poet that used to be read, when I was young, more'n he is 
 now), was buried standin' straight up in in wall, you 
 know where I mean, in that fine church in England where 
 they bury their great folks." 
 
 " Yes ; in "Westminster Abbey," said I. " But it is 
 painful to think of a man on his feet so long ; and, though
 
 SHILOII. 71 
 
 sitting may be an easier posture, I advise you not to make 
 the request. The thought of your sitting upright till the 
 end of time, could scarcely be otherwise than wearisome to 
 your friends. Moreover, it seems fitting that a man should 
 lie down in his grave as he does in his bed, resigning him- 
 self into God's hands, and trusting to Him to take care of 
 his awakening." 
 
 " So it does," said Uncle True, heartily ; " I declare, I 
 never thought o' that ! Wall, anyhow, me an' my old 
 chair '11 jog on together, as fur as the grave. To be sure, 
 it's a good deal rusty an' creaky (like myself), an' its ben 
 mended tAvo or three times (which I hain't, as I know on), 
 but I guess it'll last my time. I hope so ; I shouldn't like 
 to try a new un, this has been legs an' seat, an' carriage 
 an' travel, an' tavern- for me, so long ! " 
 
 " Why ! do you never go without it ? " I asked, in sur- 
 prise. 
 
 " No more'n a snail goes without his shell. You see, 
 marm, when I was a young feller, about sixteen year old, 
 I was flung out of a wagon, an' lamed for life. Wall, first 
 I -tried crutches; but I couldn't sit on 'em when I got 
 tired, an' that w r as pooty often. Then, I took to shovin' 
 this old chair about ('twas a new un, then !), an' that 
 suited 'xactly. I could go as fur as I liked, an' sit down 
 jest where an' when I liked. Besides, it's got a drawer 
 here, under the seat, you see, where I keep the things I 
 want to use commonly." And Uncle True opened it, and 
 displayed its contents. " Here's hammer an' nails, an' gim- 
 let and screws; them's for tinkerin' round the place: 
 wherever I see a board off, or a hinge loose, or anything 
 out o' kilter, I fix it. Here's an awl an' waxed ends, so 
 that I can mend old harness, an' boots an' shoes. Here's a 
 needle an' thread ; its easier to sew on my buttons or mend 
 a tear, sometimes, than 'tis to travel deal- into the house, to 
 get it done. Here's a trowel to dig up Aveeds with ; by 
 the way, I make out to do most o' the garden Avork.
 
 V2 SIIILOH. 
 
 Here's some old linen, an' salve, for doin' up cuts and 
 bruises ; I git a chance to use them, on myself or some- 
 body else, abeout every week. An' here's the last news- 
 paper, to read in the shade when I get tired o' choppin'. 
 An' now," shutting up the drawer, " I'm agoin' to cut 
 up that log, over yonder, an' you can see how I manage." 
 
 So saying, Uncle True stuck his axe through some 
 leather straps at the side of his chair, raised himself slowly, 
 by a firm grasp of its arms, and turned about, shifting 
 hands, as he did so, from one side to the other. Then he 
 lifted it by the arms, set it forward a step, dragged one 
 foot after the other slowly up to it, set it forward again, 
 and so proceeded until he reached the point indicated ; 
 when he twisted himself into it, resumed his axe, and set 
 to work. 
 
 I looked on with interest ; and something like pity must 
 have shown itself in my face, also, for the old man, after 
 looking at me keenly, once or twice, said quietly, "It's a 
 dull sort of a life to lead, may be you think; but it isn't 
 quite a useless one, you see. And I've grown so wonted 
 to it, that I guess I shouldn't care to have it any different, 
 now, if I could." 
 
 I recalled Mr. Warren's emphatic assertion, " Life is 
 sweet to them all," and felt its truth. Yet, what a dissim- 
 ilarity in the two men ! Uncle True's placid, sensible face, 
 was full of the glow of a kindly and contented spirit, shin- 
 ing through the dusk and rigor of its ch-cumstances like 
 sunbeams struggling through a dusty, discolored window- 
 pane. The little light in Mr. Warren's face resembled 
 rather the chill reflection of sunbeams from ice ; which 
 freezes all the harder to-day because it thawed a little yes- 
 day. 
 
 Entering the front gate, I discovered Mrs. Prescott, sit- 
 -ting in a low, lilac^shaded doorway, opening directly into 
 the parlor, or, as Mrs. Divine oddly enough calls it, the 
 " out-room. " It is a large, low-studded room, covered
 
 SHILOH. 73 
 
 with a carpet of domestic manufacture, and filled with an 
 odd mixture of antique and modern furniture ; the stiff 
 and angular arrangement of which, shutting out every ge- 
 nial and hospitable grace, as well as the exquisite neatness 
 in which it is kept, being, evidently, a work after Mrs. 
 Prescott's own heart. Surmising that this stronghold of 
 the family dignity had been opened in my honor, and con- 
 scious, withal, that I owed the lady some civility, in atone- 
 ment 'for my rude speech of the moraiing, I went to her at 
 once. 
 
 " Mrs. Prescott, is there any rector to the little church 
 on the hill yonder?" 
 
 She looked up with the first gleam of real interest that 
 I had seen on her chronically dissatisfied face. 
 
 " No, there ain't any now," answered she, " but I hope 
 there will be before .long. There's a minister coming to 
 preach here next Sunday, and if he gets encouragement 
 enough, he'll stay." 
 
 " Then the parish has not given him a call ! " said I, 
 with a little natural surprise at this way of doing things. 
 
 " A call ! Land's sakes, no, I wish they had ! But 
 there ain't life enough in them for that. He'll get no call, 
 unless it's from the Ladies' Sewing Society ; or, I might as 
 well say, right out, from me and Esther Volger, for we have 
 to drive 'em up to do all that is done. We went to the 
 Bishop, and got him to promise us that he would send this 
 man here ; and we obligated ourselves to see that he got 
 enough to support him, somehow. Of course, when the 
 men find out that a minister's really coming, they'll get 
 together and auctioneer off the pews ; and then the ladies, 
 by dint of sewing societies, and tea-parties, and fairs, must 
 make up the rest." 
 
 " Has the parish always been so feeble, or so torpid ? " 
 I inquired. 
 
 " Obi ! dear, no ; once it was strong enough. You see, 
 it was a split-off from the old church (that's up street, five 
 4
 
 74: SHLLOH. 
 
 miles away) ; and it took some of the best and most .influ- 
 ential men of that parish, father among the Test. But 
 most of them died years ago, and their sons didn't fill 
 their places (seems to me none of them do, now-a-days !) ; 
 or their property was divided and sold, and the new 
 owners didn't care for the church. Then father met with 
 heavy losses, and had to sell out his old, fine place upon 
 the Hill (this is mother's property) ; and so the parish 
 began to run down, and it's kept going down hill ever 
 since, till there isn't a man left in it worth his salt. To 
 be sure father '11 do all he can, but he's got to be old, 
 you see, and has pretty much done with active life, in the 
 world and in the Church. And if it wasn't for the women, 
 the parish would be dead as a door-nail, in no time ! " 
 
 Which it never would be, I thought, as long as Mrs. 
 Prescott remained to galvanize it into any spasmodic, inter- 
 mittent life, with her energy and acidity. And I found, 
 thereafter, that she was truly the mainspring of the parish, 
 without which it must have gone to irremediable ruin. 
 Not that she was a popular or discreet leader, for her sharp 
 philippics and stinging comments, while they penetrated 
 some obtuse consciences, and stirred their owners up to 
 sluggish good works, mortally offended others, and drove 
 them into greater apathy or dogged opposition. Neverthe- 
 less, she fought on, exhibiting genuine courage, persever- 
 ance, and self-sacrifice, and achieving something for Christ 
 and His Church, which is put down to her credit, doubtless, 
 against the day when the books are opened. 
 
 "And the clergyman that is coming next Sunday, who 
 is he ? " inquired I. 
 
 " Oh ! he's a Mr. Taylor, just ordained, I believe, 
 though he's not a young man ; he has a wife and family. 
 He seems like a downright, earnest, zealous, wide-awake sort 
 of a man, and I hope he'll shake up this valley of dry bones 
 a little. By the way, Miss Frost, won't you join our Sew- 
 ing Society ? We need all the help we can get."
 
 SHILOH. 75 
 
 MALA. Sewing Society ! Nursery of gossip, and hot- 
 bed of malice and all uncharitableness ! In the name of 
 Common Sense, tell her you must respectfully decline. 
 
 BOXA. You need not gossip, nor bear malice, nor deal 
 uncharitably. Take care that your own motives are right, 
 and do not judge your neighbors. If no good work is to 
 be commenced, or carried on, until the workers and the 
 system are cleansed from all evil, where, on this earth, 
 are you to find a place to begin ? 
 
 MALA. To be sure, it might afford you amusement to go. 
 It must be a rare place to study character. 
 
 BOXA. Nay, if you are going for that object mainly, you 
 had better decline. 
 
 I (peevishly). Was ever poor mortal bothered with such 
 a pair of contradictory advisers ! You change your places 
 so quickly that I do not know one from the other, nor 
 which to follow. (Then, aloud, to Mrs. Prescotf). I cannot 
 promise to join, until I am more certain that I can do good 
 by becoming a member. But I will go once, if you wish, 
 -and see what it is like. 
 
 " "Well, it meets to-morrow," she answered. " It don't 
 generally meet on Saturday, but it will this week, on ac- 
 count of Mr. Taylor's coming. We must get together, 
 and find out what sort of a support we can promise him. 
 And I shall certainly call you, to go along." 
 
 That evening, Leo once more accompanied me to the 
 dwelling of the Warrens, and waited patiently at the gate 
 while I made a brief visit within. The white, waxen maid- 
 en still slept her untroubled sleep, in the room where Death 
 had given her the kiss of peace ; the father sat apart, silent, 
 morose, wrapped in grief and in gloom ; the mother received 
 me with sad, gentle composure. She told me that the funeral 
 was fixed for the coming Sunday, at the usual hour of after- 
 noon service ; an appointment that seemed strange to me, 
 though I heard it without comment, seeing, from her
 
 76 SHILOH. 
 
 manner, that it must be in accordance with the Shiloh 
 practice. 
 
 Then, through moonlight and shadow shadows our- 
 selves ! Leo and I went silently home. 
 
 And the morning and the evening were the second 
 day!
 
 VTII. 
 
 THE SEWING SOCIETY. 
 
 N BOUT one o'clock on the following day, 
 Mrs. Prescott sent a shrill call up the stair- 
 case to know if I was " ready to go to So- 
 ciety ? " I had not expected so early a sum- 
 mons, but I made quick work with my toilet, 
 and soon joined her and Alice at the gate. 
 The walk was a pleasant one ; over a wind- 
 ing, hilly, alternately shady and sunny road, 
 bordered by a pleasant succession of fields and mead- 
 ows and woodland, with here and there a comfortable 
 farm-house, standing sufficiently aloof to preserve its own 
 individual life intact, yet affording its neighbors glimpses 
 of a blue column of smoke, by day, and a red window- 
 gleam by night, as an assurance of available help and com- 
 panionship, at need. 
 
 Mrs. Prescott enlivened the way with some account of 
 the people I was about to meet. 
 
 " There's my second cousin, Esther Volger Essie, most 
 folks call her, but I don't believe in turning the^ good old 
 Bible names into wishy-washy nicknames I'd rather have 
 cream than skim-milk, any day. Well, Esther is a person 
 of some consequence in Shiloh ; she is the only daughter 
 of the richest man in the place, and she has been away to a 
 city boarding-school for two or three years, and learned te 
 play the piano, and got varnished up generally ; though if 
 hasn't spoilt her a bit I'll say that for her. On the con- 
 trary, she's got some good, besides the varnishing ; for she
 
 78 SHILOH. 
 
 went to a Church school, and learned more about Church 
 ways, and got more interested in Church work, than she 
 would ever have done if she had stayed at home ; for her 
 father don't care any more about any Church than he does 
 about the man in the moon. But he gives Esther pretty 
 liberally of pocket-money, and as she's young and spry, 
 and hasn't much to do, except to mitten young fellows who 
 hang round her because she's an heiress, I manage to get 
 more money and more work out of her than anybody else. 
 Then, there's Mrs. Seber (it's at her house that the Society 
 meets to-day) ; she's a woman who had a good deal rather 
 there wouldn't be any minister here in Shiloh, because she 
 thinks it's smarter to go up town to church. Still, she has- 
 n't got the face to turn her back on us, when we do have 
 service ; but she means to be top of the heap, to pay her for 
 her condescension. She always expects to be made presi- 
 dent of Society, though she hasn't any idea of doing a pres- 
 ident's work. But there's one comfort about that, when 
 she's president, I can have my way pretty much ; all she 
 wants is the honor ; she is glad enough to get rid of the 
 labor. But Mrs. Burcham is a bird of a different feather. 
 Whether she's in office, or out, she makes it her business to 
 fight what anybody else proposes. If a measure is tried to- 
 day, she'll fight it tooth and nail ; if you try the very oppo- 
 site to-morrow, she is just as ready to fight that. I always 
 know where to find her, on the contrary side ! Then, 
 there's Mrs. Shemnar ; she happened to be made without 
 any mind of her own, so she helps herself to the one that 
 is handiest, whenever there's a vote to be taken. If I could 
 be at her elbow all the time, she would do just as I said ; 
 if Mrs. Burcham happens to be nearest, she'll follow her 
 lead just as quick. But I believe I'm more troubled, just 
 now, about Mrs. Danforth than anybody else." And Mrs. 
 Prescott stopped to take breath. 
 
 " Who is Mrs. Danforth ? " I asked. 
 
 " Mrs. Danforth is a New Yorker, like yourself. She
 
 SHILOH. 79 
 
 has taken a house down on Hope Plain, for the summer, on 
 account of two pale, peaking, spindling children she's got, 
 that the doctor told her must be brought away from the 
 city, or they would die. I called on her the other day be- 
 fore she had got fairly settled, I was so anxious to see if 
 the Church was like to get any good out of her. And 
 well, she's a curious one, Miss Frost. Not much after your 
 sort, though I used to think all city folks must be pretty 
 much alike." 
 
 " What sort is hers, then ? " 
 
 " That's just what I can't say ; she puzzles me more than 
 common. When I called, she came sweeping into the room, 
 with a silk dress and a long train, and the grandest kind 
 of an air, so I expected to be snufied out like a candle 
 in no time ; but, instead of that, she sat right down and 
 talked to me in the easiest and chattiest kind of a way, 
 and told me all about her children, and her family, away 
 back to the Mayflower times, and what she had done, 
 and what she had meant to do, and what grand people 
 she knew, and I don't know what all, my head fairly 
 swam before I got away from her. As she talked, she 
 made gestures in the most wonderful way I never saw 
 anything like it in my life ! and then her hands were 
 loaded with diamond rings ; she had two or three on a 
 finger, and how they did twinkle and glitter"! But yet, 
 somehow, her diamonds seemed to be a part of her, I 
 couldn't think of her Y ithout them, now, and I should 
 think she would have to sleep in them, for fear she would- 
 n't know herself when she wakes up. Well, she treated me 
 handsomely enough, plain as I am ; but I concluded, after 
 I had watched her awhile, that she thought she was made 
 of a very superior sort of clay, indeed ; and when she was 
 finished, there wasn't any left ; and so the little differences 
 in other people's earth weren't worth her minding. But I 
 thought, Miss Frost, that in spite of her diamonds, and her 
 grand air, and her good blood, she wasn't quite a lady."
 
 80 SHILCII. 
 
 " Indeed," said I, " what was lacking ? " 
 
 " Well, in the first place, she didn't look tidy, to be 
 sure, she was in the midst of setting to rights. Then, she 
 did boast ; though she covered it up as nicely as ever you 
 saw it done. And once she said, ' By George.' " 
 
 I had had some little idea of making common cause 
 with my unknown city sister, and defending her against 
 Mfs. Prescott's charge ; but the " By George " shut my 
 mouth. I think a lady cannot be too careful in her expres- 
 sions ; too steady in her resistance to that mighty army of 
 slang words and phrases which is invading our literature, 
 our parlors, lyceums, courts, even our pulpits. 
 
 Mrs. Prescott continued. "Anyhow, she's a Church- 
 woman, and used to Church work : she said she had been 
 President of ' The Friend in Need,' arid Vicc-President of 
 ' The Wayside Sower,' and First Directress of something 
 else ; to hear her tell the story, you'd say there wasn't any- 
 thing she hadn't been, and done. But one thing I saw 
 plain enough, she isn't going to work after anybody's or- 
 dering but her own. She'll work like a horse, I should 
 say, if you'll give her the lead ; but she hasn't much gift 
 for following on. I suspect the best thing we can do, con- 
 sidering all things, is to make her president of our Society 
 right off. But then there'll be trouble with Mrs. Seber. I 
 laid awake' all night thinking about it." 
 
 And Mrs. Prescott went on thinking about it, to such 
 an absorbing extent that she said no more till we reached 
 Mrs. Seber's gate, not the front one, which seemed not to 
 have been opened since the house was built, but a side 
 gate, which, being fettered by a chain, with a heavy weight 
 of old iron attached, did not admit us with very gratify- 
 ing alacrity. 
 
 It is the Shiloh habit to enter your neighbor's dwell- 
 ing by its heart, namely, the kitchen, a practice which 
 must have originated in the kindest consideration for visit' 
 ors ; since to be first introduced into such stiff, sour, se^
 
 SHILOH. 81 
 
 vere looking parlors as are the rule here, would inevitably 
 freeze the friendliest heart, and depress the most vivacious 
 temperament. Whereas, the kitchen, in its afternoon pre- 
 sentment, is usually an airy, tidy, and genial apartment ; 
 full of homely, but cheerful, tokens of domestic thrift and 
 comfort ; and rich as a human heart in long experience of 
 life's familiar cares, labors, and interests. Through Mrs. 
 Seber's kitchen, therefore, Mrs. Prescott led the way to a 
 small bedroom at its farther end ; where a puffy feather-bed 
 was strewn with an assemblage of bonnets and wrappings 
 that would have served for an illustration of defunct fash- 
 ions. Among them a jaunty hat, with a scarlet feather 
 (a very tulip among sage plants) caught my companion's 
 eye, and pointing to it, she said, briefly, " Esther Volger." 
 Thence, she conducted me to the "keeping room," already 
 tolerably well filled with sober matrons and comely maid- 
 ens ; all sitting stiffly upright, with that uncomfortable air 
 of being arrayed in company attire and manners, which is 
 apt to make the first half-hour of a rural gathering a thing 
 to be dreaded. From an open door into the parlor beyond, 
 came a sound q laughter and cheery voices, that indicated 
 the presence of a more enlivening spirit. Mrs. Prescott 
 made a brief pause on the threshold, nodded toward me, 
 and said, " Miss Frost, ladies." 
 
 A stout, rosy-faced dame arose and bestirred herself to 
 find me a chair, by which I identified her as the mistress of 
 the mansion. Having put me in it, she hesitated, as if 
 conscious that something further ought to be done, or said, 
 in rny behalf, but not quite certain what ; and was, doubt- 
 less, much relieved when the sudden appearance of a young 
 lady in the door, close to which she had placed me, saved 
 her from the necessity. The new-comer paused, with a little 
 start, in her swift career, at sight of a stranger in her path ; 
 then she held out her hand in the frankest, simplest way 
 
 " Miss Frost, I presume, I am glad to meet you. How 
 do you do ? I am Essie Volger." 
 4"
 
 82 SHILOH. 
 
 I did not need the explanation. The rich farmer's 
 daughter, who had been polished, but not spoiled, by ed- 
 ucational advantages, was easy recognizable. Miss Essie's 
 manner had not lost any fresh, natural charm by being sub- 
 jected to boai'ding-school revision ; but it had gained some- 
 thing, doubtless, in ease and courtesy. There was an air 
 of style, about her dress, too, as became the heiress, yet 
 nothing showy or vulgar. Without being beautiful, " her 
 face was extremely pleasing; the eyes were dark blue, 
 and met mine frankly, the nose piquant, the complexion 
 a clear shade of tan, the cheeks blooming. A frank, bright, 
 brisk, fun-loving New England maiden was Miss Essie, 
 with but little imagination, but much good sense and good 
 humor ; whose sphere was, even now, more in the Actual 
 than the Ideal ; and who would, in due course of time, 
 tone down into the most domestic, practical, and devoted 
 of wives. 
 
 I took the hand with real pleasure. " Thank you, Miss 
 Volger. Introductions are such stupid things. I am glad 
 you did not wait for one." 
 
 " So they are ! " she answered. " They t^ll you nothing 
 that you want to -know. I do not care a rush whether my 
 vis-a-vis at a dinner party is called Brown or Green, so 
 what is the use of telling me ? If we were introduced 
 something in this wise, ' Mr. Brown, who has been trav- 
 elling in China for a year, and is about to open a tea-store 
 in Blankville ; and Miss Volger, just from boarding-school, 
 with a ridiculous smattering of ologies, and a solid accum- 
 ulation of long repressed fun,' we should know where we 
 stand. But if we have to pick up these items by chance, 
 why not leave us to slide into acquaintance in the same 
 way, when we like ; and not bring us face to face to dis- 
 charge stiff commonplaces at each othef, when nothing 
 else is possible ? Names furnish no ground of meeting, ex- 
 cept for people who have genealogical tastes. But I 
 thought I heard Cousin Priscilla's voice in here ; did she 
 not come with you ? "
 
 SHILOH. 83 
 
 I looked arotmd ; Mrs. Prescott had disappeared. 
 
 " She went into the bedroom with Mrs. Seber," said a 
 lady near us. 
 
 " Oh ! " exclaimed Miss Essie, with a queer, dry intona- 
 tion. And she went after them. 
 
 In my vicinity, there was a dead silence. In other 
 parts of the room, conversation went on in most subdued 
 tones. Obviously, these good people were very much 
 afraid of me. By way of offset, I was getting to be 
 afraid of them. The spectacle of a roomful of strange, 
 stiff people, awfully afraid of doing something wrong, and 
 consequently doing nothing but send surreptitious glances 
 around them, is always discomposing to me. In sheer des- 
 peration, I turned to my next neighbor and said, " What 
 a very lovely view we have from this window ! " 
 
 " Yes, marm." 
 
 I tried again. " That is a pretty little lake down there ; 
 has it a name ? " 
 
 "Marm!" 
 
 " Perhaps she means the pond," faintly suggested the 
 next in the row. . 
 
 " Oh ! I don't know, marm," said the first. 
 
 I went on, scarcely knowing what I was saying, but de- 
 termined to say something. "It is so pretty in itself, it 
 deserves a pretty name. See how the sunshine glints 
 across it ! I wonder if Longfellow could tell us the Indian 
 for ' Sparkling Water.' " 
 
 Profound and awful silence for some moments. Then a 
 stout, cheerful looking dame over the way came to the res- 
 cue. " We call it Rustic's Pond, around here that's the 
 man's name who owns it. He lives right down to the foot 
 of the hill, two hundred rod or so, in that white house with 
 a piazzy in front, and green blinds, and a red barn, with a 
 vane, with a horse on top, you must have took notice of 
 it, if you've ever ben that way. His wife's a kind of cou- 
 sin o' mine Marietty Hine, her name was afore she was
 
 84 SHILOII. 
 
 married, mine was Lucindy Hine: we come from the 
 Hines of Winteford, which was a wonderful spreadin' fam- 
 ily ; my grandfather had nineteen children, all by one 
 wife, and most on 'em lived to marry and have children of 
 their own, not quite so many as he had, but Peter (that's 
 the oldest un) had eleven right smart children, as ever you 
 see, and one fool, who wasn't born so (I shouldn't want 
 you to believe that), but was made so by the scarlet fever, 
 as often makes children fools, or lame, or somethin' aruther ; 
 it made one of my sisters deaf, and I've heerd tell " 
 
 There seems to be no good reason why this stream of 
 recollections, continually fed by fresh tributaries, should 
 not have flowed on till now, if it had met with no interrup- 
 tion. Indeed, I had a fantastic, oppressive vision of the 
 spell-bound auditory sitting there till -doomsday, and the 
 archangel's trump breaking in upon some ludicrously petty 
 detail with tragic, untimely, irreconcilable awfulness ; upon 
 whose terrible and grotesque grouping, my imagination 
 would linger, to the poignant distress of my conscience. 
 It was a relief, therefore, to see the gaunt form of Miss La- 
 vinia Rust at the door, and to be hailed by her with the 
 cordiality due to old acquaintanceship, albeit, a little tem- 
 pered by that grim shake of the head. 
 
 " Why, bless me ! if here ain't Miss Frost ! I didn't 
 participate seeing you here, though it's strange I didn't, 
 too, you have such a dereliction for good works. Have 
 you seen any of the Warrens to-day ? " 
 
 " Yes, Miss Rust, I went down this morning and re- 
 newed the flowers around Maggie. Mrs. Warren was her 
 usual calm self. Sam is much better." 
 
 " I'm desperate glad to hear it. But, Miss Frost, did 
 you ever see a woman with such exposure as Mrs. Warren 
 has got ? I expected yesterday morning, to see her break 
 down all at once, and have a historical turn, but she kept 
 around like a marble statute. Such women ain't as num- 
 berous as grass-seed, I can tell you. Why, only yesterday
 
 SHILOH. 85 
 
 afternoon they sent for me into one of the neighbors, her 
 little boy had cut his foot, and before I could stop the 
 confusion of blood she'd gone into a dead faint, and I 
 didn't know which to take hold of first. I never was in 
 such a digamma before." 
 
 
 
 " Aunt Vin," here interposed the loquacious dame oppo- 
 site, " have 'you found out why Tom Sharp and his wife 
 have separated ? " 
 
 " Yes'm," responded Miss Rust, promptly, " on account 
 of compatibility of temper." 
 
 " Oh ! I didn't know but 'twas something worse," re- 
 turned the other, in perfect good faith. 
 
 " You'd think that was bad enough, I guess," said 
 Aunt Vin, " if you had any idea what sort of man Sharp 
 is ! He comes of a distempered family. His brother was 
 tried for murder once, and only let off, Lawyer Pound says, 
 because there was nothing to discriminate him, but sub- 
 stantial evidence. But there's plenty of people who think 
 he ought to have been hung, to this day." 
 
 Mrs. Prescott now entered. Mrs. Seber and Essie Vol- 
 ger followed her, the former looking annoyed, the latter 
 with a quizzical expression and dancing eyes. Essie came 
 directly to my corner, found a chair, and compelled the 
 whole row of wall- flowers to move and make room for her, 
 next to me. Then she whispered, confidentially, " Such a 
 time as we've had with Mrs. Seber ! I doubt if Mrs. Dan- 
 forth herself has less taste for playing second fiddle. But 
 she has consented to do it once, though you see her mouth 
 has a twist in it ; as if, after making up her mind to dine 
 off turkey and truffles, she had been forced to take up with 
 boiled pork and cabbage." 
 
 I looked at the lady in question, and could not suppress 
 a smile at the appositeness of the simile. Miss Essie con- 
 tinued, " I suppose you like keeping accounts, I am glad 
 somebody has that useful penchant. I would rather hoe 
 corn and potatoes."
 
 86 SHILOH. 
 
 I looked at her in infinite amazement at the apparent 
 irrelevancy of the remark ; seeing which, she appeared 
 nearly as much surprised as myself. 
 
 " I took it for granted," she said, apologetically, " that 
 you were in all Cousin Priscilla's secrets. Well, no matter, 
 she will open her budget pretty soon, and then you will un- 
 derstand. We are only waiting for umphl ' Speak of 
 an angel and you see his wings ! ' there she is now Mrs. 
 Danforth." 
 
 Looking up, I beheld a new-comer in the doorway, a 
 striking figure of a woman, just at the height of her richest 
 maturity, and fashioned upon a most spacious and luxuriant 
 plan of physical development. The haughty air, the gra- 
 cious manner, the sweeping silken robe (no longer untidy), 
 the diamonds, the gestures all the details of Mrs. Pres- 
 cott's recent sketch were there ; and I mentally compli- 
 mented that lady's skill in portraiture, while she received 
 and introduced the original. In two minutes, Mrs. Dan- 
 forth had glided easily into conversation with those nearest 
 her ; in four, she was relating some incident of her life with 
 a varied modulation, an illustrative play of feature, and a 
 rich and happy exuberance of gesticulation, that would have 
 made her fortune on the stage ; in six, everybody was 
 listening to her, half in wonder, half in admiration. As her 
 hands moved, her diamonds flashed and scintillated ; and, 
 after a moment or two, as Mrs. Prescott had said, it became 
 impossible to conceive of her without them ; so readily did 
 they amalgamate themselves with one's idea of her charac- 
 ter ; so subtile was their correspondence with some luxuri- 
 ant inward growth of pride and pomp; so perfectly did 
 they assimilate their richness to the brilliancy and showi- 
 ness of her person and manner. There was a charm, almost 
 amounting to fascination, about her conversation ; and yet 
 something strongly repcllant, at least to me, in her person- 
 ality. Watching her closely, I was nearly as much puzzled 
 where to place her as Mrs. Prescott had been. That lady's
 
 SHILOH. t 87 
 
 simile of the " superior clay " helped me a little, at last. I 
 decided that Nature had moulded Mrs. Danforth of the 
 coarsest earth rather than the most delicate; but circum- 
 stances had placed her in a high position, and given her a 
 large experience of men and manners, and so the rude 
 material had been painted, and gilded, and varnished, and 
 made to show, as nearly as possible, like Sevres porcelain. 
 But nothing could altogether conceal it. Notwithstanding 
 her fluent, often witty, speech, her polished manners, her 
 elegant dress, her haughty carriage, there was some in- 
 scrutable hint about her of a latent coarseness of nature, 
 upon which a vast deal of refinement had been lavished, 
 without being able to eradicate it. 
 
 On the whole, she impressed me much as a washer- 
 woman, masquerading as a queen, might have done, only in 
 a far less marked and offensive degree. I have often seen 
 German and Spanish women of identical characteristics, 
 rarely an American. Yet I am told that no foreign element 
 tinctures the ebb and flow in her veins. It must be one of 
 those curious cases of intermittent hereditary transmission, 
 which now and then startle families with what appears to 
 be the introduction of a new type, but is only the restora- 
 tion of an ancient one. Probably the blood of some old 
 time German actress, or Spanish cantatrice, after running 
 underground, as it wre, for two or three centuries, flashes 
 up to light again in this showy, fluent, haughty New 
 Yorker, of our day. 
 
 Her treatment of others was an ingenious compound of 
 easy familiai-ity and condescension, the latter being rather 
 a subtle, elusive flavor than a manifest ingredient: Nor 
 did this manner alter in the least for any difference of pei'- 
 sons. Obviously, Mrs. Danforth was too much engrossed 
 with her own huge egotism, to trouble herself to discrimi- 
 nate between the egotisms of others. 
 
 Aunt Vin eyed her curiously and silently for a considera- 
 ble time, then, willing to be agreeable, she addressed her,
 
 88 SHILOH. 
 
 " Was there much predisposition in the city when you 
 left, ma'am ? " 
 
 " To what', madam ?" inquired Mrs. Danforth, after an 
 unavailing attempt to catch the slippery purport of the 
 question. 
 
 " Why, I mean small-pox, and typus fever, and dipthery, 
 and diaeresis, and cholery infanticide, and all those refec- 
 tious and benignant deceases that carry off you city-folks 
 to Haids before your time." 
 
 Mrs. Danforth's eyes opened a trifle wider, and she gave 
 Miss Lavinia a keen look, as if to discover what manner of 
 person this might be ; then she answered, courteously 
 enough, 
 
 " I left before the sickly season commenced. The doc- 
 tor advised me to give my children the benefit of a long 
 summer in the country ; they have always been delicate." 
 
 " Do tell ! " exclaimed Aunt Yin, with great interest, 
 " I must come and see them, poor little dears ! I shouldn't 
 wonder if 'twas worms that ailed them ; and if there's any- 
 thing that I'm 'Ofate' on (as the French say), it's chil- 
 dren's complaints, ma'am. I'm particularly innoxious to 
 worms. First, I give them a mild purgatory to eradicate 
 the bowels ; and then a good, strong conic that old Dr. 
 Nichols told me of. If you'll follow my advice, ma'am, I'll 
 promise to make Tritons of your children, in a foi'tnight." 
 
 Mrs. Danforth listened to this alarming proposition with 
 a command of countenance that did her infinite credit. 
 " Thank you," she said, with only the faintest suspicion of 
 irony in her tone, " I shall be quite satisfied with some- 
 thing less than that. If you can make strong, hearty chil- 
 dren of them, you will place me under unspeakable obliga- 
 tion to you. And I shall be very glad to have your ad- 
 vice." 
 
 Mrs. Prescott now cleared her throat with an emphatic 
 " Ahem ! " that meant business.
 
 IX. 
 
 IN OFFICE. 
 
 ADIES," said Mrs. Prescott, " you all know 
 what has brought us together. There is 
 a chance of our having a minister once 
 more ; we want to do what we can to make 
 it a ceitainty. The men say that Shiloh 
 can't support a clergyman. I say it can, if 
 it does its best. We have met to-day to 
 find out what our Sewing Society is willing 
 to do toward supporting one." 
 
 MBS. BURCHAM. It's my opinion, that if we did less, 
 the men would do more. They are not going to follow 
 petticoat lead ; I wouldn't if I was they. We ought to 
 wait for them to go ahead, and then take hold and help 
 them with all our might. 
 
 MRS. PRESCOTT (sharply). That's nonsense, Mrs. Bur- 
 cham, and you know it. We should wait till doomsday. 
 I did wait three years before I got our last minister, Mr. 
 Dragner, to come here ; and I've waited six months since 
 he left, and begged and prayed every man in the place to 
 take hold of the matter, before I did anything about it. 
 They didn't any of them " like to take the responsibility ! " 
 But if I had a husband, he should take it. Suppose you 
 get Major Burcham to ! 
 
 ESSIE VOLGER (aside to me). Cousin Priscilla has made 
 a fine mess of it now I wish she would keep her tongue 
 in better order ! Mrs. Burcham will not get over that shot 
 in six months ; it hit hard. You see, Miss Frost, Major
 
 90 SHILOH. 
 
 Burcham is the dog in the manger, in our parish ; he won't 
 do anything himself, and his example and influence keep 
 back others. 
 
 AUNT VIST (adding her testimony in another aside). 
 Yes, Miss Frost, and then he's a proud, porpoise sort of a 
 man, who likes to have people believe he's the very centre 
 and circumvention of all things ; and when Mr. Taylor 
 comes here, he'll make him a high-blown speech, chock-full 
 of polysyllabub words, and take the credit of everything 
 we've done. 
 
 Mrs. Burcham being speechless with confusion and rage, 
 Mrs. Prescott proceeded : 
 
 " Our first business is to organize the Society. It has 
 always been our custom to take the names and fees for 
 memberships first, as only members are allowed to vote. 
 Nothing less than twelve and a half cents constitutes a 
 
 O 
 
 member, but you can pay just as much more as you please. 
 Esther, will you take down the names ? " 
 
 Mrs. Danforth took five dollars from her purse, with a 
 mixture of carelessness and ostentation. Other donations 
 appeared to consist of very small sums ; if the widow's mite 
 had any lineal descendant among them, it must have been 
 the half-dollar of poor, little Mrs. Banser, with four chil- 
 dren and a drunken husband depending on her needle for 
 bread, who blushed as if she thought s>he had taken a 
 liberty, or been convicted of extravagance, when she found 
 that far richer people gave no more. For some unacknowl- 
 edged reason, or it might have been merely the effect of 
 an idle mood, I was averse to become a member of the 
 Society. But it was a pleasure to contribute what I could 
 to the fund, and Essie paid no attention to my whispered 
 injunction not to put my name on her list, except to make 
 a comical grimace, and show it to me, written out in very 
 exaggerated characters. 
 
 MKS. PKESCOTT. It is our custom to appoint a Secretary
 
 SIIILOH. 91 
 
 next, that she may be in readiness to take notes of our pro- 
 ceedings. Will anybody give a nomination ? 
 
 MKS. SEBEK. It is a well-known fact that a people 
 who have always a resided in one place, and a done 
 business in a one way, are apt to get into a set ways 
 of doing a things. On that account, it is a good thing 
 to a work in new material, when it comes to a hand. 
 No doubt our Society would be the better for some a 
 new material, and therefore a a I nominate Miss 
 Frost. 
 
 I had watched the painful progress of this speech with- 
 out the faintest suspicion that it was limping in any direc- 
 tion that could concern me ; its termination, therefore, as- 
 tonished me nearly as much as if a mild-looking churn had 
 suddenly exploded a seven-inch shell in my face. Before I 
 could speak, Miss Essie had called out, in clear, brisk tones, 
 " I second that nomination." 
 
 MKS. PRESCOTT. I don't think it is necessary to vote 
 by ballot ; we will try it without. All who are in favor 
 of 
 
 But, by this time, I had recovered from my surprise 
 enough to interfere. A spice of indignation that a trap 
 should be sprung upon me thus, enabled me to do so in a 
 tone not to be ignored. " Mrs. Prescott," I began, " excuse 
 me for interrupting you, but " 
 
 Miss ESSIE (in an alarmed whisper). For heaven's sake, 
 Miss Frost ! for the sake of all that is good-natured and 
 obliging ! 
 
 AUNT VIN (in equally dismayed tones, from the other 
 side). Now don't decline, pray don't ! Leastways, wait and 
 insult Mis' Prescott about it ! 
 
 I (taking no notice of either). While I thank the ladies 
 very sincerely for the honor they have done me, and which 
 I duly appreciate 
 
 ESSIE (in consternation). If you decline now, they will 
 get in somebody who will ruin everything !
 
 92 SHILOH. 
 
 AUNT VINT (insinuatingly). A young lady who has such 
 a dereliction for good works ! 
 
 I (proceeding steadily). I must beg to decline the nom- 
 ination, most respectfully, yet decidedly. There are many 
 ladies present, who, being thoroughly acquainted with the 
 work to be done in Shiloh, and the best way of doing it, 
 can fill these offices better than any stranger. It gives me 
 pleasure to nominate in my place Miss Volger. 
 
 And I turned to that young lady with a most demure 
 look. She bit her lip. " You might have done worse, it 
 must be confessed," whispered she; "I was afraid you 
 would leave them without any nomination, and I saw that 
 Mrs. Burcham had one at her tongue's end, ready for the 
 instant you stopped talking ; yours has disconcerted her a 
 little. But I don't want to be Secretary, it is not in my 
 line ; besides, I am booked for something else. There, she 
 has got a shaft ready." 
 
 MRS. BURCHAM. Miss Frost's action in this matter does 
 credit both to her modesty and her good judgment. As 
 she says, some one who knows the place and people 
 
 . MRS. PRESCOTT (interrupting her). It doesn't need any 
 knowledge of the place or people, to keep accounts. Miss 
 Frost is perfectly competent to fill the office to our full 
 satisfaction ; and the less she knows about the place and 
 people, the more likely she will be to take some satisfaction 
 in it herself. I do hope she will reconsider the matter 
 (looking unutterable entreaties at me). She might help us 
 so much, I know she's had some experience in such work. 
 And she won't be half so likely to take an interest in our 
 work, if 'she doesn't identify herself with it, and keep the. 
 run of it. Miss Frost, won't you allow the vote to be 
 taken ? 
 
 AuNT-Viisr. Do dissent, now, do ! 
 
 MRS. BURCHAM (quickly). Essie Volger' s name is before 
 the meeting. 
 
 I suddenly became aware of a rising dislike for Mrs.
 
 SHILOH. 93 
 
 Burcham, and a desire to see her outwitted. Not that I 
 suspected her of any hostility to me, personally ; I saw 
 plainly enough that her opposition was levelled at Mrs. 
 Prescott, whose candidate she believed me to be. But one 
 docs not care to subserve another person's vengeance in a 
 quarrel which does not concern him, and the attempt to 
 make him do so is nearly certain to convert him from an 
 idle spectator into an interested partisan. Moreover, it is 
 next to impossible to watch any contest long with purely 
 neutral feelings ; whatever be the natural or artificial re- 
 moteness between ourselves and the combatants, there are 
 innumerable unsuspected and hidden channels by which the 
 ebb and flow of a common humanity will pervade our hearts 
 and minds, and draw us inevitably into the excitements and 
 sympathies of the occasion. In the interest of the struggle, 
 the listless mood which had possessed me since morning 
 wore off; and I became dimly aware that some personal' 
 duty might be involved in it ; but no time was given me to 
 decide what. 
 
 Miss ESSIE. I shall consider it a pleasure, Mrs. Bur- 
 cham, to withdraw in favor of Miss Frost, if she will allow 
 me. (Then, in a whisper to me). Do say you'll take it ! 
 
 MKS. BURCHAM (doggedly). I call for the vote. Miss 
 Essie has the nomination. 
 
 MALA. Are you going to let that spiteful woman have 
 her way ? 
 
 I hesitated. Not that I regarded the Secretaryship with 
 any more favor, having had some previous experience of the 
 utter thanklessness of the office ; but I did feel as if it would 
 give me pleasure to demolish Mrs. Burcham. Essie saw 
 the hesitation, and took courage. 
 
 " I re-nominate Miss Frost," she said. " I am sure she 
 feels it to be her duty to yield to our solicitations. Mrs. 
 Seber seconds the nomination. Cousin Priscilla, please put 
 the vote." 
 
 Mrs. Burcham made one last effort. " My dear Essie,"
 
 94 SHILOII. 
 
 she said, blandly, " I cannot allow you to withdraw in that 
 way, as if we made you serve for ' Jack at a pinch.' There 
 is no reason why we shouldn't have two, or more, candi- 
 dates, and vote by ballot. Are there any more nomina- 
 tions ? " 
 
 A weak voice from a corner responded, " Miss Bryer." 
 
 " Certainly," returned Mrs. Burcham, with immense 
 cordiality. " Ladies, your candidates are Miss Volger, Miss 
 Frost, and Miss Bryer." 
 
 Essie made a face, but said nothing. She and Mrs. Bur- 
 cham distributed slips of paper and pencils, and it was plain 
 enough that sly winks and hints were dispensed in about 
 an equal ratio. Mrs. Prescott announced the result, with a 
 note of triumph in her voice, "Miss Frost, twenty-one 
 votes ; Esther Volger, seven votes ; Miss Bryer, one vote. 
 Miss Frost is elected." 
 
 BOJTA (in a still, small, but most distinct voice). So you 
 are Secretary. Not for the sake of the Church, not from a 
 humble desire to be of use where the Providence of God 
 has placed you, not even from a willingness to oblige, mainly, 
 but from the paltry ambition to override and mortify a 
 woman that you never saw before to-day, and to whom you 
 happen to have taken a dislike ! 
 
 Abashed and confounded by this plain statement of the 
 case, I was only half-conscious of what was done next, until 
 I found myself at a small table, with some sheets of foolscap 
 paper, yellowed by time, a rusty steel pen, and a bottle of 
 pale, scared-looking ink, before me. Then, I drew a little 
 comfort from the pleased and satisfied faces of Mrs. Pres- 
 cott and Essie ; and straightway fell to berating myself for 
 doing so. " For " said I to myself, " wrong-doing is not 
 the less wrong-doing because it pleases somebody else." 
 
 BONA (more kindly). Now you are confounding the act 
 with the motive. There is no harm in your being Secre- 
 tary, if you work in the right spirit, henceforth ; there is 
 yet time to overcome evil with good. You have only to
 
 SHILOH. 95 
 
 take care that the whole of your incumbency is not accord- 
 ing to its beginning. 
 
 MKS. PRESCOTT. We will now proceed to elect a Presi- 
 dent, when I shall be glad to resign the chair. Any nom- 
 inations ? 
 
 Miss ESSIE. I nominate Mrs. Danforth. 
 
 MRS. SHEMNAB. I second the nomination. 
 
 MKS. BUBCHAM. I nominate Mrs. Seber. 
 
 FAINT VOICE FBOM THE COBJSTEB. Miss Bryer. 
 
 I shot a glance at Mrs. Danforth, to see how she took 
 her nomination, and discerned that she must have been 
 prepared for it ; doubtless, there was a conference, some- 
 where, before her introduction to our assembly. Then I 
 fell to wondering what could be her motives for accepting 
 it, and let my conjectures stray into some crooked, and not 
 over-clean paths, in search of them ; which might have 
 taught me something, by inference, of the places whence 
 my own motives are too often derived. But it is a mourn- 
 ful wisdom, at best, that questions motives; and oftener 
 misleads than guides aright. 
 
 After balloting, Mrs. Danforth was declared elected by 
 an overwhelming majority ; whereupon she took the chair 
 with an easy, nonchalant grace, implying that she had not 
 so much assumed the office, as attracted it to herself, by 
 some inevitable operation of natural affinities. Up to this 
 moment, she had watched the course of events with a stud- 
 ied carelessness and indifference ; now her manner changed ; 
 she became alive and animated to her very tinger-tips ; and 
 the rest of the organization went forward with a celerity, 
 a decorum, and an attention to parliamentary rules, that 
 showed her to be thoroughly conversant with the- details of 
 her office. Mrs. Seber quickly became Vice-President, and 
 Essie was chosen Treasurer, without a dissenting voice. 
 But over the First Directress, there was a sharp contest. 
 Mrs. Pfescott had designed this office for herself, and so 
 constituted its duties as to make it serve, upon necessity,
 
 96 SHILOH. 
 
 as a check on the President. She was duly nominated by 
 Mrs. Sebr; but Mrs. Burcham also contrived to get a 
 nomination, and there was the usual weak call from the 
 corner (now nearly extinct) for " Miss Brycr." Essie, how- 
 ever, did her cousin good service in the electioneering way, 
 keeping a sharp look out for Mrs. Shemnar and other 
 weak-backed minds ; and so Mrs. Prescott won by two 
 votes ; Mrs. Burcham and Miss Bryer being declared Sec- 
 ond and Third Directresses. 
 
 " The millenium is come ! " exclaimed Essie, in her 
 laughing aside to me, " The lion, the tiger, and the sheep 
 are to work together ! But what a quantity of flattery 
 and finesse I shall have to expend upon that poor sheep, to 
 make her cooperate with the lion, and not with the tiger, 
 and so keep a majority of our directresses on the right 
 side ! However, we have got our ticket elected, pretty 
 much as we settled it beforehand. Mrs. Burcham is the 
 only interpolation, and she is null and void, with two to 
 outvote her." 
 
 A constitution was next produced, and accepted, with 
 a few alterations ; and a book containing former records of 
 the Society was handed over to me, of which Mrs. Pres- 
 cott remarked, parenthetically, that " nobody had ever 
 been able to make head or tail of them, and she did hope 
 my accounts would be kept more orderly ; for there were 
 always disagreeable people around, to insinuate that there 
 must be something wrong about what they didn't under- 
 stand." 
 
 A bag of patchwork was next produced and distributed ; 
 and Mrs. Danforth took a pair of ivory needles and a ball 
 , of worsted from her pocket, and commenced knitting with 
 wonderful velocity, her diamonds flashing with the quick 
 motion, and her mobile face furnishing a kind of pictorial 
 illustration of her sparkling, graceful talk. 
 
 " Be it known to all and sundry," she remarked, " that 
 I always knit in Society ; it is the thing I can do the best,
 
 SHILOH. 97 
 
 and like the best to do. I have a passion for worsteds. 
 Bright colors enchant me. A well stocked worsted store 
 holds me enchained longer than a picture-gallery. I dream 
 of new colors and patterns ; and I go distracted because I 
 cannot reproduce them, when I wake. However, I can 
 make any number and variety of pretty things for fairs 
 and tea-parties ; and you will see, one of these days, that I 
 am not an altogether unprofitable laborer in your field. 
 Meanwhile, Mrs. Prescott, what is it about that minister 
 who is coming to preach for us to-morrow ? " 
 
 Mrs. Prescott reiterated the statement she had made to 
 me, with some additional particulars. 
 
 MRS. BUKCHAM. I hope you did not tell him he could 
 come here, before we've heard him, and decided if we like 
 him ! 
 
 MRS. PRESCOTT (with asperity). That is just what I 
 did tell him. What's the use of putting on airs about it ? 
 The question with Shiloh is not who we'll have, but who 
 we can get. Mr. Taylor, ma'am, begun life as a book- 
 keeper, or an agent, or something of that sort ; but his 
 whole heart is in the Lord's work, and he has been so suc- 
 cessful as a lay-reader, and so forth, in city, that he be- 
 lieves it is his duty to devote himself to it entirely. So he 
 has fitted himself for the ministry, and is going to begin it 
 among us. The real truth of the matter is, that, to do us 
 good, he gives up a certainty for an uncertainty, a comfort- 
 able livelihood for a miserable pittance given grudgingly, 
 and the right to be his own master for the privilege of 
 being everybody's servant. And you talk of waiting to 
 see how we like him ! 
 
 MRS. DANFORTH (speaking so quickly as to prevent Mrs. 
 Burcham from answering). You. make him out quite a 
 hero, Mrs. Prescott. I am already profoundly interested 
 in him ; and no doubt we shall all like him. But is he com- 
 ing here without a call, or is our Society to vote him one ? 
 
 MRS. PRESCOTT. Oh ! the Bishop sends him. Shiloh is 
 5
 
 ( jy SIIILOH. 
 
 considered Missionary ground'. Our business is only to 
 see that he is kept from starvation. Miss Frost, how much 
 do those memberships foot lip ? 
 
 " Twenty-seven dollars." 
 
 MBS. SEBER. That will pay his house-rent, if he can 
 find one. By the way, where is he to live ? 
 
 MBS. PEESCOTT. In my house. 
 
 MRS. SEBER (looking at her in great amazement}. 
 In your house ! Then what is to become of William 
 Dunn? 
 
 MBS PRESCOTT (shortly). That is his lookout. 
 
 MRS. SHEMNAR. Poor man ! I don't believe he can 
 find another house in the place. 
 
 MRS. PRESCOTT (with increased asperity). He can go 
 out of it, then. He's never done it any good, that I know 
 of. A man who doesn't care a straw for the Church, and 
 spends Sunday in counting his sheep, and patching up his 
 fences ! I tell you, people who deal with me, will find out 
 that everything and everybody has' got to stand aside for 
 the Church. I know it isn't other people's way of doing 
 business, but it's my way ; and I don't calculate to change 
 it, for nobody. Least of all, for a man like William Dunn. 
 He makes his bed to suit him, I guess, and he can lie in it. 
 
 There Was a silence of some moments ; Mrs. Prescott's 
 set mouth, and irate look, not encouraging further prosecu- 
 tion of the subject in hand. Mrs. Danforth had the tact 
 to recur to the previous question. " What has Mr. Taylor 
 to depend upon besides these twenty-seven dollars ? " in- 
 quired she. 
 
 " I can tell you, almost to a fraction," answered Essie. 
 " Our Society will raise about one hundred and twenty dol- 
 lars ; it always has, somehow, and it certainly can this year, 
 beginning under such unusually favorable auspices. The 
 seats will sell for a hundred and fifty dollars, or thei-e- 
 abouts ; and the Christian Knowledge Society gives us a 
 hundred more. Take into account that he will get his rent
 
 SHILOH. 99 
 
 for little, or nothing, and that Shiloh is a cheap place to 
 live in, where he can wear out his old clothes, if he has 
 any, and nobody hurt ; and you have the sum total of 
 Mr. Taylor's resources." 
 
 " Three hundred and ninety-seven dollars, and a family 
 to support ! " exclaimed Mrs. Danforth, with a clear, some- 
 what loud laugh, not in the least like the laugh of fash- 
 ionable women, in general, " why, he had better advertise 
 for a situation as coachman, at once ! " 
 
 Mrs. Prescott's set features softened a little. " So he 
 had, ma'am, if it's money he thinks of. But he's doing the 
 Lord's work, and I hope He will give him bread to eat that 
 we know not of." 
 
 MRS. DAXFORTH (icith a comical lifting of her eye- 
 brows). It is devoutly to be hoped He will ! But it is our 
 business to see that Ire has bread to eat and butter, too 
 that we do know of ! I think I can promise you that the 
 Society will raise more than a hundred and fifty dollars 
 this year. And if those seats don't sell for a larger sum 
 than you mention, I'll sit on the doorstep or buy them 
 all ! Six hundred dollars is the very least that Mr. Taylor 
 ought to have, and that is less than a single pew sells for, 
 in the church I attend, in Xew York. 
 
 MRS. PRESCOTT. But you see, the church has been un- 
 occupied so long that it is in a dreadful state ; we've got 
 to raise some money for repairs, too. And you don't know 
 whafc sort of people you have to deal with, Mrs. Danforth ; 
 farmers don't have a great deal of money, and a cent looks 
 bigger to them than a dollar does to you. 
 
 "Ah, well, we shall see," answered Mrs. Danforth, 
 cheerily. 
 
 The afternoon wore on swiftly enough. The blocks 
 of patchwork were gathered as fast as finished,' and Essie 
 brought me a pile of them, with a very amused face. 
 
 " If you want to see," said she, " how people carry their 
 individuality even into so mechanical a process as sewing,
 
 100 SHILOH. 
 
 just examine these specimens of needlework, and try to 
 find two alike. To utilize your study to the Society, you 
 can, at the same time, trim the blocks down to one size." 
 
 I found smooth work and puckered work, wide seams 
 and narrow seams, straight seams and crooked seams, neat 
 seams and soiled seams ; long stitches, short stitches, deli- 
 cate stitches, heavy stitches, stitches set with the precision 
 of a machine, and stitches in a state of riot ; but I did not 
 find the " two alike." 
 
 With the sewing, a good deal of talk went on, of a 
 corresponding diversity of tone and character. It was not 
 the kind of talk I have heard in Aunt Belle's drawing- 
 room, when the " Dorcas Bag " met there ; much of it had 
 to do with farm and dairy matters, and was couched in 
 terms that would sound like an unknown tongue to that 
 elegant assemblage ; but it was kindly, sensible, and prac- 
 tical, for the most part ; without any of that frothy noth- 
 ingness on its flow, which has made me so soul-sick in the 
 city organization. In the matter of gossip, the two stood 
 upon a more equal footing than I had expected ; if there 
 was more of it in the rural association, it was also of a pet- 
 tier character, and less scathing. The victim would, doubt- 
 less, have felt pricked all over, if he could have heard it ; 
 but he would not feel the quick, sharp thrust, penetrating 
 to the vitals, with which his city friends would transfix, 
 and leave him. In the country, gossip is a pastime ; in the 
 city, it is a warfare. 
 
 Moreover, there was a certain informality, very pleasant 
 to see, in the intercourse of the Shilohites, after the first 
 stiffness, and the little asperities evoked by the election, had 
 worn off. Their manner to each other was characterized 
 by a lack of ceremony and a directness of speech, which 
 were yet without any approach to rudeness. I carried 
 away an impression of a friendly, sincere, and genuine, 
 though somewhat narrow, life ; not without its place and 
 value in the economy of existence ; and capable of being
 
 SHILOH. 101 
 
 refined, by right feeling and a generous spirit, into a sim- 
 ple beauty that would have its own exceeding charm. 
 
 At five o'clock, supper was announced. A by-law, re- 
 straining hospitable instincts or housewifely ambition in 
 the matter of eatables, having been passed, over much de- 
 termined opposition, it was limited to tea, biscuits, butter, 
 cheese, preserves, and one sort of cake, the last item being 
 felt to be one of almost imendurable rigor. The house- 
 wife's skill did what it could, however, to cover itself with 
 glory, in the matter of quality ; and succeeded so well, that 
 any fault-finder would have deserved a diploma from the 
 Society for the Promotion and Encouragement of Grum- 
 bling ; if there be one. 
 
 There was no " standing upon order," in the serving. 
 Each lady helped herself to what she liked (and as many 
 others as her good-nature prompted) and ate it in any spot 
 that suited her mood. There were little knots of tea-drink- 
 ers, therefore, scattered all through the rooms, and some in 
 the porch and door-yard. Essie and I took ours on the 
 front doorstep ; the lilacs meeting overhead, and framing 
 with verdure the pretty view of hill-side and lakelet ; and 
 Aunt Vin sitting in the doorway, listening benignantly to 
 our chat, till a thought of " cows " and " milking-time " 
 hurried her homeward. As she took her departure, she 
 favored us with her opinion of the afternoon's proceed- 
 ings. 
 
 "The Society's begun suspiciously, Essie Volger, and 
 that's good, as far as it goes. But smart as you and Pris- 
 cilla Prescott think yourselves, I shouldn't wonder if you'd 
 caught a cream-of-tartar in that Mis' Danforth. She'll do 
 well enough as long as your mind and hers runs parallax, 
 but when hers wants to go north and yours east, I reckon 
 you'll see a promotion." And shaking her head grimly 
 over whatever gloomy prospect was mysteriously shadowed 
 forth in this mild prediction, Aunt Vin went after her sun- 
 bonnet.
 
 102 SHILOH 
 
 * 
 
 In the midst of the pleasant bustle of leave-taking, Mrs. 
 Danforth sought me out. " I believe we are compatriots," 
 said she, holding out her small, jeweled hand, with her 
 usual mixture of hauteur, languor, and cordiality, " I am 
 glad there is somebody to whom I can say ' How queer ! ' 
 over these Shiloh people. Do they not amuse you 
 mightily ? " 
 
 " A little, sometimes ; but they command my esteem, 
 too." 
 
 " Oh ! yes, of course," (with the slightest perceptible 
 dryness of intonation.) " I have no doubt they are very 
 estimable people, all of them ; particularly that queer 
 old maid whose vocabulary seems to suffer from what she 
 would probably call a ' suffusion worse dumb-founded.' I 
 believe I am the first comer in Shiloh, by a day or two, so I 
 shall have to call upon you. May I come any time ? " 
 
 " Certainly. I do not think reception days are in vogue 
 here. And I have not the least wish to introduce them ; I 
 am only too glad to dispense with the fashionable code and 
 the minor proprieties, for a time. I have some thought of 
 sending the fripperies after the code. I went to Clay Cor- 
 ner, and bought me a calico dress, this morning ; do not 
 marvel if I return your call in it." 
 
 " Allow me to suggest that you make it after the Vocab- 
 ulary's pattern, with a sunbonnet to match," said she, with 
 an irresistibly comic face. " I hope you do not need to be 
 told that I shall be glad to see you,in that or anything else. 
 Good morning, or good evening or whatever it is, really, 
 if there be one thing more marvellous than another about 
 these people, it is the hours they keep." And Mrs. Dan- 
 forth smiled and bowed herself out. 
 
 We reached home while the sun was yet an hour high. 
 Mrs. Divine was standing in the doorway. 
 
 " I have the honor," said I, making her a low courtesy, 
 " of introducing to you the Secretary of the Ladies' Sewing 
 Society of St. Jude's Parish, Shiloh."
 
 SIIILOH. 103 
 
 " Indeed ! " she answered, giving me a keen look, " so 
 Priscilla got you in, after all ! I told her she wouldn't. I 
 thought she wasn't going the right way to work ; I had a 
 notion that ' AH open and above-board ' was your motto. 
 But I'm real glad all the same ; you'll make a good one. 
 How did it all happen ? " 
 
 I thought of Mala's short, persuasive speech, and was 
 silent. But Mrs. Prescott opportunely launched into a 
 spirited account of the afternoon's events, and the silence 
 passed unnoticed.
 
 THE MORKISTG SERVICE. 
 
 [HAT a day it was ! One of those fresh, exu- 
 berant days of dawning summer, never 
 quite so perfect as on Sunday, when thought 
 involuntarily goes back to the story of crea- 
 tion, and God's pleasure in His finished work. 
 When all things visible seem so fresh, so 
 pure, and so glad, that we are fain to believe 
 our Earth has entered upon a new and better 
 cycle of her existence ; one wherein all the old wrongs are 
 to be righted, all the old wovmds and defilements healed 
 and cleansed ; and so we take courage and thank God. 
 And no matter if Monday, coming with its hard hands full 
 of work and its stern brow full of care, dispels the illusion ! 
 - we shall not be the worse for our cherished faith in the 
 world's improvability, nor our momentary persuasion that 
 the " good time coming " was come. Both the one and the 
 other will make us patient to wait, and earnest to labor, 
 for its advancement. 
 
 I spent the hour before service with a volume of George 
 Herbert's quaint poesy in my hand, wherein such Divine 
 fire often breaks up through such a homely crust of expres- 
 sion ; and was helped, possibly, to' a deeper comprehension 
 than usual by nature's leafy commentary, lying open out- 
 side my window. By and by, I descried small groxips of 
 country-folk, on foot and in wagons, slowly wending their 
 way churchward, across the far-off bend of road before- 
 mentioned ; Uncle True and his chair, too, setting forth on
 
 SHILOH. 105 
 
 their snail-paced pilgrimage, came into view just beyond 
 the garden-fence ; so, putting the finishing touches to a 
 designedly plain and simple toilet, I went down to the 
 " out room," where Mrs. Prescott and Alice, with their 
 bonnets on, were assisting Mrs. Divine to don hers. 
 
 The faces of the elder ladies clouded so noticeably, at 
 sight of me, that I was moved to ask, in some perplexity, 
 " What is the matter ? " 
 
 " Nothing," said Mrs. Prescott, shortly, closing her lips 
 firmly over the cause of her disapproval ; which, neverthe- 
 less, seemed to escape from them, unwittingly, the next 
 moment. " I thought you would have dressed up more." 
 
 And Mrs. Divine added, " You wore a finer gown than 
 that to Society, yesteixlny." 
 
 " I am sorry," said I, " if you think my attire is not 
 worthy of the occasion ; but I supposed that the congrega- 
 tion would be dressed very plainly, for the most part, and 
 I did not want to look like a popinjay among respectable 
 fowls." 
 
 _ " Umph ! there's no danger of your outshining Mrs. 
 Danforth, I guess," said Mrs. Prescott, relaxing her severe 
 features a little. " But, I can tell you, we country folks 
 like to have city people wear their fine feathers when they 
 come among us ; if they don't, we suspect they think we 
 ain't worth wasting them on." 
 
 " But, Mrs. Prescott, I don't think God's house is the 
 place to wear ' fine feathers.' " 
 
 Here Mrs. Divine took up the subject in her usual crisp, 
 decided tones. " I suppose, Miss Frost, if you were going 
 to see Queen Victoria, now, or the Emperor of Russia, 
 you'd wear your best clothes, wouldn't you ? " 
 
 " Yes, ma'am, but, " 
 
 " Never mind the ' but ' just now ; I want to ask you, 
 first, if you think you ought to show more respect to one of 
 them earthly rulers, than you do the ' King of Kings,' 
 whose house AVC take the Church to be ? " 
 5*
 
 106 SIIILOII. 
 
 " Certainly not ; but then Christ set us such an example 
 of plainness and simplicity in all His earthly life, that it 
 seems fitting for His followers to imitate it ; particularly 
 when they meet together, to offer up prayers and praises in 
 His name." 
 
 " Now, I think," persisted Mrs. Divine, " that Christ 
 lived and labored in the humblest walk of life, to show men 
 that fine things are nothing in themselves, since He could 
 do without them ; so that nobody need to feel proud be- 
 cause he has got them, nor mean because he hasn't. I am 
 certain that the Lord likes me just as well in my old- 
 fashioned gown here, that I've" worn this ten years, as He 
 does Alice in her pretty blue muslin, if my heart is as much 
 set to obey Him ; but I shouldn't feel so sure of it, if I had 
 a brand-new silk hanging up in my closet, that I thought 
 was too good for Him, but not a bit too nice for Mis' Thing- 
 embob's parties. I guess Solomon wore his royal robes, and 
 handsome ones, too, when he went up to praise the Lord in 
 the temple he had built." 
 
 " But, Mrs. Divine, I wish you could see some of the 
 dresses I wear to parties, at home ! I am sure you would 
 agree with me that they are not suitable to wear at 
 church." 
 
 " It's very likely I should. But did you ever ask your- 
 self whether it was just right to have dresses too fine, or 
 too showy, to wear in God's house ? The bettermost for 
 Him, I say ; but that don't prove that costly finery and 
 finicky gew*gaws are the things for a Christian to wear 
 anywhere." 
 
 "But there are always people who will wear such 
 things," returned I ; " must they, therefore, wear them 
 at church ? " 
 
 " Well, no, I suppose not," answered Mrs. Divine, after 
 a little hesitation ; " perhaps it's one step toward better 
 things for them to make up their minds they can't flout 
 them in the Lord's face. But that don't make it right for
 
 SHILOH. 10t 
 
 His followers to have clothes too fine to wear in His courts ; 
 I'm decided on that." , 
 
 " Still," I urged, " custom will always make a certain 
 style of dress obligatory for parties." 
 
 "Don't you be too sure of that. The Christian world 
 is stronger than the fashionable world ; if it did but know 
 it, and wasn't afraid to stand to its principles. If Christian 
 people always went to parties in simple, modest apparel (I 
 don't care how pretty and becoming it is, if it keeps inside 
 the bounds of simplicity and modesty), you'd soon see a 
 change in custom. The fashionable world wouldn't like to 
 see itself marked out so plainly as an enemy to God and 
 decency. It is because Christian women are so much ' con- 
 formed to the world,' that women of the world are rushing 
 headlong into such reckless extravagance and such shame- 
 less display. As long as they know that wherever they 
 lead, good women will follow, there's nothing to put any 
 check on them." 
 
 Mr. Divine now joined us, with a quizzical smile on his 
 shrewd, sensible face. "I've heard you preaching for a 
 good quarter-hour, mother," said he; "don't you think 
 it's about time to go over and let Mr. Taylor take his turn 
 at it?" 
 
 Half-way to the church, we found Uncle True resting 
 in the shade of a great, gnarled apple-tree that stretched 
 its sturdy boughs, covered with a late bloom, over the 
 stone wall, and half-way across the road ; his face beaming 
 with mild contentment and good-humor as he returned the 
 greetings of passers by ; all of whom addressed him with 
 a certain deferential cordiality, partly due to his infirmity, 
 and partly to the simple, genuine character of the man. I 
 stopped to speak with him, I"am acquiring a relish for the 
 old man's cheerful, mellow philosophies, with here and 
 there a vein of something like poetiy in them. I am get- 
 ting to call him " Uncle True," too ; the influence of con- 
 stant example is so strong, and the' hearty, homely life of 
 Shiloh so insidiously destructive of formalities.
 
 108 SHILOH. 
 
 " How lovely it is ! " I exclaimed, glancing around at 
 the fresh, shining landscape. " But I miss one thing, the 
 bells. I caught myself singing a snatch of Robinson Cru- 
 soe's aong this morning, 
 
 The sound of the church-going bell 
 These valleys and rocks never heard ; 
 
 yet how silvery sweet and clear the tones would flow out 
 over these meadows and linger among these hills ! St. 
 Jude's ought to have a bell." 
 
 " I don't know about that," said Uncle True, reflectively ; 
 " I b'lieve I like the Sunday stillness and the birds' singin' 
 the best. And I ain't so lazy, nor so forgetful, that I want 
 a bell to tell me when it's time to go to church, no more'n 
 I do to let me know when to go to work Monday mornin'. 
 But hark ! do you hear that ! " 
 
 A faint, sweet bell-echo pervaded the air ; not louder 
 nor more distinct in one quarter than another ; seeming to 
 have fallen from the sky, rather than to have arisen from 
 the earth, so difficult was it to associate its soft, ethereal 
 melody with any lower origin. 
 
 " That's the up-town bell," continued Uncle True ; 
 " seems to me it sounds a good deal pootier than if 'twas 
 nearer. You can allers hear it like that when the air is 
 clear, and the wind right if you listen for it. There's a 
 good many fine things you've allers got to listen for, if you 
 hear 'em at all ; there's a bee hummin' in that clover-head 
 yonder ; you can't hear it when you're talkin' ; but if you 
 jest keep still a minute " (Uncle True made a little pause) 
 " you can hear it as plain as a church-bell, and I think it's 
 jest as pooty a noise, leastways, it tells me more." 
 
 " Indeed ! " said I, leaning my elbow on the stone-wall, 
 covered with greenish-gray lichens, " I should like to know 
 what it tells you." 
 
 " Wall, in the fust place, it shows me that honey's to 
 be got out o' all the flowers, even the leetlest and home-
 
 SHILOH. 109 
 
 liest. The bee gets it in the onlikliest places, you see ; he 
 don't turn up his nose at a mullein stalk no more'n he does 
 at a garden pink, and I shouldn't wonder if the Lord had 
 put jest as much honey in one as t'other. But if he was a 
 bee with an aristocratic turn o' mind, and wouldn't look 
 for honey anywheres but in garden pinks and damask 
 roses, it's my opinion that he'd go hum' to his hive empty- 
 handed, the biggest part o' the time. And I guess the 
 Lord has put abeout as much honey in one man's road as 
 another's ; if he only knew how to look for it, and didn't 
 despise mullein stalks. Then, the bee shows me that it's a 
 man's business to hive up honey, not jest to go round 
 amusiu' himself with the flowers, and takin' only what 
 tastes good and what he can eat at the time ; but to store 
 it up against the winter of old age and trouble, I mean 
 the honey of wisdom, mama, that begins in the fear of God. 
 And, besides all that, the bee shows me that a man should 
 go to his honest day's work with a joyful sperit, singin' 
 and rnakin' melody in his heart : and not be a goin' round 
 with a sour face and a grumblin' tongue and a cross- 
 grained temper, jest as if he thought the Lord that made 
 him didn't know what was good for him. But it's time 
 for me to jog along, inarm, for this old chair and I 
 haven't been late to church, since we took to goin' thar to- 
 gether, and we shouldn't like to begin now; though to 
 be sure, people that's got legs, and horses, to git 'em thar, 
 don't seem to mind bein' late much." 
 
 " Thank you*" said I, as he twisted himself out of his 
 chair, " I suspect you have taught me as good a lesson as 
 any I shall get at church." 
 
 Uncle True stopped in the act of dragging his foot after 
 the step he had caused his ' chair to make, and looked at 
 me gravely. " No, marrn, you don't quite mean that, I 
 guess. For, though the Lord's works do preach pooty 
 good sermons to them that's got ears to hear, you'll hear 
 His Word in the church, and that's what helps us to under-
 
 110 SIIILOH. 
 
 stand the works. People that don't know the Word, are 
 apt to make mistakes in rcadin' the works more's the 
 
 There was a buzzing human swarm about the church 
 steps, hale, weather-browned farmers, exchanging re- 
 marks about the weather and the crops, bashful youths, 
 awkward and uncomfortable iif the unwonted restraints of 
 Sunday garments, and boys, who gave me a vague im- 
 pression of being all eyes, mouths, and pantaloons pockets ; 
 all of whom stared at me in a way to indicate that a 
 strange face was a novelty in their experience. The small 
 vestibule was filled with a varying company of matrons 
 and maidens ; each comer lingering there, a few moments, 
 to exchange greetings and. set to rights garments and 
 tresses disordered by the breeze. Mrs. Prescott awaited 
 me among them. 
 
 The interior of the church, by reason of the preposter- 
 ous size and number of its uncurtained, unblinded win- 
 dows, gave me an odd impression of a spiritual hothouse, 
 where moral cuttings and seedlings were to be carefully 
 nurtured under glass ; while the light thus freely admitted, 
 and everywhere reflected from white walls and woodwork, 
 dazzled and blinded me to a painful degree. All addition- 
 al details, when I could look for them, were comprised 
 in a small gallery, perched aloft at the rear end of the 
 building, over the vestibule ; a box of a pulpit against the 
 opposite, wall ; a small communion-table in front of it ; and 
 thirty or forty narrow, high-backed pews, 'strongly sugges- 
 tive of penitential observances. 
 
 Mr. Taylor soon entered the chancel. I saw a tall, thin, 
 bent form, a pale face, not of a decidedly intellectual typo, 
 but with some clear, fine lines in it, deep-set blue eyes, full 
 of a quick sensibility, and small, nervous looking hands. I 
 discerned that he brought to his work genuine enthusiasm, 
 thorough conscientiousness, inconsiderate impulse, ready 
 sympathies, morbid sensitiveness, activity verging on rest-
 
 6IIILOH. Ill 
 
 lessness, little tact, and such culture as circumstances had 
 permitted. A man whose enthusiasm would often outrun 
 his judgment ; who would never, except by a miracle, escape 
 any wayside thorn, but would get his wound from each, 
 and give his drop of blood in return ; yet whose true cour- 
 age, earnestness, and self-devotion, could not fail to win re- 
 cognition and respect, and to gather in sheaves to the Lord 
 of the harvest. 
 
 It was plain that some nervousness beset him, at first. 
 The congregation was not of the class to which he had been 
 best accustomed in his lay-missionary work among the city's 
 lower life-strata. These sturdy, hard-featured, and close- 
 fisted New England farmers looked much too independent 
 and critical ; they had far more the appearance of judges 
 sitting on his merits, than of disciples waiting to be taught. 
 His voice shook slightly, therefore, as he began the service ; 
 but nothing more composing can be conceived of, I think, 
 than its opening, the few solemn sentences from Holy 
 Writ, the Exhortation, touching the speaker's own heart as 
 nearly as any other, the Confession, when, losing the faces 
 and eyes of the congregation, he feels his voice and heart 
 buoyed up by the swelling undertone of their voices and 
 prayers. His tones soon steadied themselves, though he 
 still read with a rapidity of utterance that it took me some 
 little time to set down as habitual. 
 
 MALA.. How dreadfully thin he is ! He must have put 
 himself on a course of semi-starvation, to be ready for what- 
 ever pinchings and sacrifices are involved in Shiloh's hard- 
 raised four hundred dollars ! 
 
 BONA. There is a worse semi-starvation than that of the 
 body, even that of the soul. They who deny themselves 
 the spiritual nutriment of the Church's praises and prayers, 
 while they indulge in sarcastic reflections on minister or 
 congregation, will be likely to experience its effects, in the 
 inevitable attenuation of their religious life and growth. 
 
 I (recalling my mind to the service, with an effort}. " As
 
 112 SIIILOH. 
 
 it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world 
 without end." 
 
 MB. TAYLOR. Here beginneth the sixteenth chapter 
 of- 
 
 MALA (suddenly). Bless me ! there is Mrs. Danforth, 
 diamonds and all ! Evidently, she thinks it is proper to 
 wear one's bettermost (as Mrs. Divine phrases it) at church. 
 What a showy silk ! what exquisite lace ! what a sunset- 
 cloud of a bonnet ! 
 
 I (meditatively). I wonder whether Mrs. Divine or I 
 was right about the Sunday garb ! It is one of those ques- 
 tions where there is so much to be said on both sides, that 
 one gets puzzled. 
 
 First, there is the human phase of it Mrs. Prcscott's 
 notion that these people would consider my studied plain- 
 ness of attire a slight to them. If the Queen of England 
 came to visit me in the extremest plainness of apparel pos- 
 sible to her, I wonder whether it would strike me as a dis- 
 courtesy, or a kind attempt to spare my feelings ! But why 
 should her splendor hurt my feelings ! Does it not argue 
 some meanness of spirit in me, to be either dazzled or mor- 
 tified by her rich array ? ' is not the body more than the 
 raiment ? ' I know she is a queen, and has queenly attire ; 
 would it not be paying me a more delicate compliment to 
 visit me in the same dress in which she would visit a prince ? 
 Is there any rudeness quite so rude as to make it evident to 
 your fellow-mortal that you are trying to let yourself down 
 to what you are pleased t6 consider his lower level ? and 
 does a man ever secretly attach so much importance to 
 social advantage, as when he is making an ostentatious 
 attempt to prove that he forgets it ? 
 
 Then, there is the heavenly phase. Will God feel His 
 courts to be duly honored by less careful and costly toilets 
 than are made for the courts of fashion ? Would it not be 
 only a surface humility that flaunts in satins and jewels all 
 the week, and goes to church in drab serge on Sundays ?
 
 SHILOH. 113 
 
 Or did Mrs. Divine hit the nail on the head when she de- 
 clared that a Christian had no right to finer clothes than 
 could be fitly worn in God's house ? 
 
 Would the best motive ever justify the showy splendor? 
 I will suppose Mrs. Danforth putting on her diamonds, and 
 her point lace, without a thought of human observation, 
 but with a sincere desire to honor God's house with the 
 best that she has ; but then how could she sit under ap- 
 peals for money to build churches and schools, and fit out 
 missionaries, with the price of a church hanging in her ears, 
 a Sunday School library around her neck, and a Mission- 
 ary's salary on each finger ! Would she not suspect that 
 there were better ways of honoring God with her wealth 
 than by lavishing it on her personal "adornment ? 
 
 MR. TAYLOR. Here entleth the First Lesson. 
 
 Box A. And you have not heard a word of it. 
 
 MALA. IVever mind ; you were trying to settle a question 
 of right. 
 
 Box A (very gravely). But God's house, and His time of 
 worship, are not the place and time for settling questions. 
 Devotion and attention are essential to a right use of those 
 privileges. 
 
 I. But, dear Bona, when such a subject gets into my 
 head, it is so hard to get it out, even in church ! 
 
 BOXA. There is always the resource of prayer. But do 
 listen ! 
 
 I did listen to, and join in, the Te Deum, that grand, 
 wonderful Hymn, whose certain origin is lost in the shad- 
 ows of primitive time ; and which seems to have so little 
 of human work in its majestic, comprehensive, ordered 
 march of joyful praise, pure doctrine, and fervent prayer, 
 that I am fain to believe it came straight from the Holy 
 Spirit, through the hands of some devout, meek man, who, 
 feeling how little he had to do with it, dared not stamp it 
 with his name ! 
 
 The Canticles were read, not sung. During the Jubi-
 
 114 SIIILOH. 
 
 late, Mala's irreverence broke forth again, " Do see that 
 bonnet ! If it is not the identical one that Hani's wife wore 
 into the ark, what museum of dead and buried fashions was 
 it fished out of?" 
 
 My amused eyes lingered involuntarily among the 
 quaint details of the ancient structure, an awe-inspiring 
 poke, with a kind of full blown cabbage-rose on one side, 
 and a mammoth bow on top. Notwithstanding the wear- 
 er's face was invisible, the angular outlines of her tall form, 
 and several spasmodic jerks of the bonnet which gave me 
 an odd impression that that piece of head-gear, by reason of 
 extreme old age, had itself taken to shaking with paralysis 
 enabled me to recognize Aunt Vin. 
 
 Mala went on. " I wonder if she says her prayers ai 
 she talks ! In that case, she must put up some curious pe 
 titions to the Throne of Grace ! " 
 
 I very nearly laughed at the bare supposition. 
 
 BONA (severely). Have you any consciousness whatever 
 that you are saying the Creed ? 
 
 I (very humbly). " I believe in the forgiveness of sins." 
 
 Never were those words so sweet to me ! Coming in the 
 midst of my repeated failures to keep my thoughts from 
 wandering, they seemed to have been made for the express 
 need of the moment; as do so many utterances of the 
 Liturgy to humbled, burdened souls everywhere ; which,- 
 nevertheless, have given freely of their help and witness 
 to thousands before ; and, instead of losing anything, have 
 constantly grown richer thereby. And a comfortable ar- 
 ticle of belief is " the forgiveness of sins ! " Without it, 
 how the soul would tremble in view of the " resurrection 
 of the body, and the life everlasting ! " 
 
 MR. TAYLOR. " The Lord be with you." 
 
 I gave the necessary response with hearty emphasis. " If 
 Mr. Taylor's mind is as prone to wander as mine," I said to 
 myself, "how cheering it must be to him to hear the whole 
 congregation distinctly and devoutly ejaculate, ' And with
 
 SHILOII. 115 
 
 
 
 thy spirit ! ' ' The people who would be blessed with the 
 most solemn, earnest, and effective ministrations from desk 
 and pulpit, must not fail to give their clergyman the sup- 
 port of their fervent, effectual prayers in his behalf; 
 " That which the fountain sends forth returns again to the 
 fountain." 
 
 During the prayers Mala's fertile mind suggested an- 
 other distraction. " I wonder," said she, " if Major Bur- 
 cham is here, and if he answers Aunt Vin's very flattering 
 description." 
 
 I darted a quick glance toward the corner where Mrs. 
 Burcham sat, and beheld the " porpoise-looking man " in' 
 question, Aunt Vin meant pompous, doubtless, but some 
 of her misses ai'e capital hits, and I thought " porpoise " 
 the better word. ^ Fancy a round, corpulent, oleaginous 
 figure ; with its head held very high and its hair brushed 
 straight up ; looking as if it had just jumped out of a sun- 
 ny sea of self-complacency, all dripping, and would imme- 
 diately plunge back again, and there you have Major Bur- 
 cham. 
 
 MR. TAYLOR. "O God, the Father of Heaven, have 
 mercy upon us, miserable sinners." 
 
 I echoed the petition with a fervency of beseeching 
 which might not have been too dearly bought, even with 
 that moment of inattention. We are so prone to forget, 
 in our guarded, upright moments, what miserable sinners 
 we are ! 
 
 When the Psalm in metre was announced, so strange 
 and unexpected a sound came from the perched-up gallery, 
 that I was plunged into the darkest depths of bewilder- 
 ment ; and it was not till near the close of the second verse 
 that I was able to identify it (inevitably smiling, as I did so) 
 as proceeding from an accordeon. " Well, why not ? " I asked 
 myself, the next moment, " since many a rusty-sinewed fid- 
 dle, and growling bass-viol, has led off in the song of praise ; 
 and the melodeon favorite instrument of feeble churches 
 is only an accordeon on a large scale."
 
 116 SHILOH. 
 
 
 
 This novel and incapable accompaniment was played 
 with a delicacy of touch and truth of feeling, that aston- 
 ished me ; and went far to justify its use. With it rose a 
 clear, fresh voice ; singing as a bird sings ; without artistic 
 culture, but with an airy sweetness, that had its own pecu- 
 liar charm. It was not powerful, an excessively harsh 
 alto and a direfully shrill tenor did their best to cover it 
 up ; but the pure quality of its tones could not be hidden, 
 any more than the small, sweet strains of a bird can be 
 drowned by all the cackle and clamor of a barnyard. I 
 looked up for the singer. Mrs. Prescott saw the look and 
 intei'preted it. 
 
 " That's Ruth Winnot," whispered she, with a degree 
 of pride ; " hasn't she got a nice voice ? "
 
 XI. 
 
 THE SEEMOK. 
 
 )ETWEEN the close of the Ante-Communion 
 service and the singing of the Hymn, I had 
 a brief opportunity to give myself a moral 
 shaking up, and to set myself deliberately to 
 listen to the sermon. Of course, I did not ex- 
 pect an intellectual treat, I knew that Mr. 
 Taylor made no pretensions to oratory or erudi- 
 tion ; but I have found, after some years of pa- 
 tient listening to all sorts of sermons, that I never yet gave 
 my whole, prayerful attention to any, even the poorest and 
 plainest, without getting from it something that I should 
 have regretted to lose. It might be some subtle* touch of 
 human kinship, awakening new sympathies in my heart ; or 
 a bit of homely wisdom, quick with an endless progeny of 
 application ; or an isolated clause of a sentence, stirring with- 
 in me a train of heavenward thought that made me feel, for 
 some blissful moments, as if I had talked face to face with 
 God ; or perhaps, a hitherto unheeded text of Scripture fall- 
 ing on my ear with sudden opulence and profundity of 
 spiritual meaning. So I have come to think that God never 
 fails to bless the seed of the Gospel however unskilfully 
 sown with a rich germination of spiritual help, to all who 
 listen to His ministers reverently and teachably, as to 
 " deputies of Christ for the reducing of man to the obedi- 
 ence of God." 
 
 Mr. Taylor's sermon was pointed and vivified by a
 
 118 SIIILOII. 
 
 warm earnestness of manner, and a directness of purpose, 
 that made it very effective, in its way. It was no fine 
 speculation of the brain, but a drop of life-blood from the 
 heart. It was enriched with wisdom gathered from the 
 mistakes, conflicts and defeats of his own life, and carefully 
 hived for the benefit of his fellows ; of whose longings after 
 holiness and struggles toward right, as well as of their dis- 
 couraging failures and lapses into evil, he knew something 
 through fellowship, not less than observation ; in virtue of 
 which knowledge he was irresistibly moved to help and to 
 teach them. His sentences were commonplace enough in 
 themselves, but they seemed to have imbibed a rich warmth 
 and fragrance from having been so thoroughly steeped in 
 the enthusiasm and the tenderness of his heart. I had a 
 curious intuition, as. I listened, why God had called him into 
 His service just as he was, with his culture and his want of 
 culture, his zeal and his unpracticalness, his strength and 
 his weakness. A man with less infirmity to contend with 
 in himself, would not have comprehended so clearly the 
 necessities of others ; and one of less sanguine and hopeful 
 temperament would never haw labored for their reforma- 
 tion with feuch entii'e confidence in his ultimate success. If 
 it was necessary for our Lord to take upon Him human 
 flesh, with the pains, weaknesses, and temptations belong- 
 ing thereto, for the work of atonement ; it is not strange 
 that those whom He calls to the work of teaching in His 
 name, should be men of like passions and infirmities with 
 ourselves. 
 
 Not that I would, for a moment, be supposed to under- 
 value, or discourage the employment of, whatever good gifts 
 of mind or manner God vouchsafes to man, in His special 
 service. If, in the Christian life, the wisdom of the serpent 
 be fitly conjoined with the harmlessness of the dove ; why, 
 in Christian teaching, need one hesitate to employ the finest 
 art of rhetoric, the loveliest grace of fancy, the subtlest har- 
 monies of elocution, in aid of the depth, the simplicity, and
 
 _ SHILOII. 119 
 
 the endless adaptation of the Gospel ? Not that the Word 
 shall return unto Him void without these helps, since the 
 power of the Spirit of God is in it ; but the power of the 
 spirit of love in man should surely keep him from the in- 
 dolence, or the impertinence, of offering unto the Lord of 
 that which has cost him nothing nothing of that careful 
 labor and exquisite finish which shows that the heart of 
 the worker was in his work ! 
 
 Just once during the sermon, my attention wandered. 
 Major Burcham was fast asleep in his pew, with his mouth 
 hospitably wide open; into which innocent-minded flies 
 strayed occasionally, and were instantly caught by the 
 quick, involuntary closing of his powerful jaws; to his 
 and, no doubt, their extreme disgust. The spectacle was 
 not exactly edifying, as a smothered laugh from the gallery 
 attested. 
 
 When the service was over, a little knot of people 
 gathered near the chancel to shake hands with Mr. Taylor, 
 foremost of whom was Major Burcham. His deep, im- 
 portant tones, swelling above the hum and bustle of the 
 departing congregation, reached me where I stood, and 
 made me acquainted with his peculiarities of speech ; name- 
 ly, a frequent substitution of some laggard word in place of 
 the half-spoken one that came more quickly to hand, and 
 an emphatic, sonorous repetition of commonplace phrases, 
 as if to make up by sound for lack of substance. 
 
 " I am de charmed to see you, sir," I heard him say- 
 ing, " and I hope we shall have the benefit of your la 
 ministrations for some time. You are aware, I suppose, 
 that Shiloh is rather a poor place to come to, rather a poor 
 place ; I really couldn't ad recommend you to take up 
 with the parish, if you've anything better in view ; but if 
 you're not afraid to try, we will do our best, sir ; we will do 
 our best." 
 
 I waited for no more, but went out with a foolish impa- 
 tience in my heart. In the vestibule, I came face to face
 
 120 SIIILOH. 
 
 with Mrs. Danforth. She put out her hand in her usual 
 careless, condescending way ; " Good morning, Miss Frost, 
 how do you like him ? " 
 
 "Who Mr. Taylor? I do not know him yet, Mrs. 
 Danforth." 
 
 " I was not aware you were such a purist ! I mean, 
 how do you like him as a clergyman ? " 
 
 " I like all clergymen in the abstract." 
 
 " Well, what do you think of Mr. Taylor as a specimen 
 of the concrete ? " 
 
 " I have not thought much about him ; I was thinking 
 of his sermon." 
 
 " Nous arrivons" said she, arching her brows ; " what 
 did you think of that ? " 
 
 " I thought my life would be the better for an abund- 
 ant interfusion of its spirit." 
 
 She made a gesture of vexation, partly comic, partly 
 real. 
 
 " I never knew a case of perseverance so ill-rewarded," 
 said she. " However, I will be as frank as you are non- 
 committal, and " 
 
 " I beg pardon for interrupting you, but I cannot let 
 that slander pass unnoticed. I thought the best compli- 
 ment to be paid to any sermon, was to bring its teaching 
 home to one's own heart and life." 
 
 " Bless us ! how pleasant ! " exclaimed she, shrugging 
 her shoulders. " We glorify ourselves, and fire sly shots 
 at our irreverent neighbors, simultaneously. But they do 
 not hit me this time. I was about to say that I liked Mr. 
 Taylor a great deal better than I expected." 
 
 " If I knew the character of your expectation, I could 
 better appreciate the compliment." 
 
 "Adieu!" she exclaimed, with. humorous abruptness, 
 " I shall take' refuge in flight. Good morning, Miss Rust," 
 (addressing Aunt Vin, who approached at that moment), 
 " I advise you to keep out of Miss Frost's way ; she is in a
 
 SHILOH. 121 
 
 mood compounded of the Sphinx and the Cynic, and you'll 
 come off second best as I go." 
 
 But Aunt Yin stopped her. " I hope, Mis' Danforth, 
 that you're a coming to the obsequious this afternoon ; I am 
 sure the family would take it as a tribune of respect." 
 
 Mrs. Danforth looked utterly bewildered. 
 
 " Maggie Warren is to be buried this afternoon," I ex- 
 plained. " A young . girl of this neighborhood, who died 
 on Thursday morning last. The funeral services are to be 
 held in this church, at half-past one. Miss Rust invites 
 you to attend." 
 
 " Oh, indeed ! No, I thank you ; it is not the city cus- 
 tom to attend funerals of people you don't know. By the 
 way, what is the hour of afternoon service? " 
 
 " One o'clock," replied I. " And it is the country cus- 
 tom, Mrs. Danforth, to hold funerals in the place of the af- 
 ternoon service, when they can conveniently be arranged 
 to take place on Sunday." 
 
 " Ah, I see, a labor-saving institution, and thoroughly 
 New Anglican ! But you do not mean to say that after- 
 noon service is always at one o'clock ! " 
 
 "Assuredly." 
 
 Mrs. Danforth held up her hands with a laughable air 
 of consternation. "Two sermons, with only an hour be- 
 tween ! my moral digestion is not equal to that ! I should 
 get the heads of the afternoon discourse tacked on to the 
 tail of the morning preachment, and the morning applica- 
 tion unlawfully joined to the afternoo\i text ; and endless 
 bewilderment and error would be the inevitable result. 
 Put me down for a half-day Christian in Shiloh, Miss 
 Rust." 
 
 " I haven't got anything to do with putting anybody 
 down. I expect the Lord attends to that business Himself," 
 returned Aunt Yin, rather shortly ; internally displeased at 
 the implied ridicule of customs endeared to her by long fa- 
 miliarity. " And if you repine that an hour and a half out 
 6
 
 122 SIIILOH. 
 
 of His holy day is enough to give Him, it isn't my loca- 
 tion to calculate whether it's a seventh or a seventeenth of 
 your time." 
 
 "My peccadilloes are getting hard measure between 
 you," replied Mrs. Danforth, with imperturbable good hu- 
 mor ; " Miss Rust has even more of the Cynic than the 
 Sphinx about her. Good-bye." And her diamonds flashed 
 out into the sunshine. 
 
 " It's easy to see what she's ' confounded of,' " said Aunt 
 Yin, looking after her, with two or three jerks of extreme 
 disapproval, " I guess 'twouldn't take a Styx to put her 
 together, nor a Clinic to pull her to pieces ! Are you go- 
 ing to the house before the people begin to dissemble, Miss 
 Frost ? " 
 
 " Yes ; I promised Mrs. Warren that I would bring 
 fresh flowers for Maggie ; but I must go over to Mrs. Di- 
 vine's and get them. Tell her, please, that I will be there 
 in good time." 
 
 I passed Uncle True at the foot of the hill. He looked 
 up at me with a beaming face. " That's what I call a good 
 sermon," said he, " a sermon with the breath of life in it. 
 I've heard 'em that sounded just as a case of bugs and but- 
 terflies, with pins stuck through 'em, looks ; a bit here and 
 a bit there, scraped together out o' books and papers, with- 
 out no connection, nor no heart and soul in 'em anywheres. 
 You feel pooty sure the preacher didn't write 'em with a 
 tear in his eye, nor a prayer in his heart." 
 
 Mrs. Prescott brought Mr. Taylor home to lunch witli 
 her, and engaged him in a brisk conversation at table. It 
 is rare to see a man so thoroughly in earnest, and showing 
 it in every word and movement. His whole soul was in his 
 work, and all his talk tended thitherward ; no matter what 
 other topic might be introduced, he gave it but a glance, 
 and immediately recurred to the one absorbing idea, fre- 
 quently overlooking the necessity, or expediency, of using 
 tact in the transition. His experience and success, as
 
 SHILOH. 123 
 
 a lay-missionary, had been just enough to rouse his enthusi- 
 asm and engage his affections in the Church's work : and 
 now that he had been duly furnished with the requisite intel- 
 lectual weapons, and received the grace of ordination, he 
 felt himself stronger than all the powers of evil, human and 
 spiritual, combined. He believed, as many a_ tyro in the 
 ministry has done before him, and as many more may 
 do, I trust, in years to come, since a man had better never 
 have been born than to have been born without a gen- 
 erous hope and confidence in the world's amendment, and 
 in his power to help it forward; he believed, I say, that 
 he brought to his profession some more vital force, some 
 deeper spiritual insight, some Diviner fire, than his pre- 
 decessors ; by which the world, old and reprobate though 
 it be, must of necessity be intenerated and overcome, and 
 its long partnership in iniquity with the Spirit of Evil be 
 dissolved. I gazed at him with a sorrowful pity. It 
 needed no seer to discern that that bitterest form of 
 disappointment which steals upon the heart in the fair 
 disguise of a long and fondly cherished purpose, at last 
 accomplished was surely coming to him, sooner or later, 
 and would wring his soul with sharpest anguish and dis- 
 couragement. Not so easily was the old Adam to be 
 overcome by the new Melancthon ! 
 
 I thought it a noteworthy expression of his character 
 that, before luncheon was over, he was engaged in a warm 
 discussion with Mrs. Divine, touching some matters, of cere- 
 monial, things about which she holds very old-fashioned 
 and decided opinions; upon some one of which, coming ac- 
 cidentally to the surface of the conversation, Mr. Taylor 
 pounced with zealous disapproval, and which she defended 
 with her usual adroitness and homely sense. In the height 
 of the discussion, I left them for the house of mourning.
 
 XII. 
 
 WOUNDS AND BALMS. 
 
 [HEN I reached the little gray house of the 
 Warrens, to which the presence of Death 
 seemed to have imparted a certain dignity 
 as well as sombreness, I found Aunt Vin in 
 the doorway, watching for the undertaker, in 
 a state of extreme dissatisfaction. 
 
 "If there's anything that aspirates me," 
 she said, severely, " it's to have people so 
 desultory about getting ready for funeral and wedding 
 cerements. Pm always punctuous, and I don't see why 
 other people can't be." 
 
 Mrs. Warren was standing by her dead daughter, hold- 
 ing Jack by the hand. That hardy and slippery urchin had 
 somehow been captured and thrust into a new suit of 
 clothes, and had- not yet recovered from his astonishment 
 and discomfiture. He glanced at his mother out of the 
 corner of one eye, and sniffled ; gave me a kind of leer with 
 the other, and grinned ; looked down at his clothes, and 
 wriggled, as if he would fain cast them as a serpent does 
 his skin ; and, finally, contemplated, the door in a way that 
 made it evident he was calculating the chances of escape. 
 
 His mother's face of quiet sorrow went to my heart. 
 "I am just beginning to realize that I must give her up," 
 said she to me, piteously. " So far, she has been like an 
 angel in the house, filling it with peace and restfulness ; but 
 when she is gone, what is to take the vacant place?"
 
 SHILOII. 125 
 
 There are questions which only He who spake as never 
 man spake, can answer. Certain of His words came to my 
 lips, in such wise that they seemed to utter themselves 
 without help of my volition. " ' I will not leave you com- 
 fortless, I will come unto you.' 'And I will pray the 
 Father, and He will send you another Comforter, that He 
 may abide with you forever.' " 
 
 " I know it," she answered, in a low, self-communing 
 tone. " I know the Everlasting Arms- are always ready to 
 catch us. when our earthly props fall away, if we will but let 
 them. Yet the human supports are very sweet, too ! But 
 thank you, Miss Frost ; I will try to remember those words 
 when when it comes to the final parting." 
 
 She watched me silently, while I combed out and ar- 
 ranged her daughter's long, shining hair, that wonderful 
 human growth ! so beautiful in its tint and texture, so in- 
 destructible in its nature, keeping lustrous and lifelike 
 long after the head that it adorned has crumbled into 
 dust, and often outliving both the affection that treas- 
 ured, and the memory that enriched, it! 
 
 " How is your son S..amuel ? " I asked, at length, de- 
 sirous of diverting her thoughts into some brighter 
 channel. 
 
 " He is a great deal better, thank you. He would make 
 us bring him in to bid his sister good-bye, this morning. 
 It was pitiful to see his wan face hanging over hers." The 
 mother's lip quivered. 
 
 " And Mr. Warren ? " I hastened to inquire. 
 
 " He is nearly sick with grief. Maggie was his idol, 
 you know. I am quite distressed about him. He comes in 
 and looks at her awhile, and then goes put and wanders 
 aixwnd the place, or sits in the garden, perfectly silent and 
 motionless, for hours. He is there now. Cannot you go 
 and speak to him, Miss Frost ? It is time he was roused. 
 He has not yet dressed himself for the funeral ; indeed, I 
 do not even know that he means to go."
 
 126 - SHILOH. 
 
 I made a gesture of dismay. The idea of intruding 
 upon the grief of a man that I knew and understood so lit- 
 tle, was exceedingly distasteful to me. 
 
 " I wish you would go," she urged. " I think he likes 
 you. It is certain that he has listened to you more patiently 
 than ever he did to anybody else, and that he has not been 
 able to get some of your words out of his head. Do go ! " 
 
 Thus entreated, I went, though not without extreme re- 
 luctance. " What shall I say to him ? " I murmured to 
 myself, as I caught sight of his motionless figure at the 
 farther end of the garden. 
 
 BOXA. " Take no thought how or what you shall speak, 
 for it shall be given you in that same hour what you shall 
 speak." 
 
 He was sitting on a fallen tree, with his back toward 
 me. It is wonderful how much misery can be expressed by 
 mere attitude ; his head was bowed, all the lines of his 
 figure drooped, his very garments had a weary, dejected, 
 grief-worn aspect. He must have heard my footsteps, but 
 he neither moved nor turned his head, not even when I 
 stopped within an arm's length of him. A genuine em- 
 barrassment overcame me. I was about to steal noiselessly 
 away, when I felt by chance, I was about to say, but I 
 have expunged that word from my vocabulary my little 
 prayer-book in my pocket. The touch was like an inspira- 
 tion. Opening it at random, my eyes fell \ipon the thirty- 
 eighth Psalm, and I began to read, in a voice that shook 
 like an aspen leaf, 
 
 " ' Put me not to rebuke, O Lord, in Thine anger, 
 neither chasten me in Thy heavy displeasui-e. For Thine 
 arrows stick fast in me, and Thy hand presseth me sore.' " 
 
 I saw that the words struck him powerfully, not so 
 much by any start or gesture, as by the greater immobility, 
 the fixed attention, of his form. I went on, therefore, wi; h 
 increasing confidence, " ' For my wickednesses are gone 
 over my head, and are like a sore burden, too heavy for me
 
 127 
 
 to bear.' ' I am brought into so great trouble and misery, 
 that I go mourning all the day long.' ' I am feeble and 
 sore smitten. I have roared for the very disquietness of my 
 heart.' " 
 
 A groan burst from him, like an echo of the words, 
 and so deep and powerful that I started in alarm. Recov- 
 ering myself instantly, I proceeded, 
 
 " ' My lovers and neighbors did stand looking upon my 
 trouble, and my kinsmen stood afar off.' '' 
 
 He murmured some unintelligible words. 
 
 " ' As for me *I was like a deaf man, and heard not ; 
 and as one that is dumb, who doth not open his mouth.' " 
 
 He nodded his head, as if in assent. 
 
 " ' For I will confess my wickedness and be sorry for 
 my sin.' " 
 
 A kind of hopeless shiver ran over him, and a deep 
 sigh escaped his lips. Still turning the leaves at random, 
 I alighted .upon the twenty-second Psalm, and read on 
 without any apparent pause. When I came to the sen- 
 tences," Our fathers hoped in Thee They called up- 
 on Thee, and were holpen. But as for me, I am a worm 
 and no man, a very scorn of men, and the outcast of the 
 people," he dropped his head heavily into his hands, and 
 a long, struggling moan of incontrollable agony testified 
 that the "Word of God is, in truth, " sharper than any two- 
 edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of 
 joints and marrow." The sound smote me with poignant 
 pain and pity ; not wittingly or willingly had I pressed so 
 heavily upon his hidden sore. I began to look, trembling, 
 for balm wherewith to dress the wound, and the thirty-sec- 
 ond Psalm came opportunely to hand. The better to make 
 him feel that his place was still secure in the sympathetic 
 chain of human brotherhood, I laid my hand lightly on his 
 shoulder as I read, knowing that there is often a subtler 
 sympathy in touch than in any word spoken afar off; and 
 having lost, for the moment, that consciousness of moral re-
 
 128 SHILOHv 
 
 pulsion which had hitherto made it so difficult for me to 
 approach him. 
 
 When the Psalm was finished, I waited silently for the 
 paroxysm to cease ; then I said, quietly, " It is nearly time 
 for the people to gather, sir, and Mrs. Warren says you are 
 not dressed yet. Of course, you will not let Maggie go 
 from you, without accompanying her as far on the way as 
 you can." 
 
 And without seeking to extract any reply, or to look in 
 his face, I went back to the house. A moment after, I 
 heard him enter, and go up stairs. 
 
 In a short time the undertaker arrived, and brought into 
 
 * O 
 
 the death-chamber that long, narrow box, which, whether 
 it be rich or plain, shows more clearly than anything else 
 in the world, perhaps, how limited are the world's posses- 
 sions, how bounded the world's hopes. If this life were all, 
 and to end thus and there who would care to live it ? 
 
 So I thought, and so I said to Mr. Warren, who, I found, 
 was standing by me, looking into the coffin with a face of 
 utter loathing. 
 
 " You really believe in another life, then ? " he asked, 
 but in a listless, aimless way, as if the answer could in no- 
 wise concern him. 
 
 " Believe ! I think I can say with Job, I KNOW that my 
 Redeemer liveth, and that though after my skin worms de- 
 stroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God." 
 
 He shook his head, more, it appeared, in hopelessness 
 than contradiction. " Look abroad in Nature ; everything 
 dies." 
 
 "Yes, sir- to live again." 
 
 " Um do you believe that the beasts live after death?" 
 
 " There is no conclusive evidence against it, that I know 
 of. The fact from which I chiefly draw an inference to the 
 contrary, furnishes as strong a presumption in favor of 
 man's immortality." 
 
 He began to look interested. " What is it ? "
 
 SHILOH. 129 
 
 " Well, so far as we can judge, the beasts have no hope 
 nor expectation of another existence. And it seems to me 
 that God would be likely to impart a hope that He designed 
 to fulfil, inasmuch as He never implants one that He mean? 
 to disappoint." 
 
 "I don't know about that," he answered, in .a vague, in' 
 ward tone. " I once hoped to be happy." 
 
 " You can be yet, sir, if you will seek for happiness in 
 that only, narrow path which leads to it. They who choose 
 to walk in the broad way of self-indulgence, and the pride 
 of human reason, are fools, deceiving their own selves." 
 
 ",And rich," he continued, in the same dreamy voice. 
 
 " Yes, sir, with the riches that do not perish in the 
 using." 
 
 " And handsome and brilliant." 
 
 " They shall be mine, saith the Lord, in that day when 
 I make up my jewels." 
 
 He turned upon me with a sudden and to me inex- 
 plicable sharpness. " I wish you would find an answer 
 somewhere besides in the Bible." 
 
 " I would, sir, if I could find an apter one elsewhere," I 
 answered, quietly. He looked at me a moment, then his 
 eyes fell. 
 
 All things now being ready, the undertaker stepped to 
 Maggie's side, and, signaling to Aunt Vin to help him, was 
 about to lift her into the coffin ; when Mr. Warren started 
 forward, crying out, in a loud voice, and with flashing eyes, 
 " What are you doing there ! In Heaven's name, let my 
 dead child alone ! " 
 
 The man shrank back, and stared hard at him, in amaze- 
 ment and perplexity. 
 
 "I don't want any strange hands about her," continued 
 the father, after a moment, trying to control his irritation ; 
 but still with a shade of bitter resentment in his tone. " If 
 you'll just step out into the kitchen there, we will do it 
 ourselves, thank you." 
 6"
 
 130 SHILOH. 
 
 The man obeyed, and Mr. Warren carefully closed the 
 door after him, muttering between his teeth, " How dare he 
 touch her ! " Certainly, his character is a study of such a 
 nature as was never before presented to my eyes. What 
 a curious combination of delicacy and coarseness, of re- 
 finement and crudity ! 
 
 We transferred the still, white maiden to her narrow 
 couch we four with very gentle hands ; it falling to my 
 share to lay the lovely head, with its face of unearthly 
 peacefulness, on its last, low pillow. A tear fell" beside it. 
 I bethought me that Maggie Warren was the first and only 
 being, in many long days, to call out in me that species of 
 affection which is so quickly begotten of helplessness and 
 help, and to respond to it with a certain degree of apprecia- 
 tion and preference ; and I regretted to lose even that small 
 sunbeam out of my life. To be helpful is not to be happy, 
 I know ; but it is one of the elements of happiness that I 
 least like to miss. 
 
 Lastly, I put a fresh cross and wreath in their -places, 
 and fastened to the coffin-lid a dove made entirely of lilies 
 of the valley ; which last ofiei'ing elicited from Jack a bit 
 of unqualified commendation. 
 
 " Golly ! ain't that fine ! " 
 
 " Perhaps Miss Frost will tell you what it means," said 
 his mother, quietly. 
 
 " It is the emblem of the Holy Ghost, whose sweetest 
 name is ' Comforter,' " I answered, instantly perceiving her 
 intent. " If it reminds us also of that first dove noted in 
 the world's history, which found no rest nor shelter till it 
 returned to the ark from whence it set forth ; and helps us, 
 by means of these exterior types, to understand that the 
 human soul finds never perfect peace, nor safe home, until 
 it resorts to that God who created it ; my dove will have 
 done its perfect work, Jack." 
 
 Jack stared, uncomprehending; Mr. Warren turned 
 hastily away.
 
 XIII. 
 
 THE DOVE BEFORE THE ALTAR. 
 
 HE funeral guests were now assembling fast. 
 A goodly company of grave-looking ma- 
 tron*, quaintly respectable in well-pre j 
 served old fashioned garments, was already 
 seated in the kitchen ; filling it with a whisper- 
 ing buzz, as of a swarm of flies. Knots of 
 bright-faced girls were standing in the corners, 
 and around the front door-yard ; so thoroughly 
 imbued with the glow and freshness of this first day of 
 June by their long walk over breezy hills and through leaf- 
 arched lanes, that all their efforts to subside from gayety 
 into gloom, only resulted in a compromise of subdued cheer- 
 fulness. Not until they entered the little room where Mag- 
 gie lay, and looked at her white face, did their pretty play 
 of smile and dimple quite cease, and a quick moisture suffuse 
 and soften their sparkling eyes. There were stout, steady- 
 going farmers, too, gathered about the 'step and gate (the 
 house being too small to hold half the assemblage) and 
 talking intermittently in low, grave tones ; and a row of 
 young men leaning on the fence ; and a sprinkling of boys, 
 full of curiosity and restlessness, hanging .about their eld- 
 ers with upturned faces and wide-open ears. And all up 
 and down the road, on either side, was a string of country- 
 wagons, of every antique and clumsy pattern ; and horses,
 
 132 SHILOH. 
 
 of every age, size, color, and quality ; from restless, h nlf 
 broken colts, constantly stamping and backing, and elicit- 
 ing an occasional low, sharp " Whoa ! " from their vigilant 
 masters, to patient, broken-down mares, standing motion- 
 less in the sun, with drooping heads ; and only proving 
 themselves to be alive by a lazy whisk of the tail; now and 
 then, or a sudden contraction of a muscle and twitching of 
 the skin, to displace some tormenting fly. One of these 
 last had a colt of very tender age, frisking about her, and 
 often provoking an angry snort and snap from some neigh- 
 boring animal, evidently of the opinion of certain of the 
 human race, that babies should never be taken from Jiome. 
 
 Mr. Taylor now appeared, accompanied by Mrs. Pres- 
 cott and the Divines. I saw his face light up, as he 
 caught sight of my dove ; and, a moment after, he sought 
 me out. 
 
 " "What made you hit upon that design, of all others ? " 
 inquired he. 
 
 ' I do not know ; I thought it was appropriate enough, 
 is it not ? " I answered, wondering. 
 
 " I should think so ! you have not the least idea how 
 singularly appropriate it is." And he passed on. 
 
 A few prayers were offered : then the procession formed, 
 and moved slowly toward the church. Very seldom had 
 Maggie entered its doors in her lifetime, I knew, not so 
 much on account of adverse influence at home as because 
 its services had been so few and irregular, of late. -Not 
 only over Jerusalem, be sure, did the Saviour weep ; but, in 
 His penetrating, prophetic vision, over every place where 
 the House of the Lord is allowed to stand empty from 
 month to month, and year to year; while those who dwell 
 under its shadow grow daily and hourly more absorbed in 
 earthly toil and earthly aims, more and more forgetful that 
 life was given for any other purpose than to buy and sell 
 and get gain. Over all such fallow fields in His vineyard, 
 our Lord's mournful words echo even yet, "If thou
 
 SHILOII. loo 
 
 hadst known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the 
 things which belong to thy peace ! " 
 
 When I entered the vestibule of the church, Alice Pres- 
 cott (evidently on the watch) intercepted me, and led me 
 into the shadow of the gallery staircase. " Oh ! Miss 
 Frost," she exclaimed, eagerly, " can't you sing ? " 
 
 '' Sing ! " I repeated, between surprise and disgust, " no 
 I don't know that is, why do you ask ? " 
 
 " Ruth Winnot is so so hoarse," stammered she, blush- 
 ing, her small array of self-possession, called out by the 
 exigency of the moment, being utterly routed by my un- 
 gracious manner, " she can hardly make a sound. And I 
 thought or mother did that you would at least, that 
 perhaps you might sing for us just this once." 
 
 " But Miss Winnot sang this morning," I said, in a cross- 
 questioning tone. 
 
 " Yes, her cold was only just beginning then, and she 
 managed to get through, somehow. But she thinks that 
 singing only irritated her throat ; and after she stopped, 
 she seemed to choke right up. When she tried, a few min- 
 utes ago, she couldn't get out a note. And then I thought 
 of you." 
 
 " But do you not sing ? " 
 
 " I can help a little, I can't lead." 
 
 " Make your alto take the air, then." 
 
 " Who ? " asked Alice, looking bewildered. " Oh ! you 
 mean the second ! She went right home, as soon as it was 
 proposed. Nothing puts her out so much as to be asked 
 to sing treble." 
 
 No doubt I looked fully as much " put out," to judge 
 by Alice's downcast face. Its pained and discomfited ex- 
 pression softened my tone a little, when next I spoke, 
 though there was no relenting in my mood. 
 
 " I sing ' second,' too, Alice, when I sing at all." 
 
 " Do you ? " she rejoined, in a wondering, doubtful way, 
 " I thought you could sing anything you liked."
 
 134 SIIILOII. 
 
 Her naive confidence in my powers brought a reluctant, 
 but irrepressible smile to my lips. "Thank you, but you 
 greatly overrate my musical ability ; I am not such a happy 
 and convenient combination of Malibran, Alboni, Mario, 
 and Lablache. The real state of the case is that I have 
 always cared more for the theoretical than the practical 
 part of music, for myself; and that latterly, for reasons 
 which it is not worth while to enter upon, I have acquired 
 an aversion to the sound of my own voice. You have not 
 heard me sing since I came to Shiloh, I think." 
 
 " Yes, ma'am, once in the garden. First, you imitated 
 a wren that was singing in the pear-tree ; and then you went 
 on with something that sounded like a great many birds' 
 songs, put together. I never heard anything like it, in my 
 life ! To be sure, you looked all the time as if you were 
 thinking of something else." 
 
 I was dumbfounded. Without this incontrovertible 
 testimony, I could not have believed that I had sung a 
 note since April. Doubtless, I had treated Alice and the 
 wren to a purely mechanical and involuntary repetition of 
 some old exercises in trills or chromatics, recalled to my 
 memory by something in the song of the latter. And no 
 wonder the simple little country-maiden was astonished ! 
 Probably she never did hear anything like the scientific 
 training of a modern singer ; nor is she in the least aware 
 what a blissful ignorance is hers ! 
 
 " I am very sorry," she sighed, after a pause, turning 
 reluctantly away. "It's so miserable not to have any 
 singing ! " 
 
 BONA (with severity). "Well, what are you waiting for ? 
 you know you can sing well enough for the occasion, if you 
 like. 
 
 I (petulantly). But I do not like ! You know I hate to 
 sing, and why. I wish I had never learned how ! 
 
 MALA. And to such an audience ! How very appreci- 
 ative they will be of Signer Canto's "style," which lie
 
 SHILOH. 135 
 
 drilled into you so thoroughly ! An accordeon accompani- 
 ment, too ! 
 
 I shrugged my shoulders. 
 
 BOXA. The question is not one of preference or appre- 
 ciation. It is simply whether the burial service this after- 
 noon shall be conducted with the greatest attainable degree 
 of perfection and solemnity, by your help ; or whether it 
 shall be shorn somewhat of both, through your unwilling- 
 ness to do your duty. 
 
 MALA. It is not your duty. You are not one of the 
 Shiloh choir. 
 
 BONA. It is your duty to do anything you are asked to 
 do, to sustain the service, when there is nothing to hinder, 
 and no one who can, or will, do it any better. 
 
 I. But I am all out of practice. 
 
 BOXA. That is your fault. And one fault is not to be 
 offered as an excuse for another. 
 
 I. And it is so awkward and uncomfortable to sing with 
 people one is not accustomed to sing with ! 
 
 BONA. Your own comfort is the last thing to be con- 
 sidered, under the circumstances. And your audience will 
 notrbe a critical one. 
 
 I. And I sing alto ! 
 
 BONA. Your voice has all the compass, and more, that 
 will be required for the music you will have to sing. 
 
 My last defences being thus carried, I began to mount 
 the stairs slowly and reluctantly. Alice, watching my in- 
 decision from a few steps above, accepted the movement as 
 a favorable augury. " Oh ! are you going to sing, after 
 all ? " she asked, with a brightening face. 
 
 "Perhaps," I answered, shortly; not to enhance the 
 value of the favor by that cheerful readiness of compliance 
 which would make it most acceptable. 
 
 Her face fell again, and she led the way in silence to 
 where Ruth Winnot sat, with her head resting wearily on 
 the seat before her. One glance at her flushed and suffer-
 
 156 SHILOH. 
 
 ing face convinced me that her excuse was no trumped-up 
 one ; she was in the fell grasp of an influenza. Yet even 
 under such unfavorable circumstances, I was struck with 
 her uncommon beauty. Soft, wavy hair, of that rare, rich 
 tint of auburn which artists love so well, framed a face of 
 pure oval outline ; with straight, delicate features, and 
 clear, brown eyes, that had a strain of pathos in them for 
 which not even the influenza accounted fully. 
 
 " The bass " to borrow Alice's title, was turning over 
 his music-book, with an anxious face. He was a little, 
 meek-looking man, with a legible enough record of misfor- 
 tune and. patience written across his brow ; and wofully 
 near sighted. He glanced toward me nervously, gave ut- 
 terance to an embarrassed " Ahem ! " and buried his face 
 in his music-book. 
 
 I sat down, and looked around me. The gallery was so 
 small,. and so near to the ceiling so ill-ventilated, withal 
 that it was like a furnace. I noted, mechanically, half-a- 
 dozen high-backed pews ; the unrailed opening of the stair- 
 case, looking like a trap ; a ladder leading to the little 
 tower above ; and a whole colony of wasps clinging to the 
 window-sashes, with two or three scouts flying in the open 
 space, which I could not help dodging, now and then, 
 though no one else seemed to mind them. 
 
 The bass sent another nervous glance in my direction, 
 and a preliminary, " Ahem ! " 
 
 " What would you like to sing ? " inquired he, in a tone 
 which seemed to imply that he feared it was taking a liberty 
 to ask the question. 
 
 " It does not matter in the least," I answered, making 
 some little effort to bring my mood up to the level of oi-di- 
 nary civility ; but conscious that there was a disagreeable, 
 injured inflection in my voice. It was plain that it was felt 
 acutely in his consciousness, too, for he colored to the 
 roots of his hair, and hid his face in his music-book again. 
 
 Ashamed of venting my ill-hurnor upon anything so
 
 SHILOH. 137 
 
 mild and inoffensive, I hastened to remove the unpleasant 
 impression. " That is," I continued, " I should prefer to 
 have you choose ; I am such a tyro in choir-singing. This 
 is my first attempt, and I have not the least idea how I 
 shall acquit myself. You are the best judge, therefore, 
 what the tune should be." 
 
 He looked a little reassured. After some moments' 
 search, he held the book toward me and pointed to the 
 open page. " Would you mind singing that ? I guess it's 
 as suitable as anything we've got, and it's an old tune that 
 everybody knows." 
 
 It was so old as to be quite new to me. I hastily sig- 
 nified my acceptance of it, however, and the matter was 
 settled. In good time, too, for Mr. Taylor's voice began 
 to vibrate solemnly through the building, "I am the Res- 
 urrection nnd the Life." 
 
 I drew near the gallery-rail, and looked down. Slowly 
 and with difficulty the pall-bearers made their way up the 
 narrow aisle ; and Maggie was placed in front of the chan- 
 cel, with her white face looking up to the white ceiling, 
 and the strong light of the many windQws setting clearly 
 forth every line, ev.ery feature, every fold and flower. A 
 broad band of sunshine lay directly across her bosom, kind- 
 ling cross and crown into a vivid, half-diaphanous bright- 
 ness ; and the breeze came freely in, full of pleasant sum- 
 mer sounds, the twittering of birds, the cheery chirp of 
 insects, the faint tinkling of a cowVbell in a far-off meadow, 
 and lifted the sleeping girl's hair with light fingers, and 
 ruffled the fragrant plumage of the dove on the coffin, un- 
 til both seemed to be stirring with some new-found, myste- 
 rious life. I should scarcely have marveled to see the one 
 arise, and the other fly out of the window, such life-likeness 
 did the breeze and sunshine impart to them. 
 
 The few mourners followed, and filed into the front 
 pews. Mr. Warren looked around him, with a face that 
 was almost fierce in its grief and bewilderment. He had
 
 138 SHILOH. 
 
 not crossed the threshold of a church for years on years, I 
 was told ; and there were many eyes gazing at him with 
 more curiosity than sympathy. I think his quick intuitions 
 felt, and resented it momentarily, even then ; for he stopped 
 at the pew-door, and looked as if he were about to turn 
 and march out ; then his glance fell on Maggie's form, his 
 chin dropped on his breast, and he sank into his seat, with 
 the air of a man who had lost all consciousness of outward 
 things in the miserable abstraction of mental anguish. 
 
 Then followed the beautiful, brief, comprehensive bur- 
 ial service of the Church ; so excellent in what it says, so 
 especially admirable in what it leaves unsaid. There is 
 nothing like it anywhere ; all other ceremonials of burial 
 seem either heavy or puerile, beside its severe, yet most 
 fit and satisfying, simplicity. 
 
 I understood Mr. Taylor's remarks about my dove, 
 when he announced his text. " But the dove found no 
 rest for the sole of her foot, and she returned unto him in 
 the ark ; for the waters were on the face of the whole 
 earth. Then he put forth his hand, and took her and 
 pulled her into the ark." Spiritual unrest its nature, 
 cause, and cure, this was Mr. Taylor's subject. It was 
 developed with a degree of poetic feeling that I had not 
 expected: God's loving haste to meet and welcome the 
 first return of the wandering soul to Him, as typified in the 
 putting forth of the hand, and the pulling of the dove into 
 the ark, was not overlooked : neither was the yet deeper 
 analogy of the hand to the death-angel, and of the ark to 
 the heavenly state, with its gentle consolations for the 
 time of bereavement, neglected; and the delivery was 
 warmed by a still richer glow of that fervor and earnest- 
 ness which had so impressed me in Mr. Taylor's manner in 
 the morning. He was more at home now, he felt himself 
 more thoi-oughly en rapport with his hearers, sure of the 
 responsive kinship of all souls that sorrowed or sym- 
 pathized around him. After the first few sentences, Mr.
 
 SHILOII. 139 
 
 Warren lifted his head, and listened with an attention that 
 never wavered throughout. I was so interested myself, 
 that the announcement of the two-hundred-and-fifth hymn 
 came upon me with startling unexpectedness. 
 
 I might say, with almost perfect truth; that I did not 
 know there was such a hymn in the prayer-book ; for I had 
 never before read it with any attention, nor known of its 
 exquisite fitness for an occasion like the present. I just 
 glanced over the words, and a thrill went through and 
 through me. By the time Ruth Winnot had finished her 
 small prelude, I was nearly unconscious of accordeon, ac- 
 companiment, helpers, or hearers, of everything, save the 
 wonderful power and adaptation of the words I was to 
 sing, and the mighty swell of a musical inspiration such as 
 I never felt before, and do not expect to feel again. I be- 
 gan in a full, clear, recitative style, that filled the little 
 church like a sea, and quenched every stir and rustle be- 
 low. At the third line, Alice's small voice dropped out 
 entirely, and her head went down on the book-ledge before 
 her, trembling with emotion. The bass being both smooth 
 and sympathetic, kept along well ; the tenor, uncertain 
 what I might, or might not, do next, sang in subdued, 
 and consequently, more musical tones ; and Ruth played 
 like one doubly inspired from without and within. 
 
 When I came to the words, 
 
 
 
 " So blooms the human face divine, 
 When youth its pride of beauty shows," 
 
 Mr. Warren faced square about, totally unmindful of cus- 
 tom or comment, and fixed his piercing eyes on my face. 
 His intent gaze only deepened and quickened the electrical 
 current that had already made me aware of the entire sympa- 
 thy of all my auditors, and I sang on with added power and 
 fervor. The mournful sentiment of the next verse wailed 
 itself forth in slow, soft, sombre 'tones, that Alice heard 
 with an accompaniment of long-drawn, smothered sobs ;
 
 140 SHILOH. 
 
 "The fading glory disappears, 
 The short-lived beauties die away." 
 
 The next verse began to swell with the joy of heavenly 
 hope and faith ; but I reserved the full power of my voice 
 to roll out the last like a stately anthem of praise, 
 
 "Let sickness blast and death devour, 
 
 If heaven shall recompense our pains ! 
 Perish the grass and fade the flower, 
 If firm the Word of God remains ! " 
 
 Mr. Warren kept his position for some seconds, after the 
 last tone died away ; then dropped heavily into his seat. 
 For him, I suspect, the service was over. Certainly, he 
 gave little heed to the prayers which followed ; neither^ if 
 the truth must be told, did I. The confusion and the 
 fatigue of reaction came upon me powerfully ; I leaned my 
 head against a pillar, and knew nothing save that I had 
 been in a state of superhuman exaltation, and that it had 
 left me very humanly weary. 
 
 When the benediction was pronounced, Ruth Winnot 
 turned a wet and working face toward me. " Miss Frost, 
 I shall never sing again," she said, mournfully. 
 
 " Indeed, why not ? " I responded, only half-roused to 
 intelligence. 
 
 " I can never sing like that, and nothing less could 
 satisfy me now," with a half-sob. 
 
 "Miss Winnot," I returned, earnestly, "your voice, 
 naturally, is worth a dozen of mine ; there are possibilities 
 lurking within it, to which mine could never, by any possi- 
 bility, attain. The effect that I have produced on you to- 
 day is partly owing to the cultivation my voice has received, 
 and partly borrowed from the emotional excitement of the 
 occasion. Your fingers felt it as much as my voice. If 
 you could put the same soul into an organ as you did into 
 that accordeon just now, the musical world would fall down 
 and worship you."
 
 SIIILOH. 141 
 
 She shook her head sadly, unconvinced. Bona whis- 
 pered softly into my ear, and I made a sudden resolution. 
 
 An opportunity was now given to friends and neighbors 
 to take a last look at features shortly to vanish, for all time, 
 from the eyes and the places that had known them ; of 
 which, it seemed to me, everybody took advantage, except 
 Ruth Winnot, who remained in her seat, silent, and, ap- 
 parently, suffering. 
 
 The mourners went last. Mrs. Warren gave her child 
 one long, lingering, ineffably tender look ; and turned 
 away, never once losing her self-control. It was plain to 
 see, however, that her face was so calm only because her 
 grief had sunk so deep down into her heart ; as the bosom 
 of a lake is smooth and silent over the mournfullest secret 
 of its depths. But the father, utterly regardless of obser- 
 vation and the lapse of time, hung over the lovely face as 
 if he would never consent to part with it. "Twice the un- 
 dertaker laid his hand on his arm, and sought to draw him 
 away, and twice he shook it off, with a sound like a sub- 
 dued growl. Suddenly he stood upright, glared around 
 him like a wild thing, and marched quickly down the aisle. 
 Mrs. Warren hastened after, and took his arm; I suspect 
 she was afraid he would go straight home in a fit of sorrow- 
 ful abstraction.
 
 XIV. 
 
 DUST TO DUST. 
 
 NOTWITHSTANDING the mournfulness of 
 the occasion, that afternoon ride has a kind 
 of glory in my memory, mainly attributable, 
 I imagine, to the genial influences of the balmy 
 June weather; the really fine days of which 
 month are the most perfect that the year 
 vouchsafes us. A little too warm in the sun ? 
 perhaps, yet only enough so to assure us that 
 that luminary was in a lavish and beneficent mood; 
 neither intent on restricting his life-giving warmth to a 
 bare sufficiency for one's needs ; nor engaged in a malicious 
 experiment how much of it human flesh and blood could 
 endure without broiling. And in the shade, the atmos- 
 phere was full of a primal freshness, as if it had just been 
 created, which it was enough of delight merely to breathe 
 and taste. 
 
 The graveyard was about two miles away. The road 
 thither wound through a pleasant variety of New England 
 scenery, wherein the tamest objects had a semi- wild look, 
 as if but half-subordinated to civilization, and ready, at any 
 moment, to lapse back into savagery, which was not with- 
 out its charm. Every farm had its ledges, thickets, swamps, 
 and outlying wastes, covered with rambling, untutored 
 vegetation; alternating with green meadows and fertile 
 fields, and mingling a spice of rudeness with the gentler
 
 SIIILOII. 143 
 
 traits of the scene. Tiny lakelets smiled and scintillated 
 in the valleys ; here and there a late-blooming apple-tree 
 scattered the fragrant snow of its petals "over a green hill- 
 side. Overhead, arched a sky without a cloud ; depth be- 
 yond depth of illimitable, dazzling blue. And the quietude 
 was perfect, though a quietude so voiceful! Sweetened 
 only not disturbed by twitterings of birds and dreamy 
 hum of insects, soft whisperings of leaves and babblings of 
 wayside brooks. 
 
 Through all this light and glow, this warm color and 
 various melody, this fresh, joyous, abundant life, the funeral 
 procession, with its hearse and coffin and mourners, crept 
 like a black, devouring shadow. A sorrowful enough sight, 
 at best, with its hard realities of human waste and woe ; 
 but how immitigably bitter to all such as are insensible to 
 the comfort breathed through the inspired declaration, 
 " That which thou sowest is not quickened, except it die ! " 
 For one miserable moment, I tried to identify my mind 
 with Mr. Warren's, and look at the landscape through his 
 eyes. It was as if I had viewed it through a smoke- 
 blackened glass. Without the hope of a Perfect Day yet 
 to dawn, through whose splendor no funeral train shall 
 march, all the glory of the opening June seemed but a 
 hollow mockery of joy, beside that trailing shadow of 
 death and gloom. 
 
 The burial ground occupied the rounded summit and 
 slope of a hill, by the roadside. It was a stony, barren 
 spot enough, notwithstanding that a few daisies and thistles 
 did their small best to make it beautiful ; obviously, the 
 founders thereof had not thought it worth while to waste 
 any soil capable of a present yield of grain-sheaves, upon 
 the prospect of the future harvest of immortality. There 
 was a sufficiently abundant crop of grave-stones, however ; 
 which stony outgrowth was to be found in every stage of 
 freshness and decay, from the disagreeably new, sharp- 
 cut, white, modern monument, to dark, time-graven, moss-
 
 Ill SIIILOH. 
 
 grown head-stones, fast crumbling away and mingling their 
 dust with that which they had so ineffectually sought to 
 memorialize. TKese seemed to have their allotted period' 
 for flourishing and decay, not less than the weeds and flow- 
 ers, albeit, of somewhat longer duration. 
 
 We all gathered around the narrow niche in the damp 
 ground, and watched the coffin lowered to its place, and 
 listened to the solemn words of the Committal, and heard 
 the dread rattle of the three-fold fall of earth on its lid 
 " earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust," and gave 
 thanks for the good examples of the faithful departed, and 
 prayed to be raised from the death of sin unto the life of 
 righteousness. When Mr. Taylor's voice ceased, there 
 were a few moments of deep, uncovered silence ; then, two 
 men seized their spades, and began to " fill up the grave. 
 With the fall of the first shovelful, came the dull thud 
 of a large stone on the coffin, cruelly wounding the white 
 dove, and inflicting a yet deeper -hurt upon Mr. Warrren's 
 sensitive heart. He gave an irritated start, knitting his 
 brows ; then, as a second hollow sound smote his ear, he 
 rushed forward, and caught the man's arm. 
 
 " Good Heavens ! " he cried, bitterly, " is there no 
 earth, in all Shiloh, to throw on my dead child, but that ! " 
 
 There was an embarrassed silence. Mr. Taylqr, with 
 Ms features working convulsively, stooped and began, in a 
 blind, unreasoning, mechanical way, to pick out the 
 stones from that side of the pile nearest him. One or 
 two of the bystanders felt constrained to follow his exam,- 
 ple, though with manifest reluctance and a latent fear of 
 making themselves ridiculous ; but the great body of prac- 
 tical-minded farmers shook their heads over such inconven- 
 ient acuteness of feeling, and waste of time and labor; and 
 Major Burcham officiously laid his hand on Mr. Warren's 
 shoulder, and tried to draw him aside, with some common- 
 place, reiterated assurance that the " soul was gone, and 
 the body only an empty casket, sir, only an empty casket ! "
 
 SHILOH. 145 
 
 and was shaken off with an angry rudeness that consid- 
 erably ruffled his dignity. At this juncture, William Her- 
 man stepped forth and showed himself the same cool- 
 headed, quick-witted, and kind-hearted character, here, 
 that I had found him to be in the sick-room. 
 
 " Miss Essie," said he, quietly, " your barn is nearest ; 
 is there any straw in it ? " 
 
 " Oh ! plenty, thank you ; " catching his idea at once, 
 and feeling a quick and grateful relief, that was shared 
 by everybody within hearing. " Bring as much as you 
 want, please." 
 
 The straw was soon brought, two or three offering to 
 help, and the coffin covered to a sufficient depth to soften 
 and deaden any fall and sound of stone or earth. The 
 grave was then rapidly filled, and rounded over ; most of 
 the people waiting until the work was finished ; a custom 
 which, though it has a sufficiently stoical look to unac- 
 customed eyes, seems to have its root in the heart's ten- 
 derest and softest feelings. We do not readily leave our 
 most treasured things to be disposed of by strange and 
 careless hands. 
 
 When all was done, the concourse broke up slowly, and 
 dispersed itself over the graveyard, taking advantage of 
 the opportunity to review places consecrated by the ashes 
 of forefathers and compatriots, now intermixing indistin- 
 guishably, and some of them, doubtless, reappearing above 
 the earth in the shape of grass and flowers, to show how 
 much of old material is inevitably blended with the fresh- 
 est novelty, of life, nature, or art. Mrs. Divine and Mrs. 
 Prescott stood gravely by a group of half-a-dozen, or more, 
 head-stones, where sons, brothers, and husband had fallen 
 together ; and I strayed off by myself to the oldest portion 
 of the ground, into which the most ancient life of Shiloh 
 had subsided, and began trying to restore some of the in- 
 scriptions, by scraping away the mosses and lichens from 
 the half-obliterated letters, taking a quaint and sad pleas- 
 7
 
 14:6 SHILOH. 
 
 ure in bringing back to a temporary legibility and possibil- 
 ity of recognition, some name which had long ago faded 
 out of the village memory, and so cheating Oblivion a lit- 
 tle longer of its prey. Very commonplace names they 
 were, belonging to that long roll which the world willingly 
 lets die ; not one of them being able to impart to its mon- 
 ument any historic interest or poetic immortality, to repay 
 me for my trouble. Yet I worked on, well pleased to see 
 them take shape and meaning under my fingers ; and 
 thankful to every one of their owners for having added 
 something to the quaint impressiveness and the thought- 
 fecundity of the place, by depositing his ashes there, and 
 causing the vaguest shadow of his shade to flit across 
 my imagination. 
 
 In some cases the dates alone could be restored, the 
 forlorn little human identities being quite lost ; which 
 gave me a curious impression that not people, but Years, 
 had laid themselves down under the sod ; as glad to be 
 done with sunshine and snow, calm and tempest, as their 
 human bedfellows with toil and pleasure, battle and bi- 
 vouac. It was pitiful to notice, I thought, following out 
 the idea, how few of them had signalized themselves by 
 any beautiful or noble deeds any great wrong righted, or 
 wide redemption achieved that might tend to exalt their 
 memory above others ; in fact, the greater part of those 
 which individualized themselves in my recollection, did it 
 in virtue of the mischief they had wrought. The most of 
 them, however, were as uninteresting as their mortal com- 
 panions, and perhaps, after all, were the more to be 
 really reverenced, on that account. The sterling useful- 
 ness of doing quiet duties in quiet ways, unobtrusively 
 and uncomplainingly, is one which, though the world 
 may make little account of it, .God will surely bless and 
 abundantly reward. Of such humble, unattractive lives, 
 is the Book of Life chiefly made up, I imagine. 
 
 A numerous group of head-stones, all bearing one fam-
 
 SHILOH. 147 
 
 ily name, set me upon another train of thought. It was 
 good to see in what close and quiet proximity they lay 
 there ; whatever difference of age, or position, or opinion, 
 whatever personal antipathies, or jealousies, or misapprehen- 
 sions, had kept them apart in their lives. I doubted not 
 that I had chanced upon the type of a spiritual reality. 
 The souls of the dead, probably, mingle in the great com- 
 pany of the Departed, without a thought of the dislikes 
 and repulsions that made some of them so disagreeable to 
 each other on earth. A common glory or a common gloom 
 unites them in a close fraternity of hope or despair, joy or 
 misery. 
 
 Finally, I ascended the topmost swell of the hill, and 
 sat down on a fallen stone to consider the view, made up 
 of a pretty curve of road, mottled with tree-shadows; 
 two or three meadows, with grass so green that it seemed 
 . to have a lustre in it ; a bit of forest ; and an open, blue 
 eye of Rustic's Pond, mirroring the nearest objects with 
 a fidelity that might make one doubt which was the sub- 
 stance, which the reflection ; that trite material of which 
 Nature, everywhere and endlessly, makes fresh, sparkling 
 pictures, each with its own peculiar and exceeding charm. 
 Here, Mrs. Divine came to look for me. 
 
 Who can tell when the day begins to wane ? There 
 seemed not one sunbeam the less, no fainter tints, no deeper 
 shadows, yet, as we turned homeward, we felt a nameless 
 something in the air, and- saw and heard it in every hue 
 and tone, telling us that the day was fading its face al- 
 ready turned toward the oncoming Night. 
 
 And who can tell when his life begins to go down the 
 hill ? Few ever realize that they have passed its topmost 
 "point, until they are already far down the slope ; in sight 
 of the Valley of Shadow at its foot !
 
 HEKB AND THERE. 
 
 you were less ready to play the part of a 
 viaduct, Francesca, I do not know but I should 
 take to writing to my father's spirit. I remem- 
 ber being profoundly affected, when I was a 
 school girl, by the information that among the 
 posthumous papers of a certain shy, reticent as- 
 sistant teacher, whom nobody ever seemed to un- 
 derstand or fraternize with, had been found a 
 large package of letters written to an early friend, over 
 whose grave the grass had grown green for years. This 
 friend had been her only confidant during her life ; and 
 after her death, the lonely survivor had gone on, writing to 
 her just as if she had been alive ; every week adding a 
 closely written epistle, duly signed, sealed and addressed, 
 to the growing pile ; through whose whole sombre texture 
 ran a touching story of long, wasting disappointment and 
 heart-ache, like a crimson thread. Without this resource, 
 doubtless her poor, proud, sensitive heart would have bro- 
 ken somewhat earlier than it did ! The recollection moves 
 me, even now. There is an exquisite pathos in the lonely 
 girl's fidelity to the one friendship of her life ; in the confi- 
 dence which death could not break, nor the slow lapse of 
 sorrowful years wear away. I can almost see the disem- 
 bodied spirit bending tenderly over each letter as it was 
 deposited in its place, and reading its contents with a face 
 of still brightness ; ^pitiful for the momentary affliction of
 
 SHILOH. 149 
 
 her earth-bound friend, but rejoicing in the knowledge of 
 the exceeding glory for which it was so tenderly preparing 
 her. 
 
 Nevertheless, I am glad that I am writing for living 
 eyes and a living, human sympathy. For no others, I am 
 certain, should I feel free to set down so many minute and 
 apparently trivial details, as are necessary to a clear idea of 
 this Shiloh-life and my growing connection with it. 
 
 The fortnight following the burial of Maggie Warren 
 was fruitful only in commonplace events ; some of which, 
 however, require brief mention. 
 
 Mr. Taylor spent some days in Shiloh, visiting indus- 
 triously among the people, and trying to kindle in them 
 some small spark of interest in response to his own glowing 
 enthusiasm. They all liked him, even the most prejudiced 
 and indifferent among them, he was so earnest, so genuine, 
 there was such a cheerful alacrity in his manner, such a 
 fresh, breezy buoyancy in his tone. There was no resisting 
 the cheerful contagion of his hopefulness, or the steady, 
 stealing influence of his bright, ardent, energetic talk. He 
 contrived to throw such an air of reasonableness, and even 
 of practicability, over whatever he proposed or planned, 
 and he had so ready a response to every objection, that, so 
 far as words went, he soon had everything his own way. 
 Some of those who had been most adverse to Mrs. Pres- 
 cott's movement, and had stigmatized it as the purest folly, 
 were swept along on the swift current of his assertion and 
 argument almost to the point of thinking that it might be 
 a good thing, after all ; and if, on reflection, they were in- 
 clined to smile at him as visionary, and at themselves for 
 their momentary conversion, they respected him, none the 
 less, for the purity of his motives and the unselfishness of 
 his zeal. Others, belonging to that vast multitude which, 
 in religious enterprises, lets " ' I dare not ' wait upon ' I 
 would,' " shook their heads with a kind of mournful pity 
 over the obstacles and the disappointments they foresaw in
 
 150 SIIILOI-I. 
 
 his path ; but they were deeply touched, nevertheless, by 
 his generous confidence in himself and in them, and there 
 was not a grain of contempt infused into the pity. And all 
 this, despite his ways were unlike their ways, his thoughts 
 very different from their thoughts, his standards far re- 
 moved from their standards ; despite, too, his city breeding, 
 and his often amusing ignorance of rural customs and agri- 
 cultural lore. In these large, low, firelit farm kitchens ; 
 where the grim shade of the tenacious, old-time conserv- 
 atism lurks longest, and opposes the most steady and de- 
 termined resistance to innovation ; his visit left an influence 
 like that of a fresh breeze from a mountain top, or a sun- 
 beam struggling through a fog. And as both these airy 
 visitants, in whatever narrow, sombre, or sordid place they 
 chance to stray, immediately create for themselves a certain 
 congruity and fitness in being there ; so Mr. Taylor seemed 
 at once to harmonize with his surroundings : every segment 
 of his character, in virtue of some curious, unsuspected 
 agreement of apparently diverse angles, dovetailed into the 
 Shiloh-life, as if it had been made for it. 
 
 Having finished his visitation, and taken it for granted 
 that everybody encouraged him, because nobody could 
 long have the hardihood to maintain an attitude of dis- 
 couragement against his strenuous hope and zeal, he went 
 his way to arrange for the removal of his family hither ; it 
 being understood, however, that he should officiate on the 
 intervening Sundays. 
 
 A day or two after, I saw, from my window, Essie 
 Volger approaching the house. She reined her shaggy 
 little Canadian pony deftly up to the gate, sprang lightly 
 from the buggy to the ground, fastened the horse to a post, 
 greeted Uncle True cheerily, whistled to Leo, and had well- 
 nigh crossed the threshold before I could get down to meet 
 her. 
 
 " Ah ! Miss Frost, it is such a lovely day ! " she began, 
 " too lovely, by far, to waste indoors ! "
 
 SHILOH. 151 
 
 " So my senses have been telling me." 
 
 " Pray listen to them ! For, though I cannot say, 
 
 ' My boat is by the shore ' 
 
 my buggy is at the door, and if you will consent to receive 
 this first, formal call of mine in that, you can be enjoying 
 a drive at the same time." 
 
 She took me to the bank of the Housatonic ; at this 
 point, a clear, rapid, curving stream, forest-shadowed on 
 one side, and quickly losing itself among grassy and 
 wooded hills. Much of the way was by a steep and hilly 
 road, across which the boughs of the trees met and inter- 
 laced; with here and there picturesque glimpses of the 
 winding, shimmering stream below. At the river's brink, 
 we quitted the buggy and strolled down the wooded bank, 
 listening to the rippling current, and gathering ferns and 
 flowers. Such an excursion is a ready promoter of ac- 
 quaintance ; I came home feeling that years of association, 
 however enjoyable, could add but little to my knowledge 
 of Miss Essie. Not that her character is so shallow, but 
 because it is so clear. Sometimes, the waters of a fountain 
 are so pellucid, allowing the shells and pebbles of its bed 
 to be distinctly seen, that a careless observer- is easily de- 
 ceived in regard to its depth. And not every one, seeing 
 her so frank, so open, -so sparkling, too, would give her 
 credit for the real depth and strength of her pure, womanly 
 nature. 
 
 It was a little thing that gave me the opportunity of 
 measuring it more accurately. 
 
 "This dear old river!" she exclaimed, dipping her 
 fingers into it, caressingly. " It is like a friend ! I have 
 known and loved it from childhood." 
 
 " Are you sure that it is the same ' old river ? ' " I asked. 
 " Recollect that, though you may always have seen the 
 same shape of flood, you have never looked twice upon the 
 same waves."
 
 152 SHILOH. 
 
 The thought seemed to strike her. " Never the same 
 waves ! " she repeated, musingly ; " never the same waves ! 
 "Where, then, are those I saw so long ago ? " 
 
 " Gone. Swallowed up by the vast, distant ocean. 
 Where are the friends of your early days ? " 
 
 She looked at me earnestly, and her cheek glowed. 
 " They are not gone ! I see every one of the old waves 
 in these : if I did not, I should not care for them. And 
 the old friends ! it is for their sakes that I love the new 
 ones ! Should I care for the new, if I had not loved the 
 old so well ? They taught me to love Love, as the former 
 waves taught me to love the River ! " 
 
 Mrs. Danforth made me her promised call ; and from a 
 large mass of vivacious, often witty, but utterly immemor- 
 able talk, I gleaned a few facts which throw a clearer light 
 on her character, and the reason of her sojourn in a place 
 so apparently uncongenial to her education and tempera- 
 ment as Shiloh. Her husband is gone to Europe, to exam- 
 ine into certain business transactions, which may, and may 
 not, have a disastrous termination ; and, during his absence, 
 it was thought desirable for herself, and almost indispensa- 
 ble to the physical well-being of her children, to find some 
 retired and healthful spot, where she could live in a natural, 
 simple way, so far as it was possible to one of her sophis- 
 ticated habits and tastes, free from the cares, the excite- 
 ments, and the expensiveness of fashionable life. 
 
 " And I thought, when I came here," she went on, 
 laughing, " that I should live in Shiloh on the let-alone 
 principle entirely. But bless me ! I was never made for a 
 recluse. There are times when I must talk to somebody, if 
 it is only a tin-peddler, I am absolutely pining for the 
 music of my own voice, and I don't care who knows it ! I 
 was in one of those moods when Mrs. Prescott first came to 
 me, to bespeak my assistance for her Sewing Society ; and 
 when she held out the prospect of a Fair, by and by, I tell 
 you, I could not resist the temptation. For if there is any-
 
 SHILOH. 153 
 
 thing I really enjoy, next to knitting worsteds (and one fol- 
 lows as naturally after the other as a horse's heels after his 
 head) ; and if there is anything for which I have a true 
 genius, it is putting through Fairs. I have had something 
 to do with every large movement of the sort in New York, 
 for the last ten years ; and like Alexander, I am burning 
 for new worlds to conquer. And I suspected I should have 
 some novel and rich experiences in a place like Shiloh. 
 And when I went to Mrs. Seber's that day, and saw that 
 queer company, with their old fashioned gowns, and their 
 quaint phraseology, above all, when I encountered the 
 Vocabulary I beg her pardon, but that is the only name 
 I can ever think of, in her connection ! I was convinced 
 that I should find plenty of amusement in a taste of Shi- 
 loh life, if not much profit ; so I determined to ' go in,' and 
 have a good time. I suppose you felt the same way." 
 
 " Well, no, Mrs. Danforth, I confess that I was so 
 foolish, or so mercenary, as to have an eye to the profit, 
 too." 
 
 She looked extremely puzzled. 
 
 " I mean," continued I, rather lightly, for I felt the ab- 
 surdity of making a very serious matter of her careless talk, 
 " that sort of profit which is supposed somehow to accrue 
 from the doing of one's duty, in that state of life where- 
 unto one is called." 
 
 For a moment she seemed almost confused. Then she 
 said, somewhat more earnestly than her wont, " Do not set 
 me down for such an unmitigated heathen, Miss Frost. I 
 exaggerate my own defects. Not even the prospect of any 
 amount of laughing matter, would have made me accept 
 the Presidency of that Society, if I had not been sure that 
 I could do them good service. Still," she added, dropping 
 back into her usual careless manner, " I do not know as I 
 should have been won over so easily, without the promise 
 of a spice of fun in the good work, and the expectation of 
 an opportunity, ere long, to disport myself in my natural 
 7*
 
 154: SHILOH. 
 
 element ; namely a Fair. So you can credit me with half 
 heathenism, after all." 
 
 Which I am afraid I did, in spite of Bona's whispered 
 warning, " Judge not, lest ye be judged." 
 
 I was deeply impressed, however, by the fact that Mrs. 
 Danforth, like myself, though from a different motive, 
 had come to Shiloh resolving to stand aloof from its social 
 life. In neither case, had the resolve been kept. In both 
 instances, it had, plainly, been broken of deliberate choice. 
 I could not find the first trace of that grim finger of Fatal- 
 ity in it, upon which so many persons seek to throw the res- 
 ponsibility of their doings when their tendency is evil, or 
 their results disastrous ; for it is impossible not to notice 
 that all such are ready enough to assume the credit of 
 whatever good they accomplish. Plainly, too, Shiloh was 
 not to be a " place of rest " to Mrs. Danforth, much more 
 than to myself. Instead of repose, God had given us work. 
 Was that, then, a better thing ? 
 
 The Sewing Society held its regular meetings ; and leg- 
 islation being over, for the present, a tolerable degree of 
 harmony characterized its labors. If, in the opinion of its 
 President, amusement was the chief end of life, she knew 
 how to give, as well as get ; indeed, it was currently re- 
 ported that certain heretofore intermittent and intractable 
 members, now attended regularly and worked with docility, 
 just for the sake of hearing Mrs. Danforth's talk ; or, as 
 one of them said, with an unconscious recognition of the 
 fact that its charm was more in the manner than the mat- 
 ter, and addressed itself quite as much to the eye as the 
 ear, " to see her talk." 
 
 Death did not reap his full harvest in Mr. Warren's 
 household. The fever shortly appeared in the dwellings of 
 two of his neighbors, neighbors, too, of that marsh, on 
 whose vicinage Mrs. Divine had charged the origination of 
 the disease. In one instance, it ran almost uninterruptedly 
 through an entire family ; the father and two children
 
 SHILOH. 155 
 
 died, and the mother struggled blindly back from the very 
 threshold of the grave into an atmosphere of such desola- 
 tion and loneliness, that she knew not how to be thankful 
 for the staying of the Destroyer's hands. Of course, it 
 was difficult to draw the needful supply of watchers from 
 the hard- worked and scattered neighborhood ; and my ser- 
 vices were again called in requisition. It soon came to be 
 well understood that, when other assistance was not availa- f 
 ble, Winnie Frost could be counted on with certainty ; and 
 a native delicacy of feeling, which I should scarcely have 
 looked for in such a quarter, prevented me from being 
 called upon until all more legitimate resources had been 
 tried and failed. Beyond these two houses, however, the 
 fever did not pass ; and the latest cases were of a mild 
 type, easily controlled, and quickly conquered ; but not 
 until these humble services of mine, freely given wherever 
 asked, had brought me very near to the Shiloh heart, and 
 won for me a degree of affectionate respect and considera- 
 tion which often brought tears to my eyes, and gave me a 
 deeper insight into the hidden harmonies of God's govern- 
 ment of the world. There are sweetnesses only to be dis- 
 tilled from bitternesses ! 
 
 I have also made the acquaintance of most of the hills, 
 dales, meadows, woodlands, and other natural objects of 
 interest, to be found on the Divine Farm, or in its near vi- 
 cinity. The various prominences of Chestnut Hill afford 
 many pretty views ; through the most striking of wliich 
 the distant Housatonic goes winding and shining, like a 
 narrow strip of a bluer and more lustrous sky. But I have 
 found no prettier haunt, anywhere, than the brook-lit glen, 
 before described ; and there I have spent many an hour, 
 book or portfolio in hand. For it is a dreamy spot, with- 
 out them ; and, as yet, I do not dare to dream ! 
 
 In many of my rambles by day, and in all of my night- 
 walks to and fro from sick beds, Leo is my silent, watchful, 
 trusty attendant ; giving me a pleasant sense of compan-
 
 156 SHILOH. 
 
 ionship and protection, without any drawback of con- 
 straint. Mr. Divine's flattering introduction did him no 
 more than justice ; his strength, intelligence, and faithful- 
 ness are really wonderful. He is delighted to carry my 
 shawl, book or basket ; he bears with ease many a burden 
 that would be very wearisome to me. He can be sent 
 home the swiftest of messengers ! with an explanatory 
 slip of paper, to fetch any article forgotten or unexpect- 
 edly required. He knows the nearest neighbors, and most 
 intimate friends of the household, by name, and can be dis- 
 patched to any one of them with a note or a parcel. He 
 can be left anywhere, in charge of anything, and the watch 
 and ward will be patiently, conscientiously kept. 
 
 Nor is Leo so unobservant of my moods as might be 
 supposed. Often, when my book slips from my fingers, 
 and my eyes stare into vacancy (or some less profitable 
 quarter !) till they are dim with unfelt moisture, it is Leo 
 that recalls me to myself, with his head laid on my knee, 
 in token of sympathy, or his nose thrust into my hand, by 
 way of remonstrance. And his wistful eyes say, as plainly 
 as any tongue could do, " Would it not be better to drop 
 that, now, and go home ? " 
 
 Not long since, Aunt Vin and I divided a certain night- 
 vigil between us. I took the first watch ; and when it was 
 over, Leo (whom I had retained for that purpose) escorted 
 me home. To my surprise, I found Mrs. Divine quietly 
 reading by the kitchen fire. 
 
 " I generally sit up till midnight and after," she ex- 
 plained. " It's about the only time I get for reading, and 
 I can't live without that. And I thought may be you'd be 
 chilly when you come in, and a little fire wouldn't be 
 amiss." 
 
 Then she looked at Leo. " That dog takes an uncom- 
 mon fancy to you, Miss Frost." 
 
 I. (thoughtfully patting Leo's head). ' Happy ' says an 
 Eastern sage ' happy he that hath a dog for his friend.'
 
 SHILOH. 15T 
 
 MRS. DIVINE. TJmph ! it needn't have taken a sage to 
 say that ! 
 
 I. You did not hear him out. He adds, ' Happier he 
 that hath a dog alone ! ' 
 
 MRS. DIVIXE (contemptuously). A sage ? Nothing but 
 a cynic ! Leo, there, is wiser. He would say if he could 
 speak that he'd rather have you for his friend than half- 
 a-dozen dogs ! 
 
 To which argumentum ad canem neither the Eastern 
 sage nor I had anything to say. 
 
 Pardon this digression if a digression it be ! In coun- 
 try life, animals hold an important place. Dogs, horses, 
 chickens, may fairly be counted members of the social 
 circle. 
 
 On the second Sunday after the one of which I have 
 given such faithful and voluminous account, Ruth Win- 
 not's birdlike voice again charmed my ear, and recalled to 
 my memory the resolve made, at Bona's instigation, a fort- 
 night before ; which, I am ashamed to say, I had suffered 
 to slip from my mind, amid the multiplicity of my interests 
 and occupations. My faithful Mentor did not fail to im- 
 prove the opportunity to administer a reprimand and an 
 admonition. 
 
 " Remember that your talents were not given you," she 
 concluded, " to be buried in a napkin, when you cease to 
 care for them, nor to be exercised merely for your pleas- 
 ure or that of your friends ; their possession involves a fear- 
 ful responsibility. God expects to receive His own again, 
 with usury." 
 
 That very evening, I sought out my hostess. "Mrs. 
 Divine, tell me something about Ruth Winnot, please." 
 
 "Ruth Winnot!" repeated the old lady, wiping her 
 spectacles, preparatory to taking a wondering view of me, 
 " there's nothing to tell, that I know of, only that she's 
 Farmer Winnot's daughter, and lives in that red house, up 
 on the hill, there."
 
 158 . SHILOH. 
 
 "But what makes her look so sad? " 
 
 " Well, I guess it's on account of her feet." 
 
 " Her feet ! " I repeated, in amaze. 
 
 " Yes. Didn't you know she had crooked feet club- 
 feet, some folks call 'em. She was born so." 
 
 " And why were they never straightened ? " 
 
 "Well, her mother couldn't make up her mind to see the 
 child suffer ; some mothers can't or won't do that, you 
 know, even when it's for their children's plain good. If 
 God had felt like that, I wonder where mankind would be 
 now ! And Ruth has grown up so delicate, that the doc- 
 tors don't advise the straightening, at present. But she's 
 awfully sensitive about her feet, poor thing ! She never 
 goes anywhere, hardly, except to church ; and she always 
 takes good care to get there before other folks come, and 
 waits till they are gone, before she leaves." 
 
 " Ah ! yes," said I, " I remember that she remained in 
 the gallery all alone, on the day of Maggie Warren's fu- 
 neral, when Alice and I went down stairs. I wondered at 
 it, then." 
 
 "She always does so. And her mother told me she 
 couldn't bear to have a word said to her about her feet, 
 even by her ; and Alice who is more intimate with her 
 than anybody else says that she never heard her so much 
 as hint at them, in the most distant manner. But I don't 
 think there's any sense in letting her go on in that way. I 
 told her mother it would be real good for her to be made 
 to talk about them (a thing you can't talk about, always 
 seems twice as bad as it is), and that she ought to try and 
 overcome her dislike to going among folks. She's getting 
 into a downright unhealthy, morbid way ; and something 
 ought to be done about it, I think. Come, there's another 
 chance for you to do good, Miss Frost, and you seem to 
 be on the lookout for all such." 
 
 The next morning I despatched the following laconic 
 epistle to Uncle John ; having before my eyes the fear
 
 SHILOH. 159 
 
 of sundry pishes ! and pshaws ! that I had heard him 
 utter over Flora's letters; wherein demands for money, 
 and commissions, were so mixed up with foreign matter 
 that he declared himself unable to get at what was 
 wanted, except by a careful process of sifting and tak- 
 ing notes : 
 
 "Shiloh, June 15, 186 
 
 " Dear Uncle : Please send up my piano, at your con- 
 venience, marked, ' Care of Reuben Divine, Mumford de- 
 pot, &c.' Also, my music-stand, with contents. The 
 roses have not budded yet, but I have planted the 
 
 seeds. 
 
 " Your affectionate niece, 
 
 " WINNIE FROST." 
 To which, in due course of time, I received this answer : 
 
 " New York, Wall St., June 16th, 186 
 " Dear Niece : Piano sent to-day, as per order, freight 
 pd. Enclosed please find check for fifty dollars ($50), on 
 acct. for two full-blown roses, to be delivered as per agree- 
 ment. Glad you can write a sensible letter. 
 " Your affectionate uncle, 
 
 "JOHN FROST." 
 
 I smiled to see that this document had been signed, 
 from force of habit, " John Frost & Co. ; " but the writer 
 had bethought himself in time to draw his pen through the 
 words indicating copartnership, and save me from the dis- 
 mal conviction that the nearest relative I had in the world, 
 had sunken his personal, flesh-and-blood identity in the 
 mere abstraction of a firm. Yet the smile was inextricably 
 entangled with a tear ; to be sure, it did- not need my 
 uncle's prompt compliance with my request, nor his check, 
 to assure me that he loved the child of his dead brother, 
 in the depths of his heart ; but he was so undemonstrative 
 a man, outwardly, that it required an effort of the reason 
 and the will, sometimes, to hold fast to that truth. " Deeds, 
 not words," was the motto of his affections.
 
 160 SHILOH. 
 
 The piano that piano which I never intended to touch 
 again ! was duly installed in the " out-room ; " and I inau- 
 gurated its mission (for it has one !) by playing a polka or 
 two for " the boys " a term which Mr. Divine seems to 
 apply indiscriminately to his grown-up sons and his hired 
 men, a nocturne for Alice, and two or three sweet old 
 Scotch melodies for the elder members of the household. I 
 dared not yet trust myself to sing, that was too full of 
 stinging memories ! 
 
 Then, I set out to find Ruth Winnot.
 
 XVI. 
 
 RUTH WINNOT. 
 
 (emphatically). You know you cannot 
 expect to get much, without giving some- 
 thing. 
 
 I winced. Confidence was the one thing I 
 was unprepared to give. 
 
 MALA (chiming in with my mood). You 
 know the giving will be like pressing on a 
 raw sore ; and the getting will not heal it. 
 BOXA. No, only help to heal it. As whole acres of Per- 
 sian roses are required to make a single ounce of pure ottar ; 
 so the soul's balm is the slow product of a long course of 
 right living and thinking, every separate act and thought 
 of which contributes its own minute but precious particle 
 of sweetness to the rich result. 
 
 MALA. But, after all, how hard it is to have to take up 
 with hurt and healing, instead of happiness ! 
 
 BONA. How hard it is for the roses to be plucked and 
 pressed, and to have their sweetness concentrated and pre- 
 served, instead of perishing utterly from the earth by the 
 natural process of decay ! 
 
 MALA. Nonsense ! I am talking of a living, beating, 
 human heart. Of course, the roses are inanimate things, 
 and feel nothing. 
 
 BONA. If they did feel, might they not reasonably pre- 
 fer the short pain of the process that makes them imperish- 
 ably useful and delightful, to a few more hours of idle
 
 162 SHILOH. 
 
 bloom in the sunshine, and then to die unredeemably ? 
 And like the ottar of roses, the sweetest Christian graces 
 are the product of painful processes ; but they are ever- 
 lastingly lovely and fragrant, continuing to sweeten and 
 beautify the earth, by their memory and their influence, 
 long after their owner has entered into the "better country." 
 As" for happiness, it seldom comes otherwise than incident- 
 ally ; it is as frequently found sitting by the wayside, in 
 the paths through which Sorrow leads us, as elsewhere ; and 
 re oftenest entertain it, as Lot did the angels, unawares. 
 
 This, and much more, did my companions say to me, as 
 I toiled up the steep slope of Chestnut Hill. The twilight 
 was creeping stealthily along the edge of the forest, and 
 gathering under the trees ; but the sky was still tender 
 with the glory of sunset, and the earth had a look of veiled 
 splendor. So far as my impressions go, these Shiloh sum- 
 mer-days have neither beginning nor end. I wake at an 
 early hour, to find the sun shining brightly into my 
 room unhindered by any barricades of brick walls, which 
 must needs be surmounted before he can look at me. I live 
 through some smooth-gliding, unreckoned hours, softly 
 colored by a gentle lapse of quiet incident, and I frequently 
 go to bed while there is yet enough of daylight to show me 
 the way thither. When I get a letter from Flora, full of 
 Sai-atoga excitement and midnight gayeties, I rub my eyes, 
 and vaguely wonder if I am asleep, or if I died three weeks 
 ago, and was transported to a new planet, and new condi- 
 tions of existence ! 
 
 The red homestead of the Winnots, ringed round with 
 bossy maples, is another of those quaint, ample, sloping- 
 roofed structures ; through whose shadowy vista one gets 
 a glimpse of colonial times, or of the thunder-clouded days 
 that preceded the Revolution. It was a gorgeous bit of 
 color, to-night ; with the western splendor in its windows ; 
 the rose-bushes heavy with bloom clinging to its sides ; 
 and the smoke from its huge stone chimney aerialized into
 
 SHILOH 163 
 
 delicate, rose-tinged haze, as it floated upward to the sky. 
 There were flower-beds in the front yard, too ; bright with 
 a goodly show of pinks, button-roses, sweet peas, marigolds 
 and other old-fashioned flowers, the legacy of our English 
 forefathers, and bearing touching witness to the fact that 
 those stern-browed Puritans (whose portraits time and cir- 
 cumstance seem to delight in making grimmer and harder, 
 day by day), had, at least, one soft trait in their characters; 
 inasmuch as they could not tear their heart-roots from their 
 native soil, without bringing along with them some com- 
 vpanion-growths, to give a familiar, home grace to the new 
 land. And this, too, notwithstanding it was, to them, the 
 land of promise ! 
 
 Over one of these beds Ruth Winnot was stooping, with 
 some sort of garden implement hi her hand. The creaking 
 of the gate, as I swung it open, was plainly a startling and 
 unwelcome sound. She threw one scared glance at me, and 
 another at the house, as if to certify herself that escape was 
 impossible ; then, she rose to her feet, and awaited my ap- 
 proach, while the color came and went in her cheeks, like 
 the flashes of a northern aurora. For one moment, the 
 sight made me hesitate in the line of conduct I had marked 
 out for myself. 
 
 MALA. Go on. What can it possibly matter to you 
 whether you succeed or fail ? 
 
 BONA. Go on. By God's grace, you shall succeed and 
 not fail. 
 
 Without stopping to consider why it is that, on certain 
 occasions, both the good and the evil in me unite in push- 
 ing me forward, or holding me back, though I was struck 
 by the fact, I went to Ruth, and said, taking her hand, 
 
 " You did not expect to see me here this evening ; but 
 I hope you will make me very welcome, nevertheless. The 
 truth is, I fell in love with your brown eyes, two Sundays 
 ago ; and I have been wishing to get another look at them, 
 ever since, just to satisfy myself that they really are as
 
 1 64 SHILOH. 
 
 lovely as they seemed to me then. Turn to the light, 
 please, here, this way, and let me see them again. Ah, 
 yes there was no illusion about it ; they are, in truth, 
 just such as some of the old masters always gave to the 
 Virgin. And your hair is exactly the color that befits the 
 eyes. If I were an artist, I should ask you to sit to me." 
 
 She looked at me with a changeful blending of surprise, 
 delight and doubt, in her face ; precisely what I expected 
 to see. I had understood, from Mrs. Divine's statement, 
 that her painful consciousness of deformity, unwisely in- 
 dulged and fostered, had made her forget, or undervalue, * 
 whatever compensating grace or talent had been vouch- 
 safed to her ; and I reasoned that she needed just that kind 
 and degree of encouragement which would spring from 
 the knowledge that she was, otherwise, rarely beautiful, 
 and could, in spite of her defect, charni the eye, and at- 
 tract the regard of a stranger. There was no danger of 
 making her vain ; the recollection of her deformity would 
 counteract that tendency ; but it was really necessary that 
 she should be taught rightly to estimate the advantages 
 she possessed, and made acquainted with her own power 
 of pleasing ; in order to enable her to face her kind with 
 some degree of confidence. There was plenty of common 
 ground left, I thought, somewhat morosely, for her to 
 stand upon with them ! For surely, each one of us is an- 
 swerable, in his measure, for the perpetuation of that sin 
 which brought disease and deformity into the world ; and 
 wofully superficial is the pride of such as fancy that they 
 have the right to look superciliously down upon these its 
 unfortunate progeny. Till this entire human nature be 
 straightened, each and all of us must be, in some wise, 
 crooked. And the outward deformity is far less deplorable 
 than the inward. / The vital point to us all is, to learn our- 
 selves, and to teach others, ho'w to convert these grievous 
 burdens, heavy to bear! these multiplying hindrances, 
 weary to surmount ! into crosses, borne cheerfully for
 
 SHILOH. 165 
 
 Christ's sake, steps by which we daily climb nearer to 
 Him! 
 
 Ruth's eyes fell, tinder my intent gaze ; while astonish- 
 ment and pleasure seemed actually to have taken her breath 
 away. She tried to find some words of answer ; but her 
 voice failed her, and only a few incoherent syllables escaped 
 her lips. 
 
 " So nobody ever told you that you were beautiful be- 
 fore ! " I said, smiling. " Well, I should not, if I thought 
 it would do you any harm." 
 
 " It has done me good," she faltered, " you don't know 
 how much good ! " And she burst into a sudden passion 
 of tears. When she lifted her head, there was a return of 
 doubt in her face. " Are you*only trying to flatter me ?" 
 she asked, with a searching look. 
 
 " I am no flatterer, Ruth," I responded, gravely. " In 
 good truth, I was irresistibly attracted by your face, when 
 I first saw you ; and I am really desirous of knowing you 
 better. Indeed, I came here this evening, with Jhe inten- 
 tion if I found encouragement enough of asking you if 
 we might not be friends." 
 
 " I suppose so if you are in earnest," replied she, evi- 
 dently confounded by the request. " But it is so strange ! " 
 she went on, with a kind of slow wonder, " nobody ever 
 seemed to care for my friendship before but Alice. And 
 you a city lady who know so much and must have 
 troops of friends I can't understand it ! " 
 
 " It is not necessary that you should," I responded, 
 quietly. " The best and closest friends understand each 
 other none too well ; and there must be a large element of 
 faith in any friendship worth talking about. It is as vital 
 a necessity as it is in religion. All you have to do is just 
 to look into my eyes, and make up your mind whether you 
 can trust me, or no." 
 
 She gave me a shy, yet sufficiently penetrating, glance, 
 and then mutely offered me a kiss by way of answer.
 
 166 SHILOH. 
 
 " It is a compact, then," said I, accepting the gage <Tam- 
 iti& ; " and I promise to be faithful to you, Ruth, and 
 helpful, so far as in me lies. That is about all I can prom- 
 ise ; for I have perversities of temper and worries of heart 
 which will sometimes make me preoccupied and unrespon- 
 sive. But be sure, when you see my face clouded, that the 
 shadow comes from things with which you have nothing to 
 do, and which you need not trouble your innocent heart 
 about." 
 
 " I understand that well enough," she replied, with a 
 wise little shake of the head, and a smile that was bur- 
 dened somewhat with sadness. " I know I am not like- 
 ly to do anything to give you either much pain or pleas- 
 ure ; and I don't expect to be taken very far into your 
 confidence. I shall be just like a little pet dog to you ; 
 glad to be noticed, patient when I am turned off; and all 
 the tune trying vainly to understand what is in your 
 mind." 
 
 I was compelled to recognize a degree of appositeness 
 in this simile, even while it pained my ear. There was 
 something in Ruth's soft brown eyes, curiously like the 
 dumb, beseeching, pathetic expression of an intelligent 
 dog's face, the look of an undeveloped, yearning, strug- 
 gling genius, dimly conscious of things above and beyond 
 it ; to which it was meant to aspire, yet without in the least 
 knowing how. It went to my heart, when I first saw it ; 
 and I now resolved that, God helping me, before Ruth and 
 I had done with each other, that look should have departed 
 from her face. 
 
 " I will not offer any counter prediction," I rejoined, 
 " though my oracles of futurity read very differently from 
 that, Ruth. Humility is so good and safe a thing that you 
 may keep it while you can." I turned to the flower-bed 
 for a change of subject. " So you love flowers ? As well 
 as music ? " 
 
 "Nearly, not quite. ^Let me give you some." And
 
 SHILOH. 167 
 
 she quickly made me a bouquet from the plants nearest 
 her. 
 
 All this time, we had been standing in the yard, and 
 Ruth had not moved more than a step or two from the spot 
 where I first encountered her. Now, she cast a troubled 
 glance at the open door, and a shadow crossed her face. 
 Plainly, she saw the necessity of asking me to enter the 
 house; as plainly, she disliked to move in my presence. 
 But in this matter, I had determined to show no mercy. I 
 drew my shawl closer around my shoulders, and remarked 
 that the evening air was " really quite chilly." 
 
 " Will you come in ? " she returned, with a heightened 
 color, and a visible effort at cordiality. * 
 
 " Thank you," replied I, turning with her, and putting 
 my arm around her waist. She walked better than I had 
 expected. There was no limp, only a kind of awkwardness, 
 in her gait ; and she wore her dress so long as entirely to 
 conceal her feet. I was inwardly indignant that any mis- 
 taken tenderness should have allowed her to become so 
 sore over so inconsiderable an infirmity, and to put it like a 
 barrier between herself and her kind. 
 
 " Ruth," I asked, abruptly, but in the most matter-of- 
 fact way, " how far can you walk ? " 
 
 She started and tried to shrink away from me, as a 
 mimosa might have done ; but I held her fast, and waited 
 for my answer in the most uncomprehending manner. 
 
 " I don't know I never walk much," hesitatingly. 
 
 " So I should judge from your pale face " (repressing a 
 smile to see how very far from a " pale face " it was, at this 
 moment). " You look altogether too much like a shade- 
 grown plant; exercise would be good for you. Were you 
 ever in that glen, down yonder?" 
 
 " Yes, once or twice. It is a pretty place." 
 
 " It is a pretty place, and there is a lovely view from 
 the hill beyond. I want you to go and look at it with me, 
 sometime."
 
 168 SHILOH. 
 
 She looked distressed. 
 
 " Cannot you go ? " I continued, mercilessly. " Or does 
 it give you pain to walk ? " 
 
 She winced again, and her sweet lip quivered touchingly. 
 But she made an attempt a very tremulous and unsuccess- 
 ful one to adopt my own tone in the matter, since there 
 was no escape for her. 
 
 " No, it does not give me pain," she answered, in a con- 
 strained voice. " I could walk as far as most people, I 
 think, if I were accustomed to it." 
 
 " Then I shall make it my business to see that you are 
 accustomed to it," said I, very decidedly. " Sometimes, I 
 want a companion in my walks, not always. I know what 
 wretchedly bad taste it is, but there are times when I prefer 
 my own society to the best that can be had. The truth 
 being that I am so constituted that I actually need frequent 
 seasons of retirement ; for self-communion and self-renewal. 
 Without them, I seem to lose all that is best in my own in- 
 dividuality : breathing constantly the atmosphere of other 
 people's thoughts destroys whatever is fresh, vigorous, or 
 characteristic, in my own. But when I do want a compan- 
 ion, I shall come for you. And I am certain you will not 
 deny me ; for I intend always to begin or end by taking 
 you into Mrs. Divine's, and playing you something sweet 
 on my piano." 
 
 Her eyes brightened. " You have a piano ! " she ex- 
 claimed, breathlessly, " and at Mrs. Divine's ? " 
 
 " Precisely. And I expect to have the pleasure of play- 
 ing your accompaniments on it. I was as much charmed 
 with your voice, on the morning of that eventful Sunday, 
 as I was with your eyes, in the afternoon. Each was per- 
 fect, in its way." 
 
 She looked at me dubiously. " I thought .J. could sing," 
 she answered, with a shade of irrepressible sadness in her 
 voice, " before I heard you ; now I know better. And I'm
 
 SHILOH. 169 
 
 sure you can't take any pleasure in hearing me, I suppose 
 you have heard all the first singers of the world." 
 
 I selected silently a rose-bud or two frofn the bouquet she 
 had given me, and held the rest of the flowers toward her. 
 She extended her hand for them mechanically, looking into 
 my face with a puzzled and inquiring glance. 
 
 " I do not see why I need care for those common flowers, 
 while I have the rosebuds," I said, carelessly. " And I ad- 
 vise you, when you next visit your flower-bed, to dig them 
 all xip. To be sure, they are very sweet and pretty, in their 
 way, but they are not quite like roses, you know." 
 
 For some moments, she seemed to be groping blindly 
 about for my meaning ; then a quaint little smile evinced 
 her comprehension. But it soon faded into gravity : ob- 
 viously, she was struggling bravely with herself. At last, 
 she lifted a very shy, but still resolved, glance to mine. 
 
 " I see it is foolish for me to feel so about it, but I am 
 very much afraid to sing before you, for all that. Still I 
 will try to overcome it, now that I know I ought. I sup- 
 pose I must make up my mind to be a sweet-pea, as I can't 
 be a rose ; or, rather, to sing like a wren, since I was not 
 made a nightingale." 
 
 " My dear Ruth," I answered, speaking after Bona's dic- 
 tation, "I suspect that the difference in value between a 
 sweet pea and a rose, or a wren and a nightingale, does not 
 amount to a farthing, in immortal currency. The question 
 in Heaven is not which of these it is that makes a little per- 
 fumed space, or a tone-embalmed atmosphere, around it ; 
 but whether each gives forth freely and cheerfully the 
 best that it has. And there is another comfort. For, 
 though a sweet-pea was never known to grow into a rose, 
 nor a wren into a nightingale, through any amount of effort 
 or of patience, there is no telling what such a voice as 
 yours may not become, with the needful training." 
 
 " Where am I to get it ? " she answered, mournfully.
 
 A HISTORY. 
 
 v ^55fei .j 
 
 ~\ HE opportunity for which I had been preparing 
 
 so assiduously, and which I had expected 
 to ripen only by slow and unnoticed de- 
 grees, being thus unexpectedly put into my 
 hands, I scarcely knew what to do with it. 
 
 The pride of the, independent farmer's daugh- 
 ter was sure to rebel, I thought, against any 
 appearance of patronage, any intrusive offer of 
 service. While I hesitated, Bona came to my relief. 
 
 " You know I told you at the outset," said she, " that 
 you cannoc expect to gain much without risking some- 
 thing. The. rule holds good in confidence, as in every- 
 thing else." 
 
 Instead of answering Ruth's question, therefore to 
 which, in truth, she did not seem to expect an answer I 
 made a blind, desperate plunge into my personal history. 
 I did not stop to settle beforehand how far into its depths 
 I should venture let circumstances decide that for me ! 
 neither did I count the cost of the undertaking, though a 
 
 O ' O 
 
 vague apprehension of its probable sum total made me 
 shiver, and gave a hollow, forced tone to my voice. 
 
 " Since we are to be friends, Ruth," I began, " it is 
 right that you should know a little more of me. My father 
 was a scholar, and somewhat of an antiquarian and a vir- 
 tuoso beside, with his eyes always between the two covers
 
 SHILOII. 171 
 
 of a book, or on the point of a pen for he eked out a some- 
 what scanty income by various kinds of literary labor. It 
 was the great disappointment of his life, I. think, that his 
 only child should have been a girl ; nevertheless, when my 
 mother died, and left me a year old -babe upon his 
 hands, he immediately became the most patient and ten- 
 der of nurses and teachers. He made himself what poor 
 amends he could, however, for my mistake in sex for such 
 he evidently considered it by giving me precisely the ed- 
 ucation that he would have given his son, if he had been 
 so happy as to have had one. He instructed me in the 
 dead languages while I was yet in pinafores, and filled my 
 young brains Avith all sorts of antiquarian lumber, which 
 is of scarcely more practical use, in this headlong, irrever- 
 ent nineteenth century, than an ancient battering-ram 
 would be in a modern siege. He took good care, however, 
 to supplement this curious primary course with some very 
 thorough training in the modern languages and in music ; 
 which latter study I completed in Italy, where the last 
 years of his life were spent, and where he died. 
 
 " ' Pulvis et umbra sumus omnes,filia carissima meaj he 
 used to say to me, in his quaint, discursive fashion ; " and 
 in my case, the dust is fast disintegrating, and the shadow 
 deepening. And inasmxich as the major part of my in- 
 come dies with me, I shall leave yoii but little, beside my 
 name, which you will get rid of as soon as possible (that 
 is what it is to have a daughter!), my memory, which I 
 "hope you will cherish a little longer, and my faith, being 
 that of the one Catholic and Apostolic Church, which I 
 trust you will hold fast through life unto death. This last 
 portion of your patrimony I conceive to be of such value, 
 that it consoles me much for the smallness of the remainder. 
 Nevertheless, it is not that sort of property which can be 
 appraised and inventoried, and bought and sold, in the 
 market ; neither is it to be counted, humanly speaking, a 
 bread-producing possession. And though it is in nowise
 
 172 SHILOH. 
 
 to be doubted that your Uncle John will care for you as 
 if you were his own, after my death, since he hath been 
 the best of brothers to me, in my life, yet the vicissitudes 
 of this world are many, and the ups and downs of Ameri- 
 can society patent to all ; and there can be no certainty 
 that it may not, sometime, be needful or expedient for you 
 to earn your own bread. Moreover, it is ever the part of 
 true wisdom to provide for the worst, while expecting the 
 best. Therefore, having first given you a solid foundation 
 of that knowledge which best disciplines the mind and 
 strengthens the memory, while it refines the taste and de- 
 lights the heart ; I have thought it well to add thereto a 
 superstructure of the languages of Modern Europe (soft, 
 effeminate offspring of vigorous and sinewy sires), and of 
 music (which I see you love better to study as a science 
 than to practice as an art, whereof your music-master doth 
 somewhat complain) ; and between them all, I hope to have 
 made you independent of any mischances of fortune sap- 
 iens dominabitur astris. If the Woman's Rights move- 
 ment which, from lack of time, and intei'est, I have not 
 given the strict analysis and consideration it demands 
 ever brings forth better fruit than much darkening of coun- 
 sel with words ; I believe you might fill the Professorship 
 of Ancient Languages and Literature, in a female college, 
 with credit to the institution. In any case, I trust you can 
 teach your sex to be something better than dolls at home, 
 and butterflies abroad. But he or she who setteth up to 
 be a teacher of others, carissima mea, must needs be thor- 
 oughly furnished to that end himself. Therefore, to 
 which point all this discourse tendeth, take heed that 
 your next translation into the German hath somewhat 
 more of the Teutonic, and somewhat less of the Latin, fla- 
 vor in it ; and be not guilty of the heinous sin of further 
 vitiating a scion of one of the best and strongest of the 
 ancient stocks. 
 
 " And now, go and practice your scales as if your din-
 
 SIIILOII. 173 
 
 ner depended on their smooth and flowing execution ; 
 there is no telling if the supposition may not, some time, 
 in some sense, become a certainty. Which, though it be a 
 mournful enough prospect for an earthly father to contem- 
 plate, anima mea, is not the less likely to be the purest 
 manifestation of your Heavenly Father's tenderness ! " 
 
 How clearly the attempt to sketch my father for an- 
 other, brought him before my own mental vision ! with his 
 tall, bent figure, his fine, keen, intellectual face, his gentle 
 manners, his quaint, rambling, bookish talk; a man at 
 once wise and simple ; learned and reverent ; studious and 
 genial. All my old life defiled before me, in a series of 
 sharp, vivid pictures, as I talked. I saw again a large, low, 
 shadowy room, which was the scene of my earliest recollec- 
 tions ; in the midst, a table covered with faded green, 
 whereat my father studied and wrote, the walls lined 
 with books, the drawers and cabinets stuffed full of coins, 
 medals, ores, gems, drinking cups, missals, and a variety of 
 obsolete treasures, with an interminable pedigree, the 
 table, chairs, and floor heaped with manuscripts, draw- 
 ings, encyclopedias, and all sorts of learned litter. I saw 
 myself a somewhat grave and thoughtful child, with the 
 shadow of motherlessness over me creeping and rummag- 
 ing among this literary lumber almost at my will ; never 
 rebuked except for deliberate mischief; and often falling 
 asleep with my head pillowed on some rare old blackletter 
 folio or quarto, the Chronicles of Cooper and Froissart, 
 Caxton's " Pylgrimage of the Sowle," Breton's " Pleasant 
 Toyes for an Idle Head," or it might be a three-century- 
 old Plautus, profusely adorned with wood-cuts, or a tall, thin 
 Somnium Scipionis, the marvels and monstrosities of 
 whose illustrations and illuminations reappeared in my 
 dveams; I saw myself in my father's arms repeating after 
 him, in the twilight, texts from the Greek Testament and 
 verses of sonorous Latin Hymns, while I was yet too young 
 to learn them from the book ; and I had already become
 
 1T4 SHILOH. 
 
 as familiar with all terms of endearment, in both languages, 
 as any daughter of Pericles or of Virginius might have 1 
 been ; and in precisely the same way by hearing them 
 constantly from my father's lips. 
 
 I saw myself foraging in the book-shelves, a little later on, 
 for such mental food as best suited my youthful appetite ; and 
 seldom going much amiss, though occasionally victimized 
 by cunning title pages ; for my astonishment at finding 
 that the Diversions of Purley were anything but diverting, 
 and that the Apes ITrbance did not treat of bees, could 
 only have been equalled by that of the North of England 
 farmer, who bought Ruskin's disquisition " On the Con- 
 struction of Sheep-folds," with an eye to the necessities of 
 his own flocks, and found that it had nothing to say of any 
 inclosures but such as are for the behoof of Popery and 
 Protestantism ! Then, I saw myself sitting reverently at the 
 feet of the mighty masters of Ancient Philosophy and Song, 
 all difficulties and obscurations being swept aside, and all 
 beauties brought into strong light by my father's ever pre- 
 sent help ; while the evening hours ran golden and sweet 
 to the melodies of Milton, Dante, and Schiller, or the har- 
 monies of Mozai't and Mendelssohn and Beethoven; their 
 last moments being ever consecrated by a chapter read 
 from the Book of Books and a joint repetition of the 
 Prayer of Prayers. What a safe, peaceful, happy life it 
 was ! I never knew how happy until I had left it far 
 behhid. 
 
 The "scene then changed. Leaning upon my father's 
 arm, I drank in the sun of Italy, and felt her " marvelous 
 wind." Day after day, I threaded the narrow streets, 
 roamed through the vast art-galleries, knelt in the time 
 enriched churches, gazed, wondering, up into the soaring 
 Dome, stood, tear-blinded by the cross in the Coliseum, 
 went down into the tombs, and climbed the hills, of 
 ROME ! 
 
 Somehow, almost imperceptibly, amid these mingled
 
 SHILOH. 175 
 
 wrecks and triumphs of the ages, my father and I had 
 changed places. From the supported I had grown to be 
 the supporter; he now leaned upon my arm. Then, the 
 walks became shorter, the visits to studio and gallery less 
 frequent, the lessons and readings irregular : one day, the 
 voice that had led me, step by step, through all that is best 
 in life or books, faltered and fell, over the familiar page. 
 " Draw the curtain, figliuola mia" it murmured, feebly, 
 " and let in more light." 
 
 I saw myself, in that light, under the foreign sky 
 among strangers alone! Between my father and me, 
 God's hand had let fall a thick, impenetrable curtain. On 
 his side, the full light of eternity on mine, the darkness of 
 desolation and the shadow of death ! 
 
 I did not know that there were tears on my cheeks 
 tears due to this gliding inner panorama, and not to the 
 words I had spoken until Ruth lifted her hand timidly, 
 to wipe them away. Then I went on. 
 
 " While my father talked thus, my heart used to thrill 
 and glow with the pride of independence, and I was men- 
 tally resolved that, whenever it should please God to write 
 me down ' orphanecl,' I would be indebted to no hand, nor 
 brains, but my own for my daily bread. So I studied, con 
 amore the love of books having grown and strengthened 
 in me by as natural a life-process as that which gives 
 breadth to the leaf and fulness to the ilower. And I prac- 
 tised, with a purpose, for I was made a musician, not born 
 one, as you are, Ruth, all my acquirements, in that line, 
 are the result of patient labor and skilful training. But 
 when, on my arrival in America, I saw the pain in my 
 Uncle John's face, as I began to talk of my plans for sup- 
 porting myself a face more like my father's than anything 
 I had expected to see this side Heaven ! I gave them 
 all up, almost without a word or a struggle : that look and 
 that likeness made a moral coward of me. To be sure, I 
 comforted myself with the belief that they were only held
 
 1TG SHILOII. 
 
 in abeyance, for a time ; but that was four years ago, Ruth, 
 and I seem now to be no nearer to their realization, than 
 then. My home is made homelike enough to give me no 
 good excuse for leaving it ; though it must inevitably lack 
 that -nameless property which chiefly constitutes a home, 
 and which was never missing from even the most tempo- 
 rary abode where my father and I sojourned together. 
 However, I have assiduously kept up the practice of music ; 
 partly out of regard for my father's memory, and partly, to 
 please my aunt and cousin till lately. When I came to 
 Shiloh, I thought I had done with it forever." 
 
 Ruth opened her mouth to give utterance to an expres- 
 sion of wonder; but none coming to hand sufficiently 
 strong for the occasion, she shut it again, and only 
 looked at me as if she thought I had taken leave of my 
 senses. 
 
 " Yes," I went on, slowly, " for all my music had be- 
 come so inwrought with the memory of one who who is 
 evermore dead to me, though he is y v et alive that it was 
 only a source of pain, an instrument of torture. To es- 
 cape from it, and similar associations, I came to Shiloh." 
 
 Heaven only knows what an effort these few words cost 
 me. Each one seemed to be di-agged up from the depths 
 of my heart, slowly and with difficulty, as dead bodies are 
 drawn from the waves. And Ruth Winnot's eyes looked 
 as if she were assisting at such a dismal operation. There 
 was in them both pity and dread, the pity and the dread 
 of one who, for the first time, is brought face to face with 
 a calamity, hitherto known only by description. Yet, even 
 amid my pain, I had an intuitive perception that my confi- 
 dence had conquered her; from henceforth I might do with 
 her almost what I Avould. I saw, too in a limited, out- 
 line way, yet clearly, so far as my discernment went that 
 through pain we acquire power for good ; power to discern 
 deeply, to influence strongly, to help wisely. Those joy- 
 blossoms, without whose fragrance and bloom my life had
 
 SHILOH. ' 177 
 
 seemed destined to be all an emptiness, had, in their fall- 
 ing, left some fecund germs behind, which were already 
 developing into fruit that might be more soul-satisfying 
 than any blossoms. I began to discover that there was no 
 earthly loss which, even on earth, might not be made, by 
 God's grace, to bring forth some richly compensating 
 gain. 
 
 " I am so sorry ! " faltered Ruth, after a few moments 
 of pregnant silence, wiping the dew from her eyes, " it- 
 must have been so hard for you to sing on that Sunday ! " 
 
 " It was only hard at the outset," I answered. " As in 
 most other duties which we are constrained by the Holy 
 Spirit to undertake, against our own inclinations, the pain 
 and the struggle were over as soon as I had fairly set my- 
 self about the work. That gentle force which, while we 
 resist it, seems like an unfriendly power, tearing us away 
 from things easy and pleasant, and thrusting us upon 
 things difficult and thorny ; becomes, the instant we yield 
 to it, a friendly arm to lean upon, a faithful, helpful guide 
 unto purer enjoyments than any we leave behind. I am 
 thankful that I was made to sing on that Sunday. In good 
 truth, the occasion and the circumstances of that singing 
 were so different from anything that ever came in my way 
 before, that there was really no good excuse for old as- 
 sociations to thrust themselves into the matter. And the 
 event wrought in me an entire change of purpose." 
 
 She looked at me inquiringly. 
 
 " It would take too much time and too many words to 
 tell you how it all came about. But Shiloh or my expe- 
 riences therein had already taught me that no life need be 
 utterly forlorn while it is still capable of being helpful, no 
 more than one which is still capable of being helped ; these 
 two truths, Ruth, have roots that strike down deep into every 
 heart, and penetrate all the foundations of society. It was 
 reserved for that Sunday to show me that I had no right 
 to bury in a napkin, or suifer to rust through disuse, any
 
 178 SIIILOII. 
 
 talent which might sometime be available for the service of 
 God and the help of man. With which last conviction, 
 Ruth, you had somewhat to do." 
 
 " I ! " There was a world of astonishment and ques- 
 tioning in the tone. 
 
 " Do you remember telling me that you should ' never 
 sing again ? ' Well, immediately there rose before me a 
 vision. I saw a meek, rapt, Madonna face, making a kind 
 of glory in some shadowy church-choir ; and I heard a 
 pure, clear, soaring voice, leading the song of praise in 
 such wise as to make it seem that the heavens were opened, 
 and the strains of angelic choirs pealing down to earth. 
 Could it have been your face, and your voice, Ruth ? " 
 
 She sat looking at me, with eyes dilated and lips apart, 
 breathless, trembling, eager, doubtful. 
 
 " I do not know," I went on, "whether I shall ever see 
 my ideal songstress, in the flesh ; but, Ruth, when God 
 sends us such visions, He means iis to take the first step 
 be it never so short and, seemingly, ineffectual a one to- 
 ward bi-inging about their realization ; the second step will 
 immediately become clearer. In this instance, the first 
 step was to send for my piano. And the second well, 
 the question you asked me so long ago, and which I did 
 not then answer made the second easier to me." 
 
 There was the beginning of a look of comprehension in 
 her face. 
 
 "I have sometimes wondered of late," I proceeded, 
 " why it was that so much musical culture had been wasted 
 upon me, since I am not to win my bread 'by its aid ; and 
 inasmuch as I have no innate, spontaneous love for the 
 practice of music, (which is, be it understood, a different 
 thing from loving music itself). But if I am to be instru- 
 mental in training up one singer to sing worthily unto God, 
 in God's house, the problem is solved. And the end is 
 worth all the long preparation." 
 
 Was it worth all? Humbly, not captiously, I asked
 
 SHILOH. 1Y9 
 
 that question in the silence of my own soul. There was 
 no response, only an echo, and still a question " All ? " 
 
 Then I took both her hands in mine. "Dear Ruth," 
 I said, softly, " shall we help one another ? Will you be 
 my pupil in music, and let me be your pupil in whatsoever 
 God means me to learn through you ? " 
 
 She bowed her head on my lap, and her long-drawn, 
 choking sobs, with each one of which some weight, 
 some doubt, some anxiety, seemed to be lifted from her 
 heart, shook the silence. When she raised her head, 
 her face was radiant. Her first words came brokenly, 
 nevertheless. 
 
 " It seems like a miracle, it is so sudden and so beau- 
 tiful ! And it makes everything so plain ! I used to have 
 such blind longings such dumb pains such miserable fits 
 of depression such wonderings why I was born. I see 
 now that I was just like a poor, little seed buried too far 
 underground ; it wants to swell, to sprout, to grow. But 
 it cannot lift or pierce the heavy mass of earth that holds 
 it down. All its struggles only make it feel more uncom- 
 fortable under the constraint. By and by, some kind pass- 
 er-by, seeing the earth stirred slightly by its vain attempts 
 to put forth what is in it, lifts off some of the crushing 
 weight, and lets in the sun's warmth and the dew's fresh- 
 ness. And it sprouts, and blossoms, and bears fruit, and 
 is happy. That is what you have done for me, Miss 
 Frost ! " 
 
 Before I left her, the hours of lessons, study, and prac- 
 tice were all settled upon, to begin on the morrow. 
 
 When I reached home, I went directly to Mrs. Divine, 
 whom I found in her usual corner of the kitchen hearth, 
 with a pile of just mended stockings in her lap, and a book 
 in her hand. 
 
 She looked up as I entered ; and I plunged into busi- 
 ness, at once. 
 
 " Mrs. Divine, I have just made an arrangement with
 
 180 SHILOH. 
 
 Ruth Winnot, that waits your approbation ere it can go 
 into effect. I should have consulted you beforehand, if I 
 had supposed it could be brought about so soon. She 
 is to come here twice a week for music lessous, and twice 
 every day for practice on my piano. Have you any ob- 
 jections ? " 
 
 She laid down her book, and took off her spectacles 
 very deliberately, before she answered. Her first words 
 were certainly irrelevant. 
 
 " Miss Frost, do you think you'd burn if you was put 
 into the fire ? or drown, if you was thrown into the 
 water?" 
 
 " So you take me for a witch ? " I responded. " Thank 
 You." 
 
 " Umph ! you had better thank the Lord that Cotton 
 Mather died before you was born ! " 
 
 " But about these lessons, Mrs. Divine ? " 
 
 " Solomon said there was nothing new under the sun, 
 arid may be there ain't ; the sun covers a good deal of 
 ground. But to see Ruth Winnot coming here twice a 
 day or, indeed, showing herself anywhere in broad day- 
 light will be something new in Shiloh, at least ! Step up 
 to the light, here, and let me see your shadow that is, if 
 you've got any! There are two kinds of witches; some 
 cast no shadow, and some cast two. The double-dealers 
 are the worst, I reckon," with a humorous twinkle in her 
 eye. 
 
 " I am afraid," said I, tacitly declining to touch the sub- 
 ject of the shadows, " that such constant use will disturb 
 the strict order of your parlor a little, would it not be 
 better to transfer the piano to my room ? " 
 
 " The out-room was made for use," she returned, senten- 
 tiously. " If it wasn't, what was it made for ? " 
 
 "But Mrs. Prescott likes to keep it so immaculately 
 neat ; I am afraid she will be put to a great deal of 
 trouble."
 
 SUILOH. 181 
 
 
 
 " Of course, Priscilla will follow you round with a 
 broom and a dust-pan," she rejoined, taking snuff com- 
 posedly ; " but that pleases her, and needn't displease you. 
 There's room enough in the world for most people's crotch- 
 ets, if you only think so. But it won't hurt Ruth to give 
 her a hint not to leave things lying around and askew ; 
 there's nothing lost by tidiness, if it isn't overdone. And 
 I'm real glad you've got that poor girl to think she can 
 come out of her shell, though I can't make out how you've 
 done it." 
 
 " It is not I, Mrs. Divine. She loves music, and that 
 draws her." 
 
 " As the bucket draws the water ! But if there wasn't 
 a pole and hand in league with the bucket, it wouldn't do 
 much toward quenching anybody's thirst, I reckon. You 
 are behind the music, and the Lord is behind you. You 
 are doing His work, Miss Frost ; and I hope you'll find 
 the wages sweet sweet enough to take that look out of 
 your face ! " 
 
 The conversation was taking a direction that I did not 
 care to follow. I was glad, therefore, to hear Alice Pres- 
 cott's step in the door. 
 
 " "Well, Alice," said Mrs. Divine, " here's news for you ! 
 Miss Frost is going to give Ruth Winnot music-lessons, 
 and she's coming here every day after 'em. What do you 
 think of that ? " 
 
 The answer did not come readily ; and the first look of 
 surprise soon faded into a hurt and sorrowful expression, 
 which puzzled me. I could not see what Ruth Winnot's 
 music-lessons had to do with it ; yet it shadowed my satis- 
 faction for the moment, and haunted me until I slept.
 
 XVIII. 
 
 THE MUSIC LESSOR. 
 
 RAY and sullen was the morning, with 
 occasional spurts of rain. An easterly 
 storm was setting toward Shiloh, and all 
 the tongues in the trees gave forth melancholy 
 notes of warning. Nevertheless, Ruth Win- 
 not was punctual to the moment. While the 
 tall kitchen clock was still telling the hour of 
 nine, with strokes slow, solemn, and reverber- 
 ant as those of a passing bell, doing its best to impress its 
 hearers with the fact that the death of an hour is a matter 
 of serious and weighty import, Alice Prescott appeared 
 at my door to notify me of her presence below. The an- 
 nouncement was briefly made, and the messenger turned 
 quickly away. But not before I had observed that her 
 face wore the same grieved and discomfited expression 
 that had struck me on the preceding evening. I laid a 
 hand on either shoulder, and forcibly detained her. 
 
 " What is the matter, Alice ? -Have I done anything 
 to hurt you ? " 
 
 " Oh, no," she answered, letting her eyes drop. 
 " So far, so good. But thei-e are sins of omission as 
 as well as commission. What have I failed to do that you 
 expected or desired ? " 
 
 "Nothing." Butthere was a shade of pain, almost 
 amounting to petulance, in the tone. 
 
 " I see there is something out of joint," I said, after
 
 SIIILOH. 183 
 
 a moment's consideration of her downcast, half-averted 
 face, "but I will not press the subject now. Only, you had 
 better improve the respite in making up your mind to a 
 full and frank confession ; for I give you fair warning that 
 I shall be sure to find out what the trouble is, whether you 
 tell me or no." 
 
 I did find out, sooner than I expected. As I passed the 
 half-open door of Mrs. Divine's room, at the foot of the 
 staircase, the loud tones of Mrs. Prescott's voice, sharp to 
 a degree of snappishness, came to my ear with a distinct- 
 ness not to be shut out. 
 
 " Some folks will go a mile to give a beggar a shilling, 
 who wouldn't throw a cent to one that was starving at the 
 door ! And some folks are born to good luck they and 
 their kin to the third and fourth generation ! But I 
 wasn't. Nobody'd ever think of giving my Alice music 
 lessons, if she had come into the world without legs or 
 arms, and deaf and dumb into the bargain ! " 
 
 It was impossible not to smile at the idea of such a stu- 
 dent of harmonics ; yet my predominant feeling was not 
 one of amusement. Mala hastened to improve the oc- 
 casion. 
 
 " See there ! " exclaimed she, mockingly, " that is what 
 you get for not minding your own business ! " 
 
 BOJTA. Who was it that said : " Wist ye not that I 
 must be about" not my own, but "my Father's bus- 
 iness ? ". 
 
 MALA. Umph ! your business in the musical line is like- 
 ly to be extensive ! You will be expected to give music 
 lessons to ev.ery Miss in Shiloh, with* or without a particle 
 of musical talent. 
 
 I (shrugging my shoulders). The expectation will be 
 cut off, then. 
 
 BOXA. Whenever it is, clearly, an unreasonable one. 
 
 MALA. As it is in this instance. Mrs. Prescott is jeal- 
 ous, on Alice's account ; and jealousy is always unreason- 
 able.
 
 184 SHILOII. 
 
 I (emphatically). And it is a quality that I partic- 
 ularly detest ; and toward which I will show no mercy. 
 
 BOXA. But, in this case, is there not a little occasion 
 for the jealousy ? Mrs. Prescott would, naturally, feel hurt 
 that her daughter living under the same roof with your- 
 self should be overlooked, while her friend is so notice- 
 ably sought out. 
 
 I. But Alice has no talent for music. 
 
 BONA. Perhaps she has a talent for something else. 
 
 I (impatiently}. Her sole talent is for reading. She in- 
 herits that from her grandmother ; though her appetite is 
 by no means so omnivorous as hers. But it is even more 
 absorbing. She shuts herself up in a book as if she were 
 locked inside an oaken chest ; she becomes deaf, dumb, 
 blind and immovable, as soon as her eyes fall on the page. 
 I do what I can to gratify her. by giving her the free use 
 of all my books, all that she will read, that is ; for her 
 taste runs chiefly to novels and poetry, and she does not 
 even choose the best of either. 
 
 BONA. You might educate her taste, then.' 
 
 I (diilsfully). Must I turn teacher to everybody that 
 comes in my way ? 
 
 MALA. Perhaps Mr. Divine's hired man would like to 
 learn Latin ! 
 
 BONA. There is no occasion for the reductio ad absurdum, 
 supposing that to be it a point which remains tb be estab- 
 lished. Many a Yankee ' hired man ' has both the wish and 
 the capacity to learn Latin, and you might be worse em- 
 ployed than in teaching him. Knowledge I cannot too 
 strongly impress it ypoii you always imposes responsi- 
 bility. To know, may be merely to hoard up facts as a 
 miser does money ; to impart, is the secret of usefulness. 
 Whenever a full mind meets an empty one, it is a call to 
 teach, not to scoiF; when refinement encounters roughness, 
 it is a call to influence, not to shun ; when a higher nature 
 comes in contact with a lower one, it is a call to lift up, not
 
 SHILOH. 185 
 
 to thrust down. Whenever God places you among people 
 less cultured, less accomplished, less refined, or less heaven- 
 enlightened than yourself, be sure that He maketh you to 
 differ, chiefly, that you may be instrumental in lessening 
 that difference. 
 
 MALA (with a sneer). Which means, being interpreted, 
 that you must not only give lessons in music, vocal and in- 
 strumental, to Ruth Winnot, and lessons in Latin and 
 Greek to the hired man ; but lessons in the elements of 
 criticism and the canons of taste to Alice Prescott, lessons 
 in meekness and urbanity to her mother, in etymology to 
 Aunt Yin, in good nature and liberality to Mrs. Burcham, 
 in simplicity to Mrs. Danforth, etc., etc., ad infinitum. I 
 wish you joy of your labors ! 
 
 Weary of the discussion, I ended it by opening the 
 door of the parlor. Ruth had removed her bonnet and 
 shawl, and Avas standing in the middle of the room, with 
 clasped hands, looking at my piano as if she believed that 
 all things beautiful, harmonious, and delightful, were boxed 
 up therein, and could be brought forth by the strong mag- 
 netism of her fixed gaze. What a different face 1 it was 
 from the one which had met me on the previous evening ! 
 That was full of pallor, gloom, depression, hopelessness, 
 this was flushed, bright, eager, expectant. That might 
 have served as a model for a statue of despair ; this for a 
 picture of hope. The change was so striking that I could 
 not help an allusion to it. 
 
 " Ruth, do you know the meaning of your name ? " 
 
 " Xo, do you ? Tell me, please ! " 
 
 " It means, ' satisfied.' When I first saw you, I thought 
 it a misnomer, but I think, now, there is a prospect that it 
 may fit you excellently well, some day." 
 
 "I am not so sure of that," she replied, archly. 
 " When I can sing as well as you do, I shall be more than 
 satisfied, proud. You will have to find me a name that 
 signifies ' conceit,' if you want a perfect fit, Miss Frost ! "
 
 186 SHILOH. 
 
 It was good to see her so ready and so gay. Yet I 
 scarcely recognized the Ruth of yesterday in the Ruth of 
 to-day. Her own apt and touching metaphor recurred to 
 me with renewed force. She was, in truth, like a deep- 
 buried seed, which, when the superincumbent weight is op- 
 portunely removed, finds the blessing of its long, sore, un- 
 availing travail within itself, in being able to put forth 
 stalks and leaves in a single night. 
 
 " I do not fear that," I responded. " The true mu- 
 sician, like the true artist or 'the true Christian, finds his 
 standard rising ever faster than himself. The increasing 
 distance between the two keeps him humble." 
 
 She looked very grave for a moment. Then she said, 
 entreatingly, " Won't you play me something ? " 
 
 " Business before pleasure, if you please," responded I, 
 opening the piano and taking possession of the music-stool. 
 " That is to say ; lessons first and play afterward, is the 
 true order of things. Look over that pile of songs, and 
 see if you can find anything you know. First, I have to 
 get a clear idea of the quality and capacity of your voice." 
 
 She obeyed like a child. When she had selected " Auld 
 Robin Gray," and laid it open before me on the rack, she 
 interrupted the first chords with the question, " Where is 
 Alice ? " 
 
 " She is somewhere about the house, I suppose." 
 
 " May I go and find her ? She was my first friend, you 
 know, my only friend before you came, and I want her 
 to share in everything good that comes to me. Do you 
 mind having her here ? " 
 
 " Certainly not, if you do not mind it. But most peo- 
 ple prefer to have no spectators or auditors to their first 
 singing-lessons. The initiatory exercises are far from melo- 
 dious, Ruth." 
 
 " Oh, I don't mind Alice ; and she needn't stay if she 
 doesn't like. But I don't want to begin without her, just 
 as if I meant to shut her out of the matter entirely."
 
 SHILOH. 187 
 
 Alice being found and seated in an eligible position, I 
 played the accompaniment to " Auld Robin Gray," and 
 Ruth sang it, taking all things into consideration, sur- 
 prisingly well. Of course, she could not fully understand, 
 nor adequately interpret, all the long patience of sorroAV 
 and the subtile consolations of duty which are shadowed 
 forth in its exquisite words and music ; but her voice was 
 so sympathetic, and her musical instinct so fine, that she 
 immediately caught and imitated whatever expression I 
 gave to the accompaniment, and some of her tones were 
 marvellous in their pathos, bringing tears to my eyes. 
 Did God subject her to the long, life strain of deformity, I 
 wonder, just to put those tones in her voice ; as a tuner 
 tightens the strings of his instrument well nigh to break- 
 ing,, in order to bring them up to the desired pitch ? Had 
 He made her life, up to this time, little else than a fever of 
 pain, shame, and longing, that she might be attuned to 
 manifold accordance with the hidden sorrows of all lives, 
 and the intricate and the involved harmonies of His mys- 
 terious Providence ; and so made capable of showing 
 forth to the world, through the subtile significances of 
 sound, what unutterably rich, grand, and sweet chords are 
 formed from the combinations of sorrow, patience, faith, 
 and love ? 
 
 Testing Ruth's voice by the scales, I found that it ran 
 easily from G below the staff to B above, a present com- 
 pass that gave promise of excellent things in future. I 
 had a pupil whom it would be a delight to instruct. The 
 real drudgery of music-teaching was spared me ; sh.e 
 could already read plain music, with considerable facility, 
 at sight. 
 
 I gave her a singing-lesson first ; then one on the piano. 
 She took both with an ease and readiness that seemed 
 like almost unerring intuition. I quickly saw that she 
 would give all diligence to the practical part of music; 
 but precious little heed to the theoretical, if she could help
 
 188 SHILOH. 
 
 it. She would prefer to act upon its principles, without 
 taking the trouble to understand them. 
 
 Not so with Alice. Her interested and thoughtful face, 
 showed plainly that she fully comprehended all my expla- 
 nations and directions : and she was particularly responsive 
 (so far as looks went, for Alice is no talker) to every spir- 
 itual analogy I brought forth, or to any historical or biog- 
 raphical details that occurred to me in connection with the 
 lesson. 
 
 When I said, " All really beautiful and touching musi- 
 cal compositions have more or less modulations into the 
 minor key ; which shows the intimate relation between life 
 and art, and illustrates the truth that human lives derive 
 their richest harmonies from disappointment and depriva- 
 tion and pain," it was Alice's face that lit up most under- 
 standingly and seemed to follow out the thought. 
 
 When I explained that in ancient times music was a fa- 
 vorite study of monks and friars, and that one of those de- 
 vout men, Guido a Benedictine of the tenth century 
 named the seven tones of the diatonic scale, Ut, Re, Mi, Fa, 
 etc., from the first syllables of each line of an old Latin 
 hymn, the words of which were ; 
 
 " Ut queant laxis -Resonare fibris, 
 Mir& gestorum .Tfojnuli tuorum, 
 Solve polluti Labii reatum, 
 /Sancte Johannes!" 
 
 it was Alice, not Ruth, that asked, "Why 'Ut' was 
 changed to 'Do'?" 
 
 And when I answered, " I do not know precisely ; it is 
 supposed because ' Do ' gives a more open vowel sound, but 
 I should like to think that it was selected because it is a 
 part of the first syllable of the Latin word Dominus or 
 Lord by some equally holy man, who would fain conse- 
 crate the musical scale by beginning and ending it with the 
 thought of God ; at any rate, it will not hurt us to have
 
 SHILOH. 189 
 
 that association with it," Alice's eyes kindled softly, and 
 she fell into a long fit of musing. I grew interested in my 
 silent, yet sympathetic, listener. 
 
 When the piano-lesson was over, I inquired, " Ruth, how 
 old are you ? " 
 
 " Seventeen almost eighteen," answered she, looking a 
 little surprised. 
 
 " Are you aware that she who does not commence piano- 
 music until she is eighteen has a deal of hard work before 
 her, if she accomplishes anything woi'th her while ? The 
 joints and muscles have already lost somewhat of their first 
 flexibility, and two hours of practice will not profit her so 
 much as one hour would have done at an earlier age. 
 'Which fact, by the way, has a bearing on other things 
 than music. Affections lose their spring and pliancy as 
 well as muscles, Ruth, and habits stiffen not less inevitably 
 than joints, as many a ninth-hour disciple of Christ has 
 found, to his cost ; struggling with the miserable inaptitude 
 of a mind and heart that have not been trained and fitted 
 for their work by the practice and the tenor of years. But 
 I am wandering from the point. How much time and pa- 
 tience have you to bring to the study of music ? " 
 
 " All the time that is necessary," she answered. " And 
 as for patience, I shall not need any, I love music so 
 much ! " 
 
 I shook my head gravely. " Excellence in any pursuit 
 is the late, ripe fruit of toil, and toil must needs be weari- 
 some, at times : the willingness of the spirit cannot always 
 prevail over the weakness of the flesh." 
 
 "You cannot frighten me, if you try," she rejoined, 
 cheerily. " I have some little idea of what is before me, 
 for I learned to read music, and to play the accordeon, 
 without any teacher, and it cost me some patient study, I 
 assure you." 
 
 " I do not wish to frighten you, Ruth. I only desire 
 that you should commence the study of music as the Church
 
 190 SHILOII. 
 
 exhorts her children to enter upon the holy estate of mat- 
 rimony, ' discreetly, advisedly, soberly, and in the fear of 
 God.' I do not want to be instrumental in adding to the 
 innumerable company of musical inexperts, girls who 
 treat the divine art of melody precisely as they do their 
 worsted-work, taking it up and laying it down according as 
 convenience suits or inclination prompts ; with no thought 
 of time to be redeemed nor talent to be accounted for, and ' 
 utterly regardless of its claims to respect as a means to 
 greater usefulness in the world, and a neAV and noble branch 
 of service entered upon for God. The legitimate fruit of 
 which desultory and irreverent culture appears in the slov- 
 enly, inaccurate, disjointed playing that one hears every- 
 where, I have gotten to expect it so invariably, that the ' 
 wonder is when I hear it not. A young lady, whose cheeks 
 would tingle with shame if she were forced to exhibit her 
 room in disorder, or her work-basket filled with a life-accu- 
 mulation of unfinished beginnings and dismembered parts 
 of garments, or herself in a dress that was not thoroughly 
 neat, complete, and en regie / does not scruple in the least 
 to bring before a roomful of strange people a musical com- 
 position in rags and tatters, jagged beginnings and ends of 
 melodies, and parts of harmonies cruelly rent asunder and 
 unlawfully patched together. She seems wholly uncon- 
 scious that such a performance, for every lover of music, 
 stamps her character with feebleness, inaccuracy, indolence, 
 and a lamentable lack of conscientiousness, just as certainly 
 and indelibly as a riotous room, a tangled, scrappy work- 
 basket, or disordered attire." 
 
 " Like 1 ? " questioned Ruth, archly. 
 
 " Like no one whom we have the mutual honor to know, 
 Ruth. I am too newly come to Shiloh to be able to point 
 my remai'ks with personal illustrations. Nor do I care to 
 find an original for my sketch ; I am only anxious that it 
 shall in nowise resemble you. There is so much involved 
 in any study, Ruth, beside the mere acquisition of knowl-
 
 sniLon. 191 
 
 cdo-e. First, there is the manner. If we are exact and dilr 
 
 o y 
 
 gent in its prosecution, we form habits of accuracy and in- 
 xlustry that we shall be likely to carry into every other pur- 
 suit, to our manifold advantage ; whereas, if we prosecute 
 it loosely and indolently, the habits thus acquired cling to 
 us and impair our efficiency in everything else. Then, the 
 object by the way, what is your object in studying 
 music ? " 
 
 Ruth looked down, and hesitated. " I know that is not 
 what I ought to say," she answered, finally, "but I am 
 afraid it is just my own pleasure and improvement. Mu- 
 sic is my chief delight ; and then, I am ambitious a 
 little." 
 
 " These may answer for secondary motives, if there is a 
 better primary one to keep them in due subordination." 
 
 " I suppose you mean the glory of God," she replied, 
 in a low voice. " But, Miss Frost, I really can't see how 
 my music is to help that, except when I sing in church." 
 
 " I suspect I should be no clearer-sighted, Ruth, if my 
 father had not taken such pains to teach me how possible 
 . it is to make all our doings, in a certain sense, religious 
 acts : in much that I say, you are only getting his ripe 
 wisdom at second-hand. He used often to quote to me 
 that matchless verse of George Herbert : 
 
 ' A servant with this clause,' 
 (the said clause being, ' For thy sake?) 
 
 Makes drudgery divine, 
 
 Who sweeps a room, as for Thy laws, 
 
 Makes that and the action fine.' " 
 
 Alice drew a long breath, and her eyes lit up softly. 
 " Will you repeat that once more, Miss Frost-? " 
 
 I complied, doing my best to bring out the full beauty 
 and vigor of the lines. 
 
 She repeated them over again, in a dreamy undertone, 
 and then said, " I have it now. Thank you."
 
 192 SHILOH. 
 
 " You have the words, certainly. But are you in pos- 
 session of their whole wealth of meaning ? We all know, 
 to be sure, what sort of a transfiguration the hardest and 
 coarsest duties undergo when done for the sake of one we 
 love, often exchanging their squalid, unlovely, repulsive 
 aspect for one that is positively winning and delightful, 
 but do we comprehend so readily all that is implied in 
 sweeping a room ' as for Thy laws ?' I think white Avings 
 of angels would hover delightedly over the work ! The 
 servant, so sweeping, would bring into active exercise all 
 the Christian virtues ; namely: Obedience, he is obedi- 
 ent to the law, ' Servants, obey your masters,' and to God, 
 the Lawgiver ; Humility, he is not above his work, he is 
 only solicitous that it shall not prove that his work was 
 above him ; Meekness, he bears with his master's reproofs 
 and his own mistakes, patiently; Faithfulness, he does 
 his task thoroughly, putting his broom into all the corners 
 and hidden places, ' as seeing one who is invisible ' inspect- 
 ing his work ; Honesty, he takes nothing from the room, 
 not so much as a pin from the floor, that does not belong 
 to him ; Diligence, he is careful not to waste his master's 
 time, nor God's; Contentment, instead of fretting and 
 repining because he has to work, or because the work is of 
 a homely sort, he feels the blessing of having work so 
 plain, so immediate, so free from difficulties and entangle- 
 ments, that he cannot well go wrong in it ; Trust,^ he be- 
 lieves that his Lord knows what work is best for him now, 
 and will give him other and higher work so soon as he is 
 fit for it ; Hope, he remembers joyfully the rest that rc- 
 maineth, and the glory that shall be revealed ; Lastly 
 that crowning grace! Love, he is full of kind thought 
 and delicate consideration for those to whose comfort he is 
 ministering, careful to leave the master's easy-chair just at 
 the angle he likes best, the mistress's work-table free from 
 dust, the invalid's couch where the light falls softest, 
 everything so arranged as to give the greatest satisfaction
 
 SHILOH. 193 
 
 to the eye, the deepest repose to the mind. He can, if he 
 will, consecrate his work with prayer, and sweeten it with 
 thoughts of our Saviour bending His sacred head over a car- 
 penter's bench, and St. Paul plying his trade of tent- 
 maker. How truly such sweeping makes both the room 
 and the action ' fine ! ' Now take that same potent ' clause ' 
 into the study of music, and see how inevitably a Christian 
 must be a better musician than a worldling other* things 
 being equal." 
 
 " Still," suggested Alice, " one might think it right to 
 learn just enough of music to make home pleasant, with- 
 out having any strong musical bias, or expecting ever to 
 become an accomplished musician." 
 
 " If one does, Alice, one will be likely to prove conclu- 
 sively, in one's own person, how little advantage results 
 from any study of importance, which is not taken up se- 
 riously, and carried on regularly, with a view to the great- 
 est proficiency that is within the student's reach. If there 
 is no strong natural bent, the more need of persistent study 
 and practice ; the pleasantness of home will not be much en- 
 hanced by a soulless, slovenly, disjointed performance. The 
 real inoperativeness, or insincerity, of this motive generally 
 appears when marriage and motherhood' bring new cares 
 to the player or singer. The sweet accomplishment of har- 
 mony, which was to add so rich a charm to the home-pre- 
 cinct, is dropped and forgotten so soon as the musician 
 really has a home, for whose delight and discomforts she 
 is, mainly, responsible." 
 
 Alice looked troubled. "You would not think it 
 right," said she, " for a mother to neglect her children for 
 her music ? " 
 
 " Certainly not. But the mothers of whom I am speak- 
 ing lavish time enough upon their own and their children's 
 finery, not only to keep up their music, but to make con- 
 tinual progress in it. Yet which accords best with that 
 sweet ideal of motherhood which we all hallow in our 
 9
 
 194 SIIILOH. 
 
 hearts ? she who spends an hour or two f each day in 
 embroidering, tucking, and trimming her child's garments, 
 making its babyhood unlovely with pride, and its maturity 
 sinful with extravagance ; or she who surrounds its young 
 life with an atmosphere of soft, melodious, spiritualizing 
 sounds, training it early to comprehend the laws and the 
 significances of harmony, and bringing it, by easy and im- 
 perceptible degrees, into lovely accordance with all that is 
 good and sweet and ennobling in art or in nature ? Which 
 of them will the children reverence most ? Which will 
 they rise up to call ' blessed,' when death paralyzes alike 
 the fingers that ply the embroidery-needle and the fingers 
 that wake the white, singing keys ? Which memory will 
 send the sweetest, most pathetic strain down through their 
 future lives ? Easy it is to answer ! the garments that 
 we have worn fade quickly from our recollection most 
 emphatically they ' perish in the using ;' but the melodies 
 that sweetened our childhood, the songs that we sang with 
 our mother in the twilight, these are among the things 
 which our hearts cherish to their latest throb ! " 
 
 " Do you think it is wrong, then, to trim our garments 
 and make them pretty ? " 
 
 I could not help smiling. " Do you really think that 
 ' trimming ' and ' making pretty ' are convertible terms, 
 Ruth ? Any artist will tell you that much of the trim- 
 ming, which costs us so much time and money, is only a 
 making ugly. But, allowing that its end is beauty, and 
 that it always accomplishes that end, is there no distinc- 
 tion to be made between the high beauty and the low one ? 
 The beauty of lovely melodies is infinitely greater than the 
 beauty of lovely garments ; the former, therefore, should be 
 first sought after to beautify our homes. The real trouble 
 is, that women do not rightly divide their duties. Con- 
 sciously, or not, we each make to ourselves two catalogues 
 of the day's labors ; one under the head of ' Things that 
 must be done,' the other of ' Things that may be done.'
 
 SHILOH. 195 
 
 Then we put the tucks, the flounces, and embroideries, the 
 rich cakes and pastry, and the fashionable calls, under the 
 head of ' Must,' and the music, the reading aloud of the 
 best authors, and kindred duties, under the head of ' May.' 
 The body must be pampered ; the mind may be fed, or 
 starved, as it happens. Thence come endless toil of the 
 most slavish, exhausting, unsatisfying kind, continual de- 
 terioration, and the sharp gnawing of discontent." 
 
 There was a long pause. " Do you think, then," said 
 Alice, timidly, " that no one ought to learn music, who can; 
 not give some regular time to it daily ? " 
 
 " That would be too hard a saying. Where there is 
 genuine talent, and the way open, it might do to begin by 
 devoting all the odds and ends of time to the work, and so 
 making a kind of regularity of irregularity. If this were 
 done patiently and scrupulously, I think God would, ere 
 long, give the regular time needful. If it did not come, I 
 should consider it, in most cases, a clear indication that the 
 music must be given up." 
 
 " What ! when there is real talent ! " exclaimed Ruth in 
 amazement. " Do you think God ever gives a talent which 
 he does not mean us to cultivate ? " 
 
 " Rarely ; I never knew such a case, yet it may exist. 
 Given talent, energy, patience, and faith ; and the opportu- 
 nity for growth and the opening for usefulness generally 
 follow. But if there be, anywhere, a heart heavy with the 
 sense of germs of talent undeveloped, denied all time and 
 space for unfolding, kept down by illness, or by a multi- 
 tude of homely, yet genuine and pressing duties ; let it 
 take comfort in the certainty that God means it to attain, 
 by this thorny road of constraint and privation, unto high- 
 er and heavenlicr things than it might have won in the 
 freest exercise of its talents, even unto the sweet patience 
 of hope, the repose of unquestioning obedience, the bless- 
 edness of sacrifice. ' They also serve who stand and wait,' 
 says Milton of the celestial host."
 
 196 SHILOH. 
 
 Alice's face lit up radiantly. Ruth looked half-scared, 
 half-exultant. " Such a life would be a bitter one for me," 
 she said, with a slow shake of the head. " I tasted it be- 
 fore jon came, and I did not find out the sweetness nor the 
 comfort in it. I am so glad you came, Miss Frost ! " giv- 
 ing me a quick, impetuous caress. 
 
 " That reminds me that we have not yet agreed upon 
 the terms of payment for these lessons." 
 
 She looked utterly confounded. " I thought " she be- 
 gan, and then stopped. 
 
 " You thought I was to give them freely and uncondi- 
 tionally ? Not altogether. ' If ye hae nae purse to fine, ye 
 hae flesh to pine,' says the old Scotch proverb. I have a 
 mind to play Shylock with you. I shall exact a llesh-and- 
 blood payment." 
 
 Ruth opened her eyes at me in speechless amazement. 
 Alice only smiled. I was beginning to remark the latter's 
 quickness of comprehension wherever any spiritual analogy 
 was implied. I had already learned that her faculty of ob- 
 servation was unusually keen and delicate ; it even annoyed 
 me a little, at times, to see that every emotion which dis- 
 turbed the surface of my consciousness, appeared to have 
 its answering ripple on hers. Not, evidently, because she 
 sought to inspect or to analyze my feelings; the power 
 seemed to be most involuntarily exercised, and was even a 
 source of embarrassment. Often, when her eye met mine, 
 she colored and turned away, as if there were such a crime 
 as spiritual theft, and she had been detected in it. In a 
 loved and trusted friend, such facility of comprehension 
 would be invaluable, sparing one much painful travail of 
 speech ; but in an indifferent person, it came near to being 
 an intolerable nuisance. And, up to this time, I had not 
 taken as the phrase goes to Alice Prescott. She was 
 afflicted with such an overpowering and inveterate shyness 
 oftener taking the form of stiffness and unresponsiveness 
 than of open confusion of face that one's course of ac-
 
 SHILOH. 197 
 
 quaintanceship necessarily ran slow ; and I had easily slid- 
 clen into the habit of letting her very much alone. Yet I 
 had found myself watching her, now and then, with an in- 
 explicable curiosity ; a vague suspicion that the depths of 
 her life might be worth sounding, if one only had the means 
 and the inclination ; and a dim wonder if my own disinclina- 
 tion were not the sickly, noxious outgrowth of spiritual in- 
 dolence, rather than a manifestation of that most rare and 
 righteous quality respect for another's individuality. And 
 when I had gotten thus far, Mala always sneered or railed, 
 and my thoughts wandered from the subject. 
 
 After a momentary enjoyment of Ruth's astonished 
 face, I went on. 
 
 " Flesh and blood are figurative terms, dear ; they stand 
 Itere for labor and love. The time will come when you, in 
 your turn, will be competent to teach and help some wait- 
 ing, wistful soul, quick with musical power, yet knowing 
 not how to develop it : promise me that you will do it, for 
 my no, for Christ's sake. These are my terms, Ruth." 
 
 Her brown eyes filled slowly with tears. " Oh ! Miss 
 Frost, you knew you surely knew that you did not need 
 to ask that ! " she exclaimed, half-reproachfully. " Of 
 course I should do it ; I could not help doing it ! Don't I 
 know how it feels to long for a teacher, and culture, and 
 growth, and not to have them ! " 
 
 Then she stood upright, dashing away her tears. " Oh ! 
 I will promise more than that," she went on, passionately, 
 " for you know you have not gone to the root of the mat- 
 ter, Miss Frost ! Whenever I meet some poor, proud, dis- 
 couraged, and deformed creature, who would reproach God 
 for making her, if she dared, and who shrinks from every 
 human eye as if it had an arrow in it I will try what can 
 be done to lift her up and help her. If she has any grace, 
 or beauty, or talent, or good gift of any kind, I will find it 
 out and hold it up before her, to prove to her that God is 
 still good, and to encourage her to work and pray ; while
 
 198 SHILOH. 
 
 my own ready help and sympathy and tenderness, shall 
 make her ashamed of ever having distrusted man." And, 
 she added solemnly, after a moment, " I will, so help me 
 God!" 
 
 I drew the excited, enthusiastic speaker toward me, and 
 kissed her, through my tears. Alice laid her head on the 
 piano and sobbed aloud. 
 
 Ruth was the first to break the silence, passing quickly 
 from the extreme of exaltation to a half-playful mood ; 
 showing the real buoyancy and elasticity of her spirits, in 
 their natural play. "My first scholar is close by," she said, 
 laying her hand on Alice's head " thoxigh she isn't of that 
 sort, you know. As soon as I know enough, I mean to 
 give Alice lessons. Unless," she added, as if the* idea had 
 suddenly occurred to her, "you are going to do it your- 
 self." 
 
 Alice turned crimson. " I could not think of troubling 
 Miss Frost so much," she said, hastily ; " it is quite enough 
 for her to have to teach one of us. I am content to wait 
 for you, Ruth I shall only get her teaching at second- 
 hand. Besides," she continued, looking at me in a doubt- 
 ful, deprecating way, " she would not think it worth while ; 
 I am afraid I have no natural talent for music." 
 
 I hesitated, touched by her wistful look, yet doubtful if 
 encouragement were the right thing to give her. 
 
 " Sometimes, the means seem to justify the end," I said, 
 at last. " One may labor so assiduously and so lovingly as 
 to create a talent where it did not exist. But the training 
 should begin early, to do that, in music. If you were nine, 
 instead of nineteen, I should not hesitate. As it is, I con- 
 fess that the expediency seems doubtful; that is, if you 
 have anything better to do. In Ruth's case, the strong 
 native bias will go a great way ; besides, it is her voice that 
 I chiefly count upon to repay culture ; it is not too late to 
 work upon that, to good advantage. If she learns enough 
 of the piano to be able to accompany herself tolerably well,
 
 SHILOH 199 
 
 it is all that I look for. In your case let me see your 
 hand, Alice." 
 
 She gave it to me with a bewildered face. 
 
 " I am not a fortune-teller, though it does look a little 
 like it," I said, smiling at her amazement. " But there are 
 musical hands, Alice Ruth has them. The fingers ai'e 
 long, the joints firm, yet flexible, the movement rapid and 
 forceful. Now yours really! it is the oddest circum- 
 stance ! Where do you suppose I saw the duplicates of 
 your hands, Alice?" 
 
 " Indeed, I cannot imagine." 
 
 " In Italy, I met one of our sweetest poetesses there. 
 She had just such hands as these small, white, cool, soft, 
 they seemed to melt in my grasp as if they were made of 
 mist, with nails not quite perfect in shape, too, because, 
 as she told me, with a little laugh of vexation at herself, 
 she had the habit of biting them in her youth, and suspect- 
 ed she sometimes did it still, when s'ue was in a brown 
 study ! But there was no music in them, Alice, except 
 such as flowed from the point of her pen ; which is, after 
 all, the sweetest, richest music far wider in its scope and 
 influence than any music of tone simply. For poetry is the 
 highest of all the arts." 
 
 Alice looked down shyly, yet with something bright in 
 her face. Ruth gave her a smile and a meaning glance. 
 Then she said to me, nodding her head : 
 
 " You have hit Alice exactly. She used to bite her 
 nails in school many a time have I scolded her for it. 
 And she makes verses, too."
 
 XIX. 
 
 ALICE PKESCOTT IIST A NEW LIGHT. 
 
 was as if scales fell from my eyes. Those 
 three words, "Alice makes verses," carried a 
 spell in them. All that had seemed strange, in- 
 complete, or incongruous, in Alice Prescott, be- 
 came at once natural and comprehensible. Her 
 character fell into its place in the harmony of the 
 universe. 
 
 That intuitive comprehension of the thoughts 
 and feelings of others, under which I had been so restive, 
 I now saw to be the rightful dower of the poet ; whose in- 
 sight must needs be of that fine, penetrative quality, to 
 which all of earth, and much of heaven, is open. The 
 youngest poet whose song ever won the ear of mankind, 
 has always sung intelligently of many things wherewith lie 
 could have no intimate, personal acquaintance ; but which 
 he comprehends as perfectly by intuition and sympathy as 
 other men by experience. He is not only moved, but com 
 polled, often against his own wilf, and to the damage of 
 his own comfort, to .live much in other lives, to feel the 
 warmth of their sunshine and the chill of their shadow, to 
 be thrilled with their passions and shaken by their conflicts. . 
 Where his own experience falls short, theirs serves him in 
 good stead; and, by the help of delicate intuition, ready 
 sympathy, and instinctive perception of things so slight and 
 subtile as to escape other observation, he is enabled to catch
 
 201 
 
 every note that humanity gives forth tinder the touch of 
 Life, and to weave it deftly into his songs. 
 
 Others of Alice's characteristics, too, hitherto unnoted 
 in this chronicle, came crowding forth to get the benefit of 
 this new light, and reveal themselves in their true colors 
 and proportions. She was subject to fits of absence of 
 mind, from which not even her mother's shrill voice aroused 
 her, until it had been two or three times exerted, and had 
 gained acuteness by impatience; and there were whole 
 days when she seemed to walk in a dream ; doing what- 
 ever she did in the most mechanical, unreasoning fashion ; 
 listening to your words with ears fast locked against every 
 sound, and looking you in the face with eyes that had no 
 more sight in them than a blind man's. Often I had found 
 her sitting in the porch, or on the garden bench, with her 
 gaze fastened on the distant hill-tops ; and, at such times, 
 it was plain that I ci'ossed her field of vision without pro- 
 ducing any image on her mind, if I did upon her retinas. 
 I had inwardly stigmatized her, therefore, as listless, indo- 
 lent a dreamer and an idler in a world heavy with reali- 
 ties, and teeming with work for hand and brain. I now 
 inferred that these were moments of inward life and sight, 
 full and active in proportion to her outward immobility ; 
 the depth of her abstraction being the visible sign of the 
 intensity with which she contemplated the flow of her own 
 ideas, and the avidity wherewith she received and assimi-* 
 lated intellectual nutriment from scenes and events which 
 passed for an actual void with her neighbors. 
 
 She was quick and skilful in the feminine accomplish- 
 ment of needlework. She had a natural aptitude for the 
 lighter and more fanciful parts of dress-making and mil- 
 linery ; and a ready knack at turning to good account old 
 laces, ribbons, and other debris of the wa*rdrobe, that seemed 
 little short of miraculous; yet was only the result of a 
 quick eye for latent beauties of form and color, and a happy 
 facility in combining them. In short, she had both taste
 
 202 SHILOH. 
 
 and imagination, and could not help lavishing them wher- 
 ever there was material for them to work upon. But for 
 the coarser matters of the domestic routine, she appeared 
 to have an innate and ineradicable aversion. She " shirked " 
 them (her grandmother said) ; but it was plain that she did 
 it involuntarily, rather than of deliberate purpose. When 
 she^was forced to it, she took them in hand aptly enough, 
 but with a certain fastidious, arm's-length haste, that the 
 distasteful duty might be quickly done with ; or she work- 
 ed dreamily, with a mind afar off. So I had set her hastily 
 down as a vain and frivolous girl, with her head chiefly 
 running on matters of dress, and cherishing in her heart 
 an unwise contempt and distaste for life's every-day duties 
 and burdens. I now saw that this judgment must needs 
 be greatly modified ; though it might still be true, in a 
 mild degree, for Alice was too young a poetess to have 
 discovered the essential poetry latent in life's most prac- 
 tical affairs, the beauty that grows beside its commonest 
 walks. 
 
 Yet she possessed something that might soon lead to 
 the discovery the art of practical arrangement. She had 
 that mysterious happiness of touch, by which all the hidden 
 capabilities of things are brought forth and made to minis- 
 ter to comfort or to taste ; -a charming attribute in the 
 mistress of a household, enabling her to organize a delight- 
 ful enough home out of apparently barren and incongruous 
 elements. Whatever Alice touched seemed to fall inevita- 
 bly into lines of grace. A room where her hand had been, 
 wore a cosy, habitable aspect, curiously in contrast with the 
 starched propriety of Mrs. Prescott's arrangement. The 
 bouquets that she arranged looked as if the flowers had 
 spontaneously grouped themselves together in obedience to 
 their own lovely and mystical affinities. The dishes of fruit 
 that she brought to the table, wreathed with their own 
 leaves, or with buds and blossoms exquisitely adapted to 
 them in fragrance and color, might have served as studies
 
 BHILOH. 203 
 
 for an artist. These works suited her ; they seemed to be a 
 spontaneous outgrowth, rather than the result of conscious 
 volition. Within their sphere, her fancy was inexhaustible, 
 her invention akin to magic. It was a mystery where she 
 got the trait ; it was innate, of course, but not hereditary, 
 unless derived from some very remote ancestress, whose 
 name has dropped out of the genealogical table that Mrs. 
 Divine keeps in a convenient niche of her memory, ready 
 to be produced and consulted, at the shortest notice. 
 
 The pleasant illumination thus thrown upon Alice's 
 character fell rosily over her person also, and transfigured 
 that to my outer vision, as it had the former to my mental 
 view. She was not beautiful : beside Ruth's rare and ar- 
 tistic loveliness the rich glory of her auburn hair, and the 
 shifting light and shadow of her brown eyes, the pale, 
 cool tints of Alice's face looked like a crayon sketch beside 
 a brilliant painting. Nevertheless, my glance now lingered 
 with pleasure on the graceful contour of her head, the in- 
 tellect crowning her brow, the mystic depths of her 
 thoughtful, far-gazing eyes, the harmonious lines of her 
 womanly, yet most petite figure, for Alice is small enough 
 to have fairy blood in her veins. Always a little inclined 
 to genius-worship, I began to feel a half-reverence for the 
 shy, silent girl, whom I had been accustomed to regard 
 with indifference. I was humbled to the dust by the dis- 
 covery of my long blindness ! 
 
 "The point that is made against you," said Bona, 
 quietly, " being simply that you cannot recognize your 
 own ideal of incipient genius, when it is taken out of the 
 domain of imagination, and walks beside you daily in the 
 humble garb pf a plain, shy New England maiden, amid 
 the homely duties of a New England farm-house ! " 
 
 The next moment I was ready to laugh at my own cre- 
 dulity, and satirize my late-budding enthusiasm. " Don't be 
 a goose ! " I said to myself, severely. " As if every girl in 
 Christendom does not, during the fertile period of her
 
 204 SHILOH. 
 
 teens, try to make verses ; and succeed well enough to sat- 
 isfy her own crude taste, and that of some partial friends ! 
 As if you, yourself, had not made a few trembling attempts 
 of the sort, which you treasured carefully, for a year or 
 two, as possible gold, and threw away, at the end of that 
 time, as most certainly lead ! " 
 
 " Besides," added Mala, masquerading in the garb of 
 common sense, " you know your imagination is prone to 
 fly away with you, and to drop you, not into the valley of 
 Diamonds, but that of Disappointment. It is absurd to 
 dream of finding two geniuses in this little out-of-the-way 
 place, granting that Ruth Winnot is one, which is more 
 than I believe. And, amid all this labor and thought for 
 others, what is to become of the rest that you came to Shi- 
 loh especially to find? You know you need it." 
 
 BOJSTA. Not yet. Rest that is, inaction would be far 
 more wearisome to you than any work. The toiling hand 
 lightens the burdened heart; the busy life relieves the 
 brooding mind. The rest " remaineth." 
 
 Wonderful is the quickness of thought ! All this, if 
 not in detail, yet in substance, passed through my mind 
 while I still held Alice's hand, and before Ruth could 
 have had much time to wonder at my delay in reply- 
 ing to the bit of information wherewith she had favored 
 me. . In truth, I was too much surprised by it, and too un- 
 certain how much it might be worth, to make any im- 
 mediate, pertinent answer possible ; and my words must 
 have Seemed to ignore it completely, when they came, 
 though, in reality, they were not uninfluenced by it. If 
 Alice really possessed the poetic faculty, it was another 
 reason why she should not waste her strength on a task un- 
 suited to her. 
 
 She sat, meanwhile, with downcast eyes, looking both 
 distressed and scared. I suspect she feared an immediate 
 demand for a specimen of her verse-making. Obviously, 
 it was a relief to her when I only asked,
 
 SIIILOH. 205 
 
 " Alice, would it be much of a disappointment to you 
 not to take music-lessons, now or later ? " 
 
 She met my eyes with unusual directness and frankness. 
 " I think it would a little ; I thought I should like it very 
 much. But," she added, with a very sweet, docile look, 
 "I can trust your judgment about it, Miss Frost. It shall 
 be yes or no, just as you say." 
 
 " Decidedly no, then. I believe that the most you could 
 hope to do, would be to learn enough of the principles 
 and resources of music to enable you to understand and 
 enjoy it more perfectly, when you hear it from others ; 
 no worthless acquisition, to be sure, but you can accom- 
 plish the same tiling, in an easier way. Since Ruth is will- 
 ing, you can make it a rule to be present at her lessons, 
 and listen to the instructions she receives. You will thus 
 learn a good deal of the science of music ; you will see the 
 objects she is working to attain ; you will understand the 
 nature and the amount of the difficulties she has to over- 
 come, and the value of the successes she achieves ; and 
 whenever her time of triumph comes, you will rejoice in it 
 as if it were your own. Thus, she will get the help and 
 comfort of an intelligent, adequate sympathy, born of 
 knowledge ; and you will get the benefit of her labor, 
 without the time and fatigue. A theoretical knowledge 
 of music will be an advantage to you, if you are " (a po- 
 etess, I was about to say, but I reconsidered the matter, 
 and substituted) "if ever you are thrown into musical 
 society." 
 
 Alice gave me one of her quick, penetrating glances : 
 she comprehended, instinctively, that there was something 
 more in my thought than appeared in my words. Ruth 
 looked dissatisfied. 
 
 " You don't know how much I wanted Alice for a fel- 
 low-student," she said, dolefully. 
 
 " Take heart," I rejoined, smiling, " she may fill that 
 position yet. Alice, ha\e you any talent for languages ? "
 
 206 SHILOH. 
 
 " I don't know," answered she, " I never tried." 
 
 " I was intending to request Ruth to take up the study 
 of Italian, also," observed I, " and to ask you to join her 
 in it. It is, eminently, the language of music ; the day 
 will come when she will find it necessary, or expedient, for 
 her to sing in it, and I wish to save her from the inconve- 
 nience and the wearisomeness not to say, the absurdity 
 of using words without meaning to her. It is, also, well 
 worth learning for its literature. Certain master-pieces of 
 epic and lyric poetry can only be studied satisfactorily by 
 its aid ; for though history, philosophy, and morality, 
 may be translated without serious detriment, that chill pro- 
 cess is fatal to the ethereal essence and subtle grace of 
 poetry. Who would know Dante and Tasso and Petrarch, 
 face to face, and heart-throb to heart-throb, therefore, must 
 know them through the clear, soft medium of the lan- 
 guage they loved ; vainly we try to pour their thought 
 into any other mould ! 
 
 " Under other circumstances, I might prefer to have 
 you commence this branch of study with a different lan- 
 guage ; but you and Ruth wish to work together, and 
 there is often profit, as well as pleasure, in such compan- 
 ionship. If you like the study, and develop a talent for 
 it, we Avill try something else, by and by." 
 
 Alice's eyes had grown very bright through this long 
 speech. She now said, 
 
 " Thank you. I shall like it so much ! " 
 
 Ruth made a comical little grimace. "You do well," 
 said she, " to couple us together, in this business. I am 
 not a bookworm by nature, as Alice is, and the sight of her 
 quickness and studiousness will shame me into doing my 
 utmost. There is no doubt that she will learn fast enough ; 
 Alice can turn her hand to anything." 
 
 " Finally," said I, " I .have ventured to cut out a little 
 work perhaps play would be the fitter phrase, for us all. 
 I propose that we shall spend certain hours of each week
 
 SHILOH. 207 
 
 together, in reading aloud. We will take turns at the read- 
 ing, and try to make sure that none of the depth or the 
 sweetness of our author escapes us, by comparing impres- 
 sions as we go along. Do you accede to the proposal ? " 
 
 " I accede to anything and everything," replied Ruth, 
 good humoredly. And she added, in a half-arch, half-cares- 
 sing way, " What is the use of objecting ? You would be 
 sure to coax or reason me into it, after all. You have ways 
 there is no resisting, Miss Frost." 
 
 Further talk was precluded by the abrupt entrance of 
 Mrs. Prescott. Care sat upon her brow, as usual ; and she 
 made no delay in discharging herself of her mission. 
 There is this excellent quality (among others) in Mrs. Pres- 
 cott ; her straightforwardness is unquestionable. One feels 
 confident, upon very short acquaintance, that there are no 
 byways in her character. She never holds forth the gloved 
 hand of policy ; she knows nothing of the crooked walks 
 of diplomacy. What she has to do, she does openly ; what 
 she has to say, she says plainly. Her faults lie as close to 
 the surface as her virtues, her motives are as patent as her 
 acts. In her own characteristic phrase, she " always likes 
 to speak her mind." 
 
 " I suppose your lesson is over, I haven't heard the piano 
 going lately," she said, in her rapid, crisp way, implying as 
 much 'of an apology as she often condescends to make. " I just 
 came in to tell you that some of us ladies are going down 
 to set Mr. Taylor's things to rights a little, this afternoon. 
 They were put into the house this morning, and there they 
 lie in heaps. And to-morrow is Saturday, and Mrs. Taylor 
 can't get here till noon, so she won't have much time to 
 get in living order for Sunday. I guess she'll like to havo 
 things straightened round some, if it ain't done just exactly 
 as she'd do it herself. And I'd like to have you go along, 
 if youJre willing ; of course, we shouldn't expect you 
 to do any hard work, but we would like your advice 
 about arranging things. Mrs. Taylor mightn't like our
 
 208 SHILOH. 
 
 ways; she's used to city style, I guess. Mr. Taylor is 
 there, to tell us which furniture goes in the parlor, and 
 which in the keeping-room, and what they use in their own 
 room. That is about all he is good for, I guess, though he 
 did come on to ' make a beginning,' as he says. It's my 
 opinion that it would be all beginning, and no end ! You 
 ought to have seen him this morning, sitting on a box and 
 looking at the muss. He had unpacked three boxes, and 
 piled the things all in a heap, and was just taking breath 
 before he begun on another ! It's a mercy I happened in, 
 or he'd have had everything out, and stirred up on the 
 floor, in a mess. I told him he had better wait until this 
 afternoon, and have some help. He looked as much 
 relieved as if I had brought him a house all in apple-pie 
 order, with a dinner smoking on the table. So I brought 
 him home with me, and he's out in the meadow, talking to 
 father. Will you go with us, Miss Frost ? " 
 
 " Certainly, if there is the smallest possibility of my 
 being of service. I really was not aware, however, that 
 there were two ways of arranging furniture, one for the 
 city, and another for the country ; I thought individual 
 taste ruled in that mattei', and that the greatest attainable 
 amount of comfort and beauty was the universal aim." 
 
 " Umph ! that shows you haven't used your eyes. 
 Whenever I go into a city house, which I don't do 
 often," with an intonation, slightly flavored with con- 
 tempt, " it always looks to me as if they'd put all their 
 best things right where they'd get used up the quickest, - 
 chairs and tables and sofas where you couldn't stir without 
 hitting against their corners ; and china, and all sorts of 
 knick-knacks, where you couldn't miss of knocking them 
 off. Xo\v, that isn't our way up here; at least, it isn't my 
 way. What's worth saving, I like to save. Why, I've got 
 the mahogany table, that father gave me when I was first 
 married and went to housekeeping, packed away up garret 
 now, -just as good as new, though it's been moved twice ; 
 there isn't a pin-scratch on it anywheres."
 
 SHILOH. 209 
 
 I did not in the least doubt it. To any one who had 
 had an opportunity of Mdtnessing Mrs. Prescott's daily 
 battle with dust, dirt, and decay, in their innumerable 
 forms; and her many and marvellous solutions of the ever- 
 returning problem how to make the few things she could 
 bring herself to use, serve as substitutes for the multitude 
 that it would have broken her heart to summon forth from 
 their life-long inaction ; it was not difficult to believe in any 
 marvel of preservation that had been achieved under her 
 own strict domestic rule. My faith was strong that, if she 
 could only be spared to cherish it, that beloved mahogany 
 table would survive the crumbling of empires, and resist 
 the tooth of Time ; and, outliving the earth itself, would 
 be no very preposterous candidate for admission into that 
 extremely material' heaven, which certain dust-clogged 
 imaginations are so fond of presenting to our view. . 
 
 I left the subject of the table untouched, however, and 
 confined myself to the business in hand. 
 
 "I hope you intend to be impartial in your invitation, 
 Mrs. Prescott. Cannot these two friends of mine find an 
 opening for their respective talents, somewhere in the after- 
 noon's work?" 
 
 Mrs. Prescott" stared in undisguised amazement. 
 
 " I mean to have Alice go," she said, with a mixture of 
 austerity and amusement ; " I'm going to paper the keep- 
 ing room down there, and she's got to help me. As for 
 Ruth, I should like to have her go, of course ; there's not 
 the least danger of our having too much help ; many hands 
 make light work. But if you can get her to go, you'll do 
 more than I think you will that's all I've got to say about 
 it." 
 
 And Mrs. Prescott walked off, not to waste time on a 
 subject of so little importance. 
 
 Ruth looked at me imploringly. " You don't mean it, 
 Miss Frost ! you know I can't go ! " 
 
 I hesitated. Immediately, Alice rose and went quietly
 
 210 SHILOH. 
 
 out. I could not but marvel at the fineness of her instincts. 
 Doubtless, she understood, as well as if I had told her so, 
 that her presence was, at that moment, a constraint upon me. 
 Struggle against it as I may, my affections, my sympathy, 
 and my emotions, will always refuse to utter themselves 
 freely in the presence of a third person, a looker-on, no 
 matter how congenial to me may be that person's self, nor 
 how thoroughly in sympathy with the spirit of the moment. 
 
 Then I put my arms round my excited companion. 
 " Ruth, it is the first favor I have asked of you. And I 
 have set jny heart upon it." 
 
 She burst into tears. " Of course, I 'cannot i-efuse, if 
 you insist, when you have done so much for me. But you 
 don't know what a trial it will be to me ! I can't bear all 
 those eyes ! " 
 
 If it had really been a favor for myself, in any narrow 
 sense, I could not have insisted. But it was for Ruth's 
 own sake that I steeled myself. 
 
 " You need not look at any eyes but mine, and they 
 intend to keep very tender watch over you. Xot because 
 of anything I have done for you, that is nothing, but to 
 show me that you love me, Ruth ! " 
 
 And so, finally, she promised.
 
 XX. 
 
 THE GAVYXNE PLACE. 
 
 r N nearly every New England village, I find, 
 there is some one dwelling that enjoys a sinister 
 distinction over its .neighbors. Either, it had its 
 foundation in some ugly . and ominous circum- 
 stance ; or it is stained through and through 
 with an ever-darkening story of horror ; or a dim 
 shadow of mystery lurks in its corners ; or it is 
 pervaded by the faint, misty, elusive scent of 
 ghostly revelries. Now and then, there appears to have 
 been a sufficient germ for this luxuriant, legendary foliage, 
 in some actual fact. Oftener still, it has grown out of the 
 gray old sti-ucture by a process analogous to that which 
 has covered its roof with moss and its walls with mould ; 
 without any more fertile soil wherein to have taken root, 
 than the bare fact that its builder came of an unknown 
 stock, or that it has, at some period of its history, stood for 
 a long time untenarited. And an empty house, in a quiet 
 New England town, is the lawful playground of the im- 
 agination, the readiest material for all the latent supersti- 
 tion of the place to work upon. The winds take up their 
 abode in it, and fill it with solemn whispers capable of mani- 
 fold interpretation, birds and bats people it with vague, 
 flitting forms, its chill, damp, vault-like atmosphere is 
 thrillingly suggestive of ghostly occupants, dry-rot gets 
 into its timbers and gnaws away at their heart like the
 
 212 SHILOH. 
 
 tooth of an uneasy conscience, its silence is full of inexplic- 
 able sound, its darkness flashes with mysterious light, 
 its very exterior is believed to have some indefinable pecu- 
 liarity. Strange whispers originating no one knoAvs where, 
 and swelling no one knows how are afloat concerning it ; 
 and people who do not believe them in their hearts, are 
 ready enough to give them currency with their lips. By 
 and by, children are afraid to pass it after nightfall ; and 
 their elders glance at it half-curiously, half-nervously, 
 reasoning vaguely within themselves that, where there is 
 so much of inference, there ought, for consistency's sake, to 
 be some small residuum of fact. The eerie character of the 
 house is established. It will take years of commonplace 
 occupancy to obliterate its claim to a dismal distinction ; 
 and a long course of the plodding prose of daily life to dis- 
 pel the half-poetic charm that environs it. 
 
 Mrs. Prescott's house is of this class. Its one undenia- 
 ble peculiarity is, that it has never had either a birth or a 
 death under its roof; a curious enough fact, in a dwelling 
 that is nearly a century old ; but explicable by the shifting 
 character of its occupancy. It has missed, therefore, some- 
 what of that gentle consecration of love and grief, which 
 makes the walls of a genuine home half sacred in their 
 aspect and influence, and a dim recognition thereof is, 
 doubtless, latent in the feeling with which it is regarded. 
 
 If you ask, generally, of its history, you will be told that 
 it Avas built, and first occupied, by a strange, silent family , 
 that came nobody knew whence, lived nobody knew ho\v, 
 and went nobody knew whither. To this will be appended 
 the vaguest tale with hardly enough of definite outline to 
 be anywise transferable to paper of three fair daughters, 
 who were visited one by one, with some inscrutable and 
 malignant fate ; and waxed unutterably wan and spirit-like 
 under its touch ; and slowly faded out of existence (but not 
 in the house, its mysterious immunity from death must 
 needs have prevented that) ; and whose spirits had been
 
 SHILOH. 213 
 
 
 
 seen flitting through the dense shadow of the orchard, 011 
 moonlight nights. If you push your inquiries more par- 
 ticularly, however, you will succeed in extracting as much 
 information about this unknown family as could reasonably 
 be expected to survive it ; in a community where it had not 
 sojourned long enough to establish, by means of inter-mar- 
 riage, birth, death, and familiar intercourse, any abiding 
 claim upon its sympathies. The real truth seeming to be, 
 that the Gwynnes (for such was their name) had once 
 known better days ; had here found a brief foothold upon ' 
 the slippery bank of Oblivion ; and, sliding thence, had 
 made that final plunge beneath its dark waters, beyond 
 which none but attached friends and hound-scented lawyers 
 would care to follow them. After them, came a number of 
 tenancies, of the briefest individual duration ; and then, a 
 long period of emptiness and neglect, during which rumors 
 and conjectures thickened around the deserted dwelling, 
 not less rapidly than the dust gathered on its floors, and 
 the mosses and lichens on its roof. 
 
 Finally, Mr. Prescott, his health having failed him in a 
 neighboring town, pitched upon it as a convenient residence 
 for the remainder of his own fast lapsing life; and one, 
 moreover, where his wife, in the event of her being left a 
 widow, would be within easy reach of the kindly offices 
 and sympathies of her paternal home. If the shrewd New 
 Englander had any unacknowledged idea of cheating death 
 of his lawful prey, in his own case, by removing to a house 
 that was reported to enjoy an immunity from his dread 
 visitations, the event proved, to the " great edification of 
 curious lookers-on, how equally inevitable were the stroke 
 of doom, and the mysterious spell that hedged round his 
 dwelling. Mr. Prescott died, suddenly, at a wayside inn, 
 while on a short journey ; and, in curious confirmation of 
 the received theory that death was, in no shape, to enter 
 that charmed precinct, he was never again permitted to 
 cross the threshold of his home. For, on the arrival of
 
 214 SHILOII. 
 
 his remains, it was found that their natural course of decay 
 had been so hastened by the extreme heat of the weather, 
 as to make it inexpedient to admit them within the dwel- 
 ling. They rested, therefore, in the broad, cool shadow of 
 the maples in the dooryard ; while knots of friends gathered 
 near, and prayers were said, and hymns sung, and all the 
 sombre routine and paraphernalia of woe went on around 
 them according to their dismal wont ; and then, they went 
 forth to seek admittance into that narrow, but hospitable 
 house, which opens its doors to all comers alike, and refuses 
 not its kindly shelter to any amount nor degree of material 
 or moral pollution. 
 
 In due course of time, the increasing years and cor- 
 responding infirmities of Mrs. Divine, and the troubles that 
 befell Mrs. Prescott in managing her farm, brought about 
 the removal of the latter to the old homestead, and the con- 
 solidation of the two households. It was then duly whis- 
 pered around that either Alice or her mother had been 
 selected for the Destroyer's next stroke, and that it had 
 become inevitably necessary for the unconscious victim to 
 seek out an available spot wherein to die, the Gwynne 
 Place, as everybody knew, being absolutely ineligible to 
 such an undertaking ; a prediction which, I scarcely need 
 say, still awaits fulfilment. Its terrors are now, however, 
 transferred to "William Dunn, whose future career will be 
 honored with an amount of interest, on this account, that 
 would scarcely have been accorded to it, upon its own 
 merits. If any casualty happens to himself; or if measles, 
 scarlet fever, or any of the ills which childhood is heir to, 
 makes a break in the line of his progeny, during the next 
 few years ; that will be accounted the occult cause for the 
 expulsion, of which Mrs. Prescott, in her zeal to provide 
 her clergyman with a suitable abode, is only the blind, 
 irresponsible agent. 
 
 All this or as much of it as could be told without jar- 
 ring upon Mrs. Prescott's sensibilities we made known to
 
 SHILOII. 215 
 
 Mr. Taylor, while our little party of five traversed the 
 " short cut across lots " between the Divine homestead 
 and the Gwynne Place. Mr. Taylor had stayed to dinner, 
 which accounts for his presence with us; and I had 
 made sure of Ruth by going after her. At first, she had 
 been silent and ill-at-ease ; sending shy, surreptitious 
 glances around her, in the evident expectation and dread 
 of surprising a look of pity, of contempt, or of dislike, up- 
 on some unguarded face ; but, of course, finding none, and 
 constantly growing brighter and more courageous thereby. 
 And Alice, as might be expected, had been quick to under- 
 stand and to second my efforts to make her feel that we 
 were glad to have her with us ; without treating it as if it 
 were an unusual occurrence, calling for either question or 
 comment. So she had gradually drifted to her natural 
 place among us ; and her spirits, having flung aside their 
 dreary, habitual weight, were fast rising to the sunny level 
 of the scene and the time, into harmony with the shining 
 verdure, the singing brook, the merry chirp of insects, the 
 rich warm glow of the early-afternoon sun. 
 
 For her sake I made an unwonted effort to be gay. I 
 seized eagerly, therefore, upon every chance for merriment 
 afforded by the peculiarities of the house which Mr. Taylor 
 was so soon to occupy. I ran rapidly over a list of divers 
 charms and counter-charms in repute among different na- 
 tions, from the horse-shoe of the Saxon to the monda of 
 the African ; discussed, in a serio-comic manner, their effi- 
 cacy and adaptation to the case in hand ; and deplored the 
 impossibility of procuring a fetich of gorilla's brain, or the 
 tail of a leopard, to imbue Mr. Taylor's heart with courage 
 proportioned to his probable or possible needs ! I rattled 
 on lightly enough, no doubt, considering the many points 
 where the subject touched unavoidably upon serious 
 things ; but my one object was to bring out the fitful 
 smiles upon Ruth's face ; and whenever her gleeful, bird- 
 like laugh rang out over the meadow (it is astonishing how
 
 216 SHILOH. 
 
 joyous her laugh is, when her voice seems to be possessed 
 with the very spirit of melancholy!), I congratulated my- 
 self upon so much gained, and cast about for some fresh 
 absurdity to utter. In due time I found my reward. 
 Ruth began to answer, as well as to listen and laugh ; 
 and her gayety, when it came, was far more genuine and 
 spontaneous than mine. 
 
 Mr. Taylor listened to us, for awhile, with a very 
 amused face. Then it grew so burdened with thought 
 that Mrs. Prescott, concluding that he stood in need of en- 
 couragement, came to the rescue. 
 
 " It's all nonsense," she began, in her quick, decided 
 way. " I can assure you, Mr. Taylor, that the house is as 
 good a house, and as quiet a house, as there is in Shiloh. 
 I lived there four years, and I never heard a sound that I 
 couldn't find a good reason for ; nor saw anything more 
 ghostlike in the orchard than a white cow, or calf, or some- 
 thing of that sort. And as for the ' spell ' that Miss Frost 
 makes so much of, I don't believe a bit more in that ! If 
 you live there long enough, you'll die there, I guess. I 
 only wish you might, you and all your family ! " 
 
 The letter of this wish, in spite of its unmistakable 
 friendliness of spirit, provoked so general a smile, that Mrs. 
 Prescott felt herself called upon to add an explanatory re- 
 mark or two, which, however, did not greatly mend the 
 matter. 
 
 " You all know what I mean, well enough. St. Jude's 
 hasn't had a rector for over a year or two, at a time, since 
 'twas built ; and I'd like to have one stay long enough to 
 die here once, that's all." 
 
 " Thank you," said Mr. Taylor, bowing half-courteously, 
 half-humorously. " I only hope Shiloh and I may suit each 
 other well enough to make such a length of sojourn desir- 
 able. But I ought to assure you, Mrs. Prescott, that the 
 evil reputation of the premises has no terrors for me. And 
 as for the ' spell,' Miss Frost, I have no desire to break
 
 SHILOH. 217 
 
 it ; however, that must be as the Lord wills. But I must 
 confess that my thoughts wandered a little during your 
 careful resume of available counter-charms ; and I really 
 forget which or how many you recommended for my adop- 
 tion. I was thinking how universal is this belief in ghosts, 
 spells, signs, etc. Even the worst sceptics in religious mat- 
 ters often partake of it. And I was puzzling myself with 
 the question, whence it springs. In most cases, I imagine 
 it is the result of an unconscious craving after some power 
 behind nature, and superior to her inalterable laws, which 
 may be disposed to take an occasional interest in human 
 affairs. There are times when natural laws seem so hard, 
 so chill, so unsympathizing, as all law must, without love 
 behind it, we are glad to escape from their hands into any 
 others which are capable of voluntary action. In short, I 
 suppose it is the igorant, unrenewed soul's spontaneous 
 reaching out after God. If men only knew it to be such, 
 how much better it would be for them ! " 
 
 " And I have been thinking," replied I, " that these 
 same superstitions have their value as an involuntary con- 
 cession to the spiritual part of man. Men do under- 
 stand and all the materialistic philosophy that was ever 
 taught, cannot persuade them to the contrary that there 
 is both within and without them, somewhat, a power, an 
 essence, or an influence, which, while it works harmoni- 
 ously enough with and through the laws of matter, is not 
 obedient to them, but immeasurably above and beyond 
 them. Superstitions do not come of the earthly, sordid 
 part of man ; they have little or nothing to do with the 
 faculties that are employed in adding barn to barn, and 
 field to field ; they belong, however mistaken or degraded, 
 to his spiritual nature, and are born of his spiritual needs ; 
 and therefore I am inclined to concede them some slight 
 claim to respectful consideration." 
 
 " And I think," said Mrs. Prescott, sharply, " that they 
 are a great deal too foolish to waste so many words about. 
 10
 
 218 sniLoii. 
 
 But here we are ; and now work, and not talk, is to be the 
 order of the day. At "least for those who can't do both at 
 once. And I always find that when my tongue is still, my 
 hands move the fastest." 
 
 The Gwynne Place had certainly nothing in its exte- 
 rior to warrant its occupying so much space in our talk, 
 or in this letter. It was simply a gray, reverend farm- 
 house ; with a long ' row of maples in front, and a large, 
 dense orchard in the rear. Time and weather had left legi- 
 ble enough traces upon it, and it had the forlorn look of 
 emptiness about it ; but otherwise, it was a house as little 
 suggestive of ghostly tenants as could well be conceived of. 
 
 We found its interior in a perplexing state of topsy- 
 turvity ; but Mrs. Prescott set to work, with her usual 
 energy and directness of purpose, and soon cleai'ed a space 
 for action. Then she produced, from some quarter, a kettle 
 of paste, several rolls of wall-paper, scissors, and brush ; and 
 set about measuring, cutting, trimming, pasting, and hang- 
 ing, as if she had been born to the business. 
 
 Ruth, too, threw herself into the work with a cheerful 
 alacrity and heartiness that it was good to see. Having 
 first helped Mr. Taylor to clear the parlor, she found the 
 carpet thereto appropriated, satisfied herself that it required 
 no other fitting than a little turning in on one side, rum- 
 maged about for a hammer and tacks, and went down 
 upon her knees and commenced operations at once. The 
 quick, sharp sound of her hammer echoed through the 
 house ; and it was followed by a cheery little carol from 
 her lips, that seemed to bubble up from the very well- 
 spring of joyfulness. I could not help stopping to watch 
 her a moment, she looked so bright and happy ; and she 
 did her work so easily and so well, with a simple, uncon- 
 scious grace that gave it the easy charm of play. 
 
 " Ghosts would not endure the spectacle for a moment,". 
 I was saying to myself, when I was startled by a deep, 
 unexpected voice behind me ; 
 
 " Well ! if I ain't dumbpounded ! "
 
 XXI. 
 
 SETTING TO EIGHTS, WITHOUT AND WITHIN. 
 
 ( COKING round, I saw Aunt Vin's calico sun- 
 bonnet jerking spasmodically in the doorway ; 
 while the wearer thereof was taking in the 
 whole scene, with an amazed glance. 
 
 " Is that Ruth Winnot ? " she proceeded, 
 after a moment, " or is it a pectoral allusion ? " 
 
 " How do you do ? " said I, holding out my 
 hand. " Speak for yourself, Ruth, and tell Miss 
 Rust whether you are a spectral illusion, or not." 
 
 " My very own self, Aunt Vin ! " declared Ruth, merrily, 
 holding her hammer suspended over a nail, while she spoke, 
 and then bringing it down sharply, by way of point to her 
 sentence. " If you doubt it, pinch me, and see if I don't 
 cry out like real flesh and blood ! " 
 
 " That would be concussive evidence," returned Aunt 
 Vin, drily. " But, bless me ! Miss Frost ! what sort of 
 hokers-pokers have you been a-trying on the girl? I 
 shouldn't have known her, if I'd have met her anywhere's 
 out of Shiloh. She used to look ' like Patience on emolu- 
 ment, sp'iling with grief;' now, she's a good deal more 
 like a ' butterfly, born in a bowery.' She'll be the sinecure 
 of all eyes, this afternoon, I guess." 
 
 Ruth's face fell. That was exactly what she dreaded 
 
 most. I hastened to give a different color to her thoughts. 
 
 "Do not be turning Ruth's head with your compli-
 
 220 SHILOH. 
 
 merits, Miss Rust ! If she is pretty enough to attract 
 everybody's gaze, it is not necessary to tell her of it ; I 
 cannot afford to have her spoiled with vanity, yet." 
 
 Aunt Vin stared hard for a moment ; then, her grim 
 features slowly relaxed into a smile, and her head jerked a 
 kind of austere admiration. 
 
 " You ought to have been a dippermat or a fileofficer ! 
 You're deep enough to beat Talleyrant and Michael Velli 
 at their own game ! " 
 
 Then she turned to Ruth. " Well, anyhow, I'm just as 
 glad to eee you here, as if I had sore eyes, and you was 
 some sort of patent delirium. And the sight of your 
 industry is real respiring ! It reminds me that it's high 
 time I was set about something, myself. I'm always 
 restful and uneasy when I ain't to work at something. 
 Who is the queen-bee pro temporal of this hive, Miss 
 Frost ? " 
 
 I could not answer. Aunt Vin's opening sentences had 
 sent me in haste to the window, to laugh my irrepressible 
 laugh unseen. Ruth saw my condition, and came to the 
 rescue. 
 
 " I can't say who the queen-bee is, Aunt Vin; but you 
 will find Mr. Taylor and Mrs. Prescott in the other room, 
 if you want directions. Or you can set yourself to work, 
 as I.did. One can't go much amiss, in this house ; there is 
 work enough for all that come, and more too, I fancy." 
 
 " Oh, you'll have an enforcement soon," replied Aunt Vin, 
 encouragingly. " Essie Volger's on-a-root now, I guess ; I 
 saw her horse at the gate, as I came along. And there's 
 two or three unmentionables, we'll ct.ll 'em, who're sure 
 to come ; just to see that your carpet goes down concisely 
 straight, Ruth ; and to take a look at Mr. Taylor's goods 
 and chatters, and make sure that he hasn't got any more 
 carpets and curtains and pots and kettles, and other perso- 
 nal defects, than the law allows," she added, dryly, as her 
 vibratory sun-bonnet disappeared from the doorway.
 
 SHILOII. 221 
 
 Ruth and I looked at each other, and gave way to the 
 irresistible contagion of repressed mirth. She was the first 
 to recover herself. 
 
 " Aunt Vin is a great deal too good to be laughed at," 
 she observed, wiping her eyes ; " my conscience rebukes 
 me every time I do it. But she does say such absurd 
 things ! what is one to do ? " 
 
 " Only to take care that she does not see the laugh, and 
 feel hurt by it. I respect Aunt Yin's character from the 
 bottom of my heart, Ruth, her active kindness, her ready 
 sympathy, her voluntary assumption of tasks which others 
 shun, are worthy of all honor ; but her vocabulary is 
 fairly a subject for mirth, I think ; if the laugh is un- 
 mingled with any disrespect toward herself. But I must 
 not linger here any longer, laughing at that, nor enjoying 
 the pretty spectacle of your bright activity : it is time I 
 followed her good example, and found something to do." 
 
 " Not away from me ! " exclaimed Ruth, in affright. 
 " If you desert me now, when all those people are coming, 
 I'll never put faith in you again." 
 
 The difficulty was settled by the appearance of Mr. 
 Taylor, with a pile of muslin curtains in his arms. 
 
 " I am ashamed to bring you these, Miss Frost," said 
 he, surveying them dubiously, " but such are Mrs. Pres- 
 cott's orders. To be sure, they are all the parlor curtains 
 we have, or are like to have, but that last wash seems to 
 have established their claims to go on the retired list. For- 
 tunately, life is possible without parlor curtains. Relieve 
 my mind by saying that you will have nothing to do with 
 them." 
 
 " And burden my conscience ? No, no, Mr. Taylor, you 
 have brought me a job after my own heart, and I cannot 
 resign it so easily. I have a genius for darning and patch- 
 ing, as you will allow when your curtains are made to look 
 ' maist as weel as new.' " 
 
 " A sure sign that you are destined for a poor man's
 
 222 . SHILOH. 
 
 wife," said a cheery voice at my elbow. " Leave the cur- 
 tains, Mr. Taylor, and I will help Miss Frost to rejuvenate 
 them ; that is, if she will accept of my coadjutorship." 
 
 " Thank you, I could not wish for a better. How do 
 you do, Miss Volger ? " 
 
 " If I were sure you would ' give it the right interpreta- 
 tion, I should say ' None the better for seeing you ' at my 
 house, I mean. In other words, much the worse for ndt 
 seeing you. Is that poor, little call of mine never to be 
 returned ? I shall heap coals of fire on your head by mak- 
 ing you another." 
 
 " I devoutly wish you would ! It would be a refreshing 
 oasis of real kindness in the dreary desert of visiting eti- 
 quette. But I am coming to pay my debt no, to see you 
 very soon. Do you know my friend here, Miss 
 Winnot ? " 
 
 Ruth looked up shyly from her work, and flushed crim- 
 son ; but there was something very reassuring in the frank 
 cordiality of Miss Essie's smile, and the easy grace with 
 which she stooped to shake hands. The cheery glow of 
 the smile was quickly reflected on Ruth's face ; and the 
 flush went almost as fast as it came. 
 
 " Yes, I know Miss Winnot by sight," said Miss Es- 
 sie, "but not nearly so well as I wish I did. I see her, at 
 church, perched ' up aloft,' like the cherub that takes care 
 of poor Jack ; and singing like one, too ; and I had a 
 vague impression that, when she got through, she spread 
 her wings, and flew up into the seventh heaven, or some 
 place equally out of the reach of ordinary mortals. And 
 to find her here of all things in the world ! nailing down 
 carpets ! But it is a gratification to have such satisfactory 
 evidence that she is at home in the sphere of humanity, 
 and does not live above the toils and interests of common 
 life. And I consider it a highly providential circumstance 
 that we meet here to-day, for I want to consult her about a 
 project I have in view."
 
 SHILOH, 223 
 
 Ruth dropped her hammer, and waited, with a puzzled, 
 yet pleased, expression for what was to come next. Evi- 
 dently, she was amazed to find herself drifting thus swiftly 
 and quietly into the strong current of active life ; from any 
 pleasant participation wherein she had believed herself to 
 be distinctly marked out by the baleful shadow of deform- 
 ity, and from which she had held so persistently aloof. Yet 
 no sooner did she appear, than her place among the work- 
 ers and the interests of the outside world opened to her, as 
 if by magic, and her tenure seemed accounted a fixed fact ! 
 It only goes to show how universal are the ramifications of 
 human interests; how many and kindly the twining ten- 
 drils of affection. No one need to be a recluse, except by 
 his own fault. If he find himself constantly overlooked and 
 ignored, in the general interchange of charities, it is nearly 
 certain to be the result of some incapacitating defect in his 
 own sympathies ; some chilling inafiability of manner, or 
 heavy, inert unresponsiveness of feeling. But Ruth had 
 none of these. Like the angel with whom Jacob wrestled 
 of old, she was ready, when once fairly overcome, to bless 
 you with any required amount of affectionate regard. 
 
 " You do wonders with that accordeon of yours," JMiss 
 Essie went on, after a moment's pause ; seeing that she was 
 to get no other answer than the waiting, listening look in 
 Ruth's eyes ; " it is a mystery to me how you get so much 
 music out of it. If there is as much shut up in every other 
 instrument of the sort, what a life-long imprisonment it 
 undergoes ! But I wanted to ask you if it would grieve 
 you very much to have your accordeon displaced by a 
 melodeon ? " 
 
 I gave a little start. Ruth's face beamed with pleasure. 
 
 " It would not grieve me at all, Miss Volger ; I should 
 be delighted. I have only used my accordeon in church, 
 occasionally, because it was a little a very little better 
 than nothing. It helped to fill up, as we had so few voices ; 
 sometimes, you know, there is nobody but Eben Hyde
 
 224 SHILOH. 
 
 and me. But is there really a prospect of our having a 
 melodeon ? And who is to play it ? " 
 
 Miss ESSIE. There is just that a prospect. I know 
 where a second-hand melodeon in perfect order, and really, 
 as good as new can be bought for fifty dollars. Mrs. 
 Danforth promises to give ten, I will give as much more, 
 and I mean to try my luck at begging, for the balance. 
 Such an onslaught as I shall make on the double-barricaded 
 pockets of our Shiloh farmers, next week ! 
 
 MALA. There goes your cherished plan into fragments ! 
 Miss Essie will get the melodeon, and play it ; and you 
 will have neither lot, nor part, nor worst of all ! cre"dit, 
 in the matter. 
 
 Miss ESSIE (icith evident efforf). And I have taken a 
 vow that nobody shall escape me. Every man, woman, 
 and child, that I meet is to be button-holed, and discoursed 
 to upon the blessedness of giving. " Small sums thankfully 
 received ; large ones " with incredulity ! Have you either 
 a large, or a small one, to.give me, Miss Frost ? 
 
 MALA. It is too much to be asked to assist in your own 
 discomfiture ! Since she has taken the work out of your 
 hands, let her get through with it as best she can. 
 
 I (coldly). I don't know. I will think about it, Miss 
 Volger. 
 
 Essie looked disappointed and chilled, and bent over her 
 work, interweaving her needle in and out among the threads 
 of a darn, with great precision and persistency. Ruth 
 drove a nail or two, plainly with a divided mind, and then 
 broke out afresh. 
 
 " I do hope we may get that melodeon ! it would add 
 so much to our services ! But who will play it, Miss 
 Volger ? " 
 
 "I had thought of asking Miss Frost to do us that 
 favor, while she stays in Shiloh," replied Essie, in a formal, 
 spiritless way ; " I have heard that her playing is something 
 wonderful."
 
 SHILOH. 225 
 
 MALA (pricking up her ears). Ah! you are not to be 
 ignored entirely, it appears ! Perhaps you can afford to do 
 something for them, after all. 
 
 Box A (icith extreme ^severity). It is your glory, then, 
 not God's which is in question ! 
 
 I (reproachfully). You know I took so much pleasure in 
 the prospect of making Him an offering of the melodeon ! and 
 that I reserved Uncle John's check for that express purpose ! 
 
 BOXA. An offering to Him ! it looks more like an offer- 
 ing to^Self! Otherwise you would rejoice to see that the 
 Holy Spirit had stirred up another heart to activity in His 
 service; and would willingly stand aside and give it way. 
 So the Lord's work be done, according to His will, what 
 can it matter who does it ? 
 
 MALA. But, in many cases, you know you could do it so 
 much better than any one else ! 
 
 BOXA. That you can never know. God, surely, un- 
 derstands the adaptations of His instruments to the end 
 He has in view ; and His strength can be made perfect in 
 their weakness. Can you ever Tje sure that you have been 
 taken into His counsels, and that your end and His, are the 
 same? 
 
 I (gloomily}. What, then, am I to do, in this matter ? 
 
 BOXA. Say, rather, " Lord, what wilt Thou have me to 
 do ? " Contribute, in your proportion, to the purchase of 
 the melodeon ; and save the balance of your check for any 
 future needs, to which the parish may not so readily respond. 
 
 MALA. It looks so much more generous to give fifty 
 dollars in a lump, than to dole it out, little by little ! 
 
 BOXA. Looks so to whom ? God ? 
 
 Mala was, plainly, disconcerted. 
 
 BOXA. Moreover, let Miss Essie play the melodeon, if 
 she can do it tolerably, as no doubt she can. It is her 
 rightful place, if she cares for it, not yours. Christian 
 courtesy and humility alike demand that you, an outsider, 
 should not thrust yourself, or allow yourself to be thrust,
 
 226 SHILOH. 
 
 into any position which can be filled as well, and more 
 legitimately, by another. There is always enough of quiet, 
 unostentatious, yet most true and laudable, service, to be 
 done for God, which no one will dispute with you. Save 
 your strength for the point where it is most needed. Strive 
 to be, in the Church, what gravitation is, in nature, itself 
 unseen, but keeping all things, whether small or great, 
 active or motionless, in their appropriate places and doing 
 their appointed work. 
 
 I sat, gloomily unresponsive, staring out of the window. 
 
 BONA (gathering her forces for a formal assault}. Perhaps 
 the Christian grace, of all others the hardest to attain, is 
 humility. To stand aside, when we have fought the battle 
 well-nigh to the end, and let another bear off the spoils and 
 the honors of victory ; to sow prayerfully, and water 
 patiently, and cheerfully resign the increase to an after- 
 comer ; these are the things which show the stuff we are 
 made of ! We can conceive most reverently be it spoken ! 
 that the Son of God Himself, if He had been required to 
 give up His great work of redemption to an ai-changel ; 
 after He had meditated ovev it, aiid prepared for it, and 
 " desired it with desire," from the silent reaches of eternity; 
 would have felt a momentary unwillingness to resign, not 
 the praise, not the gratitude, not the glory, but the tender 
 joy of self-sacrifice, the deep-down, bitter-sweet delight of 
 vicarious suffering, the thrilling ecstasy of success. But 
 2le would have conquered it, you know ! 
 
 There was a brief struggle. Then I brought my eyes 
 and my thoughts back to the work in hand. As soon as I 
 could command my voice, I said, as cordially as possible, 
 
 " I have been thinking over that matter of the melodeon, 
 Miss Essie ; and when you have made your threatened as- 
 sault on those pockets, will you do me the favor to let me 
 know the amount of the deficiency ? " 
 
 " Oh ! certainly, thank you ! " she exclaimed, recover- 
 ing her wonted ease and animation of manner, at once. 
 But further conversation was stopped by a fresh arrival.
 
 XXII. 
 
 DISCOKDS. 
 
 HE new comers were Mrs. Burcham and Mrs. 
 w Shemnar, the one keen, brisk, alert, vig- 
 orous ; the other slow, bland, smiling, and 
 vapid. The former walked straight into the 
 room, her sharp black eyes taking instant note 
 of all that it contained ; the latter sank down 
 on a box just outside the door, complained of 
 the heat, and fanned herself with her sun-bon- 
 net, while her light blue eyes wandered slowly and half- 
 absently from one object to another. 
 
 Both looked surprised at sight of Ruth Winnot, and 
 each gave her a characteristic nod ; the one sharp and 
 crisp as a gust of winter-wind, the other sultry and turbid 
 as the breath of a morning in dog-days ; but neither made 
 any remark. For which unexpected piece of consideration, 
 or mark of indifference, or uncertainty how to deal with so 
 unusual a fact, or whatever it might be, I was so grateful 
 to them that I gave both an unwontedly cordial greeting. 
 Which emboldened Mrs. Burcham (though it may be ques- 
 tioned if she stood in need of such encouragement, and 
 would not have done the same thing without it) to come 
 and bend over me, inspecting my work. 
 
 It is singular how spontaneous and inevitable is the ten- 
 dency of soine persons to arouse antagonism, provoke dis- 
 cussion, ii d elicit electrical sparks of ill-humor, wherever
 
 228 SHILOH. 
 
 they present themselves. The acrid quality of their own 
 moral atmosphere diffuses itself insensibly around them, 
 and is returned upon them again and again ; as the air of 
 a confined room continually comes back to be re-inhaled, 
 and still farther corrupted, by lungs that have already viti- 
 ated its healthful, vitalizing properties. It is probable 
 enough that these unfortunates never quite understand the 
 nature or the caiise of their infelicity, nor by what natural 
 and inalterable laws their own uncomfortable moods are con- 
 tinually reflected back upon them, but go through life ascrib- 
 ing the opposition they excite and the ill-temper they evoke 
 to causes entirely outside themselves. Either they believe 
 that the world is, everywhere and always, the unlovely, 
 bitter, hostile, and provoking thing they find it ; or they 
 fancy that it cherishes some unaccountable spite and ran- 
 cor toward them, and grow ever sourer and more acrimon- 
 ious thereby. 
 
 Mrs. Burcham belongs to this class. She not only has 
 the gift of making herself -disagreeable in a marked and 
 peculiar degree ; but the added power of detecting and 
 bringing forth, as by the touch of a loadstone, all the la- 
 tent disagreeableness of others. She and Mrs. Prescott 
 rarely meet without . a shower of sparks, as when steel 
 strikes flint ; Essie Volger often comes in collision with her 
 in a way that evolves more clash than harmony ; and more 
 than once in Sewing Society matters, I have avoided irritat- 
 ing friction only by declining to enter into any discus- 
 sions. 
 
 So innate, and apparently involuntary, is her propensity 
 to oppose, to battle, to condemn, that I have been driven 
 to account for it by the supposition that her ancestors 
 must have sprung, somehow, from that hot-headed race 
 of warriors which cropped up out of the ground wherein 
 Cadmus had sown the dragon's teeth ; and that the hered- 
 itary instincts have not been greatly Aveakened by a long 
 interfusion of years and alien blood.
 
 SHILOH. 229 
 
 " Mercy on us ! " she exclaimed, lifting the worn and 
 torn portion of the curtain upon which I was at work, 
 " what in the world are you doi.ig with those ragged 
 things ? " 
 
 " Mending them, Mrs. Burcham." 
 
 She turned to the part which had been restored, and 
 examined it minutely. 
 
 " Well ! it's a wonderful specimen of mending, there's 
 no gainsaying that," she said, at length, but rather as if 
 she grudged the, admission. " Still, I must say, I think it's 
 a frightful waste of time." 
 
 " I cannot quite agree with you," replied I ; " I do not re- 
 gard anything, in reason, as a waste of time, which adds 
 to the comfort or the tasteful appearance of a home. The 
 sense of sight calls for some gratification, as well as the 
 other senses." 
 
 ESSIE VOLGER (taking up the subject with animation). 
 If Miss Frost had embroidered a pin-cushion, or a tidy, to 
 give to Mrs. Taylor, you wouldn't have called it a waste 
 of time. Yet it would have cost more work, and not have 
 been doing her half so real a service. 
 
 MRS. BURCHAM. Umph ! I've neither tidies nor mus- 
 lin curtains in my parlor. My curtains are of green paper ; 
 it didn't cost much to get them, and it won't cost much to 
 replace them when they're worn out. And what is good 
 enough for me, is good enough for my minister's wife, I 
 guess. 
 
 It is impossible to do justice to the tone in which Mrs. 
 Burcham said " my minister." It seemed to imply that 
 Mr. Taylor belonged to her absolutely, body, soul, family, 
 and possessions. I am in doubt to this day whether Bona 
 or Mala had most to do with my rejoinder; certainly it . 
 sprang from no inconsiderable depth of feeling of some sort. 
 
 "The rule admits of a much wider application than 
 that, Mrs. Burcham. In a certain abstract sense, what is 
 good enough for the beggar at your door is good enough
 
 230 SHILOII. 
 
 for you ; and what is good enough for you is good enough 
 for the king ; and what is agreeable to one portion of man- 
 kind ought to be agreeable to the rest. Therefore, since 
 the Esquimaux delight in raw meat and train-oil, let us 
 order them for dinner to-morrow." 
 
 ESSIE. And a seal-skin suit to eat them in ! 
 
 MRS. BURCHAM (seeing a loophole of escape, and making 
 for it). You forget the difference in climate, Miss Frost ! 
 
 I (quietly closing the aperture in her face]. You forgot 
 the difference in taste, habit, education, Mrs. Burcham ! 
 
 ESSIE (hurrying to make the fastening secure). Be- 
 cause Mrs. Taylor has been accustomed alt her life to do 
 without cows, sheep, poultry, a dairy flowing with milk 
 and butter, a cheese-room lined with cheeses, a cellar 
 stored Avith apples, cider, vegetables, pork, presses burst- 
 ing with blankets, quilts, comfortables, linen, and whatever 
 goes to make up the completest idea of farm-house plenty, 
 you would think it unjust and unreasonable that you 
 should be required to dispossess yourself of all these 
 things. Because Polly Sykes has no curtains at all to her 
 windows, neither paper, muslin, nor anything else (ex- 
 cept she makes an old newspaper do duty, now and then), 
 is that a good reason why you should give up yours ? 
 So, if Mrs. Taylor has been accustomed to think her par- 
 lor incomplete without snowy muslin curtains, tastefully 
 looped back from the windows, and books on the table, 
 and pictures on the wall ; and she has been able to get 
 them, or has had friends kind enough to give them to her ; 
 do not grudge her the pleasure of having them, nor Miss 
 Frost's time in mending them. 
 
 I (giving a last turn to the lock). Or, If you really 
 think it should be " share and share alike," send her half 
 your cows, hens, butter, cheese, etc., etc., and take half of 
 her curtains in return. 
 
 ESSIE (flinging a gibe through the keyhole}. Mending 
 thrown in !
 
 SHILOH. 231 
 
 MRS. BURCHAM (her black eyes flashing ominously). I 
 don't object to Mrs. Taylor's having embroidered muslin 
 curtains if she wants them, and can afford it ; I can't. 
 And if she don't mind their looking like the last gasp of 
 would-be gentility, before it gives up the ghost ! But I 
 own I do hate to see time wasted. And I did think yours 
 and Miss Frost's ought to be too valuable to be flung away 
 on old worn-out things, that must go to pieces in another 
 wash or two, anyhow. But you ought to know best about 
 that. If it isn't, all right. 
 
 ESSIE (musingly). To be sure, it would be better to 
 buy new ones, they might last longer, and I think we 
 might accomplish it, if you would be so good as to head 
 the subscription, and take it round. 
 
 MRS. BURCHAM: (reddening with anger). Thank you, 
 Miss Volger, but I believe I can spend my time better 
 than in encouraging my minister, or his wife, to strive after 
 the pomps and vanities of the world ; things he's bound to 
 preach against, if he does his duty. 
 
 ESSIE (in apparent soliloquy, holding up a very dilap- 
 idated curtain, and gravely surveying it). Um " pomps 
 and vanities ! " Decidedly more vanity than pomp, I 
 should say ! Light as a feather, and thin as a spider's 
 web ! Several holes and a border around them ! Plenty 
 of openwork and nexl to nothing to hold it together! 
 Ventilation amply provided for; protection dispensed 
 with ! Benevolently designed to let candle-light out 
 and sunlight in ! Well, yes, vanity enough, in the sense 
 of want of substance, and to spare ! .But as for 
 
 AUNT Vi^r (severely, from the doonoay, having caught 
 the last sentences in passing). Essie Volger! you must be 
 inside yourself to be a-holding Mr. Taylor's things up to 
 ludicule, like that ! I'm ashamed of you ! And as for the 
 curtains, I'm sure they look well enough, after they're 
 mended, if they was a little decapitated, to begin with. 
 
 " Aunt Viu ! " screamed Essie, hysterically, " I never
 
 232 siiiLoir. 
 
 thought of ridiculing the curtains. I was merely trying 
 to convince Mrs. Burcham that they do not come under 
 the head of the pomps of this world." 
 
 " I should think not," returned Aunt Vin, emphatically. 
 " Seems to me they'd go better among the fortifications of 
 the flesh. Though, to be sure, you've put in those patches 
 and darns so nicely that they ain't even risible from here. 
 But when I do get nigh enough to extinguish 'em, they go 
 to my heart. They show so plainly how ministers have to 
 save and pinch to get along and keep up a decent appari- 
 tion before folks, for it won't do for ministers to go shab- 
 by, they nor their houses, they've got to look respectable 
 outside, though they've got nothing inside but the heads 
 of their next concourse and an appetite ! And what 'toils 
 and hardships they have to endure, and no thanks to no- 
 body ! Poor creturs ! they have to do the most work for 
 the least rumination of anybody I know of!" 
 
 And Aunt Vin went back to her work, shaking her head 
 most lugubriously. 
 
 Mrs. Burcham started to follow her, but stopped in the 
 doorway to say,' petulantly, 
 
 " I'm sick of hearing people talk about ministers' toils 
 and sacrifices ! As if they weren't well paid for it ! " 
 
 Now this has been a sore point with me, Francesca, 
 ever since I found Cousin Will in that miserable little fos- 
 silized parish of Redburn, in a community of well-to-do 
 farmers, going without eggs, milk, or butter, for weeks to- 
 gether, to say nothing of things even more necessary ; in 
 short, patiently solving the problem how little could keep 
 body and soul together ; and in imminent danger of sun- 
 dering that long-suffering pair, some frosty morning, by a 
 very slight miscalculation. I suddenly flashed out, there- 
 fore : 
 
 " Do you really think they are well paid for it, Mrs. " 
 Burcham ? When you send for a clergyman, at dead of 
 night, to baptize your sick child, do you pay him for it ?
 
 SHILOH. 233 
 
 When you desire him to come five miles into the country 
 to preach a sermon over it, and three miles in another di- 
 rection to see it decently buried, obliging him to hire a 
 horse and carriage for the transit, do you pay him for it ? 
 When he visits you in your desolation, and teaches you 
 how to assume the garments of praise for the spirit of 
 heaviness, do you pay him for it ? When he leads you, 
 step by step, down into the valley of the shadow of death, 
 never letting go your hand until he has put it into the 
 strong, tender one of Christ, do you pay him for it ? And 
 while, year after year, he watches for your soul, as one who 
 must give account ; battling with your indifference, bearing 
 with your asperities, patient with your infirmities, gentle 
 with your prejudices, sorrowing over your lapses into sin, 
 carrying you daily before the throne of grace, and wrestling 
 with God, as Jacob of old, for a blessing upon you and 
 yours, do you pay him for it ? Or are all these things 
 ' in the bond ' whereby Shiloh (Shylock were the better 
 name, methinks !) agrees to receive him as her clergyman, 
 and to pay something less than four hundred dollars for 
 his services ? Does that mean service by day, service by 
 night, service in sickness, service iu health, service of head 
 and heart, service of prayer and teaching, service of care, 
 of counsel, of warning, of forbearance, of consolation ? 
 Are all his kindly affections and quiet charities, every 
 timely admonition, every sympathetic tear, every pro- 
 duct of brain and hand, reckoned as bought and paid for 
 by that four hundred dollars ? Does nothing remain for 
 friendliness, for generosity ? *For four hundred dollars, is 
 he supposed to have become so poor, abject, slavish, that 
 he has nothing left to give to another, either of the warmth 
 of his heart, the utterance of his lips, or the prayers of his 
 soul ? Are none of these his ? are they all ' i' the bond ? ' 
 All sold to Shiloh for four hundred dollars ! And an ex- 
 cellent bargain ! He is ' well paid ! ' ' 
 
 MRS. BUECHAM {looking somewhat aghast). Of course I 
 didn't mean all that, Miss Frost !
 
 234: BHILOII. 
 
 I. "Will you be good enough to tell me what you did 
 mean, then ? 
 
 MES. BUKCHAM (stammering). Why a you know a 
 that a we have a right to expect that our minister 
 shall visit us in sickness, and attend our funerals, and all 
 those things, because we all help to support him, you 
 know. 
 
 L Help to support him ! There it is ! Every other 
 laborer is supposed to support himself by his labor; a 
 clergyman is said to be " supported by " his parish. He 
 never earns a fair salary, but his people "give him a com- 
 fortable support ! " Did it ever occur to you to say that 
 you helped to support your grocer, butcher, shoemaker, 
 physician, lawyer, Mrs. Burcham ? Did you ever base on 
 that ground a claim to overweight in every pound of sugar, 
 gratuitous supplies of meat, several pairs of shoes per year 
 as a bonus for your patronage, night-visits never to be 
 charged in the bill, and briefs and travelling not to be in- 
 cluded in the fees ? Yet a clergyman has his regular work, 
 for which he receives a stipulated payiflent, just as much 
 as any of these, writing of sermons on week-days, officiat- 
 ing in desk and pulpit on Sundays, care of Sunday School, 
 baptism of infants, regular visitation of parish, and perhaps 
 burials of his own congregation (which he has a right to 
 expect will be so arranged as to cause him no expense). If, 
 in addition to these, out of the largeness of his heart and 
 his zeal for his Master's service, he chooses to hold himself 
 at the beck and call of every conscience-stricken soul* every 
 sick woman, every dying man, every corpse, every mourner, 
 every poverty-pinched household, within a radius of five 
 miles of his dwelling ; though such claimant never entered 
 his church nor gave a sixpence toward his salary ; let it 
 be so accounted of as a favor, a deed of brotherly kindness, 
 a loving gift of a generous heart, to be gratefully received 
 and thankfully acknowledged, and not as a service set 
 down in the bond, and duly paid for ! Do not assume that,
 
 SIIILOH. 235 
 
 because he is paid for conducting public worship, he is also 
 paid for kneeling at your bedside and commending your 
 soul to God. In the first place, love, sympathy, private 
 prayers, are not bought and sold in the market. In the 
 second place, if they were, they would command a higher 
 price. 
 
 MRS. BUECHAM (having recovered herself}. You speak 
 very contemptuously of that four hundred dollars ; I sup- 
 pose it does seem small to any one with extravagant city 
 notions. But it is more than half the families in Shiloh 
 have to live upon. Major Burcham and I haven't spent 
 over three hundred, this last year, all told. 
 
 Miss ESSIE. Did you reckon all the milk, butter, eggs, 
 potatoes, early vegetables, pork, rye, etc., that you used, at 
 the market price ? 
 
 MKS. BURCHAM (carelessly}. Oh ! we raise all those 
 things, you know ! 
 
 ESSIE (tcith a fiery spark in her eye). But Mr. Taylor 
 does not raise them, you know ! He has his sermons to 
 write, and he must hold himself in readiness to respond to 
 your calls in sickness, trouble and death. He buys them, 
 and you sell them to him at the highest market prices. 
 You do not think them worth reckoning among your living 
 expenses ; they form a large item in his. If they really 
 cost you nothing, why not let him have them at the same 
 cheap rate? Come, I'll be one of fifteen or twenty to 
 furnish Mr. Taylor with everything of ordinary farm-growth 
 that he needs during the coming year. If we do not feel 
 the loss of what we use ourselves, nor make any account of 
 it, we shall not be ruined by an additional fifteenth or 
 twentieth of his consumption. 
 
 There was a dead silence. 
 
 Then Mrs. Shemnar said, with her weak little laugh, 
 " It's all very well for rich people like you, Essie Volger, to 
 make such a proposal, but " 
 
 ESSIE, (interrupting her}. That shall not stand in the
 
 236 SHILOH. 
 
 way for a moment. I will give two shares, or three, in 
 proportion to my means. 
 
 Another silence. Essie waited for some moments, while 
 the flush slowly faded from her cheek ; then she resumed 
 her work, and her full, red lip took on its most scornful 
 curve. 
 
 BONA (softly). Do you not see that all your discussion, 
 carried on in this spirit, is worse than useless? Mrs. Bur- 
 cham and Mrs. Shemnar will remember all your gibes and 
 stings, and forget your reasoning. 
 
 I (choking down an irritating remark that was rising to 
 my lips). Well! a truce to discussion! No doubt Mrs. 
 Burcham will find her own graceful and effectual way of 
 showing her regard for Mr. Taylor ; even though she does 
 not join in our curtain-mending, nor accept your proposi- 
 tion in regard to the farm-produce, Miss Essie. Probably 
 she realizes, not less fully than we, that his happiness and 
 that of his family depend, from henceforth, very much upon 
 the kindness, sympathy, and forbearance, of this people. 
 She feels that whatever we do to make his abode a " House 
 Beautiful," will, like all kindly, unselfish work, react favor- 
 ably upon ourselves. Any parish which does its best to 
 provide its clergyman with a pleasant and convenient 
 home; thereby freeing him from petty annoyances and 
 cares, and enabling him to give his mind more unreservedly 
 to his intellectual and moral work ; will surely find its ac- 
 count, not only in the heartier, more thorough and more 
 helpful ministrations it will receive, but in its own warmer 
 interest and affection, and its more vigorous life. And there 
 will be, between it and its minister, a continually increasing 
 interchange of kindly deeds, delicate consideration, grati- 
 tude, sympathy, love. Very different from the parochial re- 
 lation which exists where the clergyman is expected to visit 
 constantly, and never be visited; always to sympathize, 
 yet ask for no sympathy ; to pray for all, and be prayed 
 for of noiie ; to study the welfare of each individual in his
 
 BHiLorr. 237 
 
 cure, while no one takes thought for him ! I wotild not 
 quarrel with the first-mentioned parish, if it did assert that 
 it ' gave its clergyman a support ; ' since it would doubtless 
 be equally ready to declare that its clergyman gave, in re- 
 turn, his labor and his love the best of his thought and 
 life. And I feel sure that Mrs. Burcham will do what she 
 can to make Shiloh such a parish. 
 
 MBS. BURCI-IAM (accepting the overture}. Of course, I 
 want Mr. Taylor to have everything convenient and com- 
 fortable, and I'm willing to do anything in reason to make 
 it so. But I shan't do much toward it, if I stand here 
 talking all the afternoon. Mrs. Shemnar, you and I might 
 as well take that bedroom in hqnd. I'll go and look up 
 Mr. Taylor, and find out what's to go in it. 
 
 In obedience to which beneficent inspiration, the two 
 ladies walked off. Shortly after, Mrs. Seber, Mrs. Banser, 
 and Miss Bryer arrived, and undertook to reduce the 
 kitchen to order. Another small party set about impart- 
 ing a look of orderliness to the second floor. Aunt Vin 
 had already installed herself in the pantry, and was scrub- 
 bing, polishing, and arranging, con amore. 
 
 The long summer afternoon wore on. Once I was called 
 to the sitting-room by Mrs. Prescott, to give my voice in 
 some question of arrangement; and as I halted in the 
 kitchen on my return, I was pleased to hear Ruth Winnot 
 babbling away like a meadow-brook to Essie Volger, while, 
 now and then, her laugh gurgled merrily through both 
 rooms. Coming nearer, and seeing her face uplifted and 
 aglow, and her eyes dancing with merriment, I could 
 scarcely rid myself of the impression that the wan and 
 mournful Ruth had somehow been spirited away, and this 
 bright, merry, sparkling creature substituted in her place. 
 I was even a little saddened by the sight ; as if I had found 
 a bird singing its song, and building its nest, in a flickering 
 strip of winter sunshine, mistaking it for the dawn of an 
 unending summer.
 
 238 SIIILOII. 
 
 At six o'clock everything was complete ; the old house 
 prepared for the new life which 1 was to be lived in it ; 
 which, nevertheless, would not be much unlike many other 
 lives it had known (since it must be woven of the same 
 human warp and woof) ; yet would be well worth living 
 through, notwithstanding, with the peaceful light of piety 
 shed over it, and immortal hope shining far on into the 
 dusk. 
 
 There is no resisting the natural gravitation of a farm- 
 house toward the kitchen. It was there that we all assem- 
 bled, by tacit concurrence, when the work was done ; and 
 it was there that I said : 
 
 " It seems to me it would be well to sing the Gloria 
 in Excelsis now, by way of pleasant finale to our after- 
 noon. We will baptize the old house in a stream of har- 
 mony, making short work with ghosts and spells, and 
 washing away whatever discordances of feeling, temper, 
 opinion, or faith, may cling to the walls. Lead off, 
 Ruth." 
 
 Ruth lifted up her voice with fervor, Essie joined in 
 spiritedly, I took the alto, Mr. Taylor supplied the needed 
 background of a bass, and other voices fell in or stayed 
 out, according to inclination or ability. The glorious old 
 song of praise rolled its rich tide through the rooms, pene- 
 trating to the darkest corners of garret and cellar, and 
 leaving everywhere, I hoped, some helpful, healing, reviv- 
 ing influence. 
 
 Then, the party scattered. Before Miss Essie took her 
 leave, she invited Alice and myself to tea with her the 
 next afternoon ; and managed to include Ruth in the invi- 
 tation, with so much tact and cordiality, that the would-be 
 recluse promised to go before she knew it, and was left in a 
 state of infinite amazement because she had done so. 
 
 When all had gone, save our own little party, Mrs. 
 Prescott drew me aside into the pantry. Loaves of bread, 
 piles of biscuit, a tempting variety of cakes, balls of but-
 
 BIIILOH. 239 
 
 tcr, triangles of cheese, brown-paper parcels, and baskets 
 of fruit and vegetables, were marshalled upon its shelves ; 
 in sufficient force to ensure to Mrs. Taylor some weeks 
 of easy and inexpensive housekeeping. Mrs. Prescott 
 pointed them out, and named their donors, with a mix- 
 ture of feelings. Mrs. Danforth had covered herself with 
 glory. 
 
 " She said she'd never heard of such a thing in her life," 
 said my guide, " but, as soon as she found out what I 
 wanted, she was ready to send everything she had in the 
 house." 
 
 To one -small card of gingerbread, however, with a 
 kind of Uriah Heep air about it, she gave a withering 
 glance. 
 
 "I would just like to chuck that out of window," 
 she said, spitefully. " Would you believe it ? that's all 
 Mrs. Burcham brought, and she as well <5ff as anybody in 
 the parish, if not better ! The truth is, some give liberally 
 and some don't give at all ; and all share the credit. Mr. 
 Taylor sees his pantry well filled, and thinks everybody 
 has had a hand in it, and believes he's in clover. But he 
 won't live here long without finding out who his friends 
 are, that's one comfort ! " 
 
 A comfort that has its reverse of discomfort ? 
 
 Mr. Taylor was to spend the night at the Divines ; not 
 to disturb the newly-created order of his dwelling, before 
 its mistress's arrival. Therefore, windows were shut 
 and doors fastened ; and finally, standing on the broad, 
 irregularly-shaped doorstep, he turned the key on the si- 
 lence within. 
 
 " How strange," said Alice, softly, " to have a home full 
 of promise, and not one memory ! "
 
 XXIII. 
 
 two 
 
 LEO. 
 
 HAT the evening was not dull, after our busy 
 and fatiguing afternoon at the Gwynne 
 Place, was chiefly owing to "Leo. The 
 suppers incident to summer farm life an 
 early one for the women and guests, and an- 
 other for the "menfolks" returning at dusk 
 from their labor being over; Mr. Taylor was 
 formally presented to that black incarnation of 
 canine majesty, as I had been, on the night of my arrival 
 in Shiloh. 
 
 " May be you'll think it's almost an impertinence, now ; 
 but you won't when you see what comes of it, one of these 
 days," said Mr. Divine, with a good-natured twinkle in his 
 eye. "Leo's friendship's worth more than that of a good 
 many humans in your congregation, Mr. Taylor." 
 
 " Indeed ! That may be saying a good deal for the dog, 
 Mr. Divine ; but it is not saying much for the ' humans.' " 
 
 " Isn't it ? " returned the farmer, with his low, mellow 
 laugh. "When you come to know Leo better, may be 
 you'll change your mind. For my part, I know lots of 
 folks that 'ud be a good deal better members of society, if 
 they'd be only just half as careful to do their ditty, as far 
 as they know what 'tis, as Leo is to do his'n. If he hasn't 
 got a soul, he's got a bigger and a cleaner conscience than 
 most men. Why, I don't think he's shirked work or dis- 
 obeyed an order five times since I've had him ; and that's 
 agoin' on seven year, now."
 
 * SHILOH. 241 
 
 " Indeed ! " said Mr. Taylor, beginning to look in- 
 terested. " Not one sin per year against his conscience 
 that is a clean record !' I wish mine were as fair ! " 
 and the clergyman sighed. 
 
 By and by, Mrs. Divine brought forth cakes, apples, and 
 other convenient refreshments, for her guests ; whereupon 
 Philip, the younger of her sons, conceived the brilliant idea 
 that Leo might be made to act as waiter. Accordingly, the 
 basket of apples was put into the dog's mouth, and he was 
 bidden to " pass it round." Two or three mistakes, at the 
 outset, such as depositing the basket and its contents in 
 my lap ; and then setting it on the floor and daintily pre- 
 senting an apjale to Alice with his teeth, provoked much 
 mirth; as well as the proud gravity with which he per- 
 formed the task, when it became clear to him precisely 
 what was Avanted: while his quickness in catching the 
 idea seemed truly wonderful to one not acquainted with his 
 capacity for far better things. Mr. Taylor's admiration, 
 therefore, was extreme and enthusiastic. 
 
 " The most intelligent animal I ever saw ! " exclaimed 
 he. " I've seen trained dogs, of course, and I know how 
 they become so accomplished by dint of a long course of 
 whips and starvation. But a great, noble fellow like that, 
 who understands what you say, and takes an idea almost 
 as quick as it is presented to him, I declare ! it's enough 
 to make one believe in the transmigration of souls ! What 
 would you sell him for ? I suppose he is worth a good deal 
 of money." 
 
 " Sell him ! " repeated Mr. Divine, laughing quietly, 
 " Sell him ! I'll tell you how near I came to selling him 
 once, and what I was offered for him ; and then, perhaps 
 you'll tell me what you'd take for him, if he belonged to you. 
 
 You see I've got a brother that lives down to Point, 
 
 Long Island ; and he wrote me last fall that there was a 
 gentleman in his neighborhood who wanted to buy a right 
 smart, knowing Newfoundland ; and if I was willing to sell 
 11
 
 242 siiiLoii, 
 
 Leo, he thought I could get at least fifty or sixty dollars 
 for him, and perhaps more. Well, just about that time I 
 happened to be pretty hard pushed for money ; I had a 
 note coming due in a month, and nothing to meet it with. 
 I'd got to sell something, and in short, I made up my 
 mind that I could spare Leo better'n anything else, though I 
 hated awfully to part with him. So I and Leo went down to 
 
 Point. When we got there, the gentleman a 3Ir. Fife 
 
 had gone to York, to spend a day or two ; and there was 
 nothing to be done but wait till he come back. Well, the 
 next day was fine, the sun bright and warm, the water 
 dancing and shining like quicksilver, so brother took me 
 out a sailing. Leo followed me into the boat, but there was 
 five of us on board, my brother and three of his children, 
 besides myself, and I thought he might be in the way ; so 
 I ordered him out, and told him to stay behind. He don't 
 often disobey orders, as I told you ; but the water down 
 there seemed to set him most crazy, he'd never seen any- 
 thing bigger than our rivfcr before, and he wanted to be 
 in it all the time. So, after we'd got out a piece, lo and be- 
 hold ! there come Leo swimming alongside ; and trying to 
 look, the rogue ! as if he thought that was what was 
 meant ; and if he wasn't wanted in the boat, there couldn't 
 be the least objection to his going outside, as convoy ! I 
 began to scold, and was about to send him straight back ; 
 but the boys pleaded hard for him, and brother said he 
 guessed we might as well take him on board, seem' he 
 wanted to go so bad ; and I finally gave in, and Leo came 
 over the side, as happy a dog as ever you see. . 
 
 " Well, we sailed along, as nice as you please, for an 
 hour or so ; and brother and I got -to talkin' about old 
 times, when we was boys together, and didn't take much 
 notice of what was going on ; when, all at once, we found 
 that the sky was all clouded over behind us, and a storm 
 trotting up in our rear faster than any race-horse. Of 
 course, we put about right away, but that brought the
 
 6HILOH. 243 
 
 
 
 wind dead ahead, and blowih' mighty strong ; and 'twas 
 slow work beating back towards the Point. Then, the 
 storm broke on us,- whew ! I never knew what wind was 
 till then; it seemed as if 'twould blov us out of water. 
 Brother took another reef in the sail, and we staggered 
 along a bit ; and then, just as we were going to come about 
 on 'tother tack, there was a whiz and a bang and a crash, 
 and our mast was snapped off, close to the deck, as clean as 
 a whistle ! Mast and sail both overboard ! Brother hur- 
 ried to cut 'em all clear, for fear they'd swamp us ; and 
 then ! I shall never forget the look in his face as he 
 turned round and gasped out, ' The oars ! good heavens ! 
 we've forgot the oars ! ' 
 
 " Well ! there we was, drifting out to sea as swift as 
 wind and water could carry us, and nothing to do but fold 
 our hands and calc'late how fast they were adoin' it! 
 Nothing in sight, indeed, we couldn't . see three boat- 
 lengths through the storm ; for the rain began to pour 
 down in sheets, now, though, to be sure, that brought 
 down the wind a little. But 'twas getting so cold, I 
 thought 'twouldn't take long for us all to freeze as hard 
 as rocks, in our seats, if we didn't go to the bottom 
 first. And I began to think 'twas about time for me to be 
 settling up my account with this world, when Leo I sup- 
 pose he saw the trouble in my face crept up and began to 
 lick my hand. Brother saw him, and his face brightened a 
 little. ' How far can Leo swim ? ' says he, ' I don't know,' 
 says I, ' he's never been tried, that I know of.' ' If he 
 could swim ashore, now,' says he, thoughtfully, 'there 
 might be some chance for us : but no, it's too far ; he 
 can't do it. I don't suppose he'd even try.' ' He'll do any- 
 thing that I tell him to, if he thinks it's important,' says 
 I ; ' or he'll die atrying.' So brother wrote a line to his 
 wife ; and I rolled it up tight in my handkerchief, and tied 
 it fast to Leo's collar. Then I took his head between my 
 hands, and looked him right in the eye, and says I, ' Leo,
 
 244 SHILOH. 
 
 old fellow ! if you can carry that letter ashore, to my sis- 
 ter Nancy, may be you'll save your master's life ; if you 
 can't, good bye, for you've seen your last of him ! ' And I 
 made him a sign to, go overboard." 
 
 Mr. Divine's voice faltered. Leo went to his side, and 
 laid his huge head upon his arm, looking up at him with 
 great, soft eyes, full of intelligent sympathy. 
 
 Mrs. Divine took off her spectacles, and wiped them 
 with great circumspection. " Father always breaks down 
 when he gets to that part of the stoiy, as many times as 
 he has told it," said she, with a somewhat hysterical laugh. 
 "And Leo knows the story just as well as he does, every 
 word of it. Watch him now, and see if he don't." 
 
 Mr. Divine proceeded. 
 
 " "Well, Leo looked me right in the eye, too, for a mo- 
 ment ; and if ever a dog's face said, ' Master, I'll save you, 
 or I'll die,' Leo's face said it then. Actually, it seemed to 
 me that there was tears in his eyes ! And then, he sprang 
 overboard, and was out of sight among the boiling waves, 
 in a moment. 
 
 " Well, when the storm came on, and we didn't come 
 home, you won't need to be told that my brother's wife, 
 Nancy, began to get scared. And she kept agoing to the 
 door and looking out, to see if she couldn't hear or see 
 something of us ; and finally, as she opened the door for 
 another look, Leo dragged himself across the threshold, all 
 dripping, looked up in her face, gave a mournful soi't of a 
 howl and fell over on the floor at her feet, just like a log. 
 Nancy thought that the boat had surely capsized, and we'd 
 all been drowned ; and Leo had just made out to swim 
 ashore, but only to die of exhaustion. You can guess 
 what a state of mind she was in, till one of the children 
 said, ' Mamma, what's that on Leo's collar ? ' So then she 
 found brother's note. You may be sure she didn't waste 
 much time ! She sent the children one way, and went an- 
 other herself; and pretty soon all the neighbors were out
 
 SHILOH. 245 
 
 after us with boats and lanterns, for the storm was now de- 
 creasing fast. They found us, of course, or I shouldn't be 
 here to tell the story ! 
 
 " When Nancy got back home, Leo was lying just 
 where she left him, looking a good deal more dead than 
 alive ; but she found he still breathed faintly. So she and 
 the children pulled him up to the fire, rubbed him and 
 wrapped him in blankets, poured warm milk and brandy 
 down his throat, and got him so that when I came in, he 
 could just raise himself up on his forelegs and lick my 
 hand. But it was three or four days before he got that 
 swim out of his bones. As nigh as we could calculate, he 
 must have swum from eight to ten mile that night, in that 
 heavy sea. And I've always thought that he never could 
 have done it, if he'd nobody but himself to think of. But 
 he couldn't fail his master. He couldn't make up his mind 
 to stop and rest, or give up and go under, with his errand 
 undone." 
 
 Never was dog's face so eloquent as Leo's while this 
 narrative was going on. It was almost human in its ex- 
 pressiveness. Plainly, he comprehended every word, every 
 detail. And when Mr. Divine paused, he reared his mag- 
 nificent head and looked round upon us with the calm dig- 
 nity of conscious worth. 
 
 " Well ! " continued Mr. Divine, " the story was all 
 round, next day, of course; and Mr. Fife heard it, and 
 came to see me. He offered me seventy-five, and a hun- 
 dred, and a hundred-and-fifty dollars, for Leo ; and I can't 
 say how high he'd have gone, if I hadn't cut him short by 
 telling him that I'd about as lief sell him one of my chil- 
 dren." 
 
 " I should think so ! " burst out Mr. Taylor, very em- 
 phatically, but with a little unsteadiness of voice. 
 
 " So," concluded Mr. Divine, " I brought Leo home 
 with me, and sold a couple of cows instead. Poor econ- 
 omy, I s'pose ; but when feeling gets into the accounts, it's
 
 246 SHILOH. 
 
 apt to play the mischief with the balance ! Anyhow, I've 
 never been sorry. Leo and I won't part, now, till one or 
 t'other of us dies." 
 
 There was a moment's silence. 
 
 " Leo," yawned Phil, lazily, "just hand me another ap- 
 ple, will you ? " 
 
 And Leo, with a half-sigh, as if deprecating so sudden 
 a descent from the heroic to the commonplace, brought him 
 the basket.
 
 XXIV. 
 
 LIFE'S QUIET PLOW. 
 
 OU desire me to tell you something of my 
 heart-life, Francesca. I know not that I 
 have any, in your sense of the term. Ex- 
 cept by that daily battle between Good and 
 Evil to which no anguish and no sorrow 
 bring lasting truce ; and of which, surely, I 
 send you voluminous report my heart gives 
 little sign of life. I think it is slowly healing 
 (or dying, I am doubtful which) down there, in the dusk 
 and the quiet ; but I resolutely refuse to make any investi- 
 gation of the process. It is sore enough still, I suspect, to 
 the touch. 
 
 In one thing, I can discover a little improvement. My 
 mind no longer insists upon a daily, hourly wandering 
 through the silent Forum of my Past, mournful with the 
 ruins of vanished glory. The duties and cares of the Present 
 continually start up by the way, and turn it back from that 
 dreary, unprofitable journey. Between Sewing Society in- 
 terests, and night watchings, and daily lessons with Ruth 
 and Alice, etc., etc., it finds enough of travel and of inter- 
 est within its immediate sphere. The thousand little pre- 
 sent plans and anxieties crowd in ; and slowly, but surely, 
 crowd out the heart-depressing tendency to dwell upon the 
 recollection of past sorrow. It is the old story of Gulliver 
 and the Liliputians, told over again and enriched with a 
 new meaning. Though the sorrow is a giant, and not to
 
 248 SHILOH.- 
 
 be altogether expelled; yet its enemies are many, and by 
 weaving myriads of minute chains about it, they are able to 
 keep it down. Kind thanks to the busy little toilers ! If 
 they have not all been taken into the Divine counsels, they 
 must- in some way derive their power and efficacy from the 
 Divine Beneficence. 
 
 But what changes come over us, as we go on our life- 
 journey ! I remember when I thought it would be heaven 
 to enjoy, all day, and never to work! Now I am of the 
 opinion that a higher heaven would be to work all day, 
 and never be tired ! Yet the weariness deepens and sweet- 
 ens the rest ! 
 
 There it is, Francesca ! There seems to be nothing final 
 in opinion or in feeling. No sooner do I come to a conclu- 
 sion, you see, than some little after-thought steals in to 
 modify it. No wonder brains that try to solve life's prob- 
 lems unaided by those two potent affirmative signs, " God" 
 and "Trust," get bewildered and go fearfully astray. 
 Without these, they can never get a final answer. What 
 they take to be one," soon turns out to be the beginning of 
 a new term. 
 
 Since my last jotting-down, life has flowed very quietly 
 with me. Some few of its ripples, however, deserve charac- 
 terization. 
 
 First, in order, if not in importance, the tea-drinking at 
 Essie Volger's came off according to appointment. She 
 lives in a large, white, maple-shadowed, open-hearted look- 
 ing mansion ; somewhat antiquated in point of style, but 
 comparatively modern, in point of date ; yet old enough to 
 have made its place good in men's familiar knowledge and 
 everyday interests. It differs from the prevailing Shiloh 
 pattern, chiefly, in having a portico in front and in lacking a 
 lean-to behind. Its outward expression is one of dignified, 
 yet not ungenial, comfort and amplitude ; and the sight of 
 the interior only deepens it. The furniture is older than 
 the house, Mr. Volger having deep-rooted prejudices in
 
 SHILOH. 249 
 
 favor of his old-time belongings, not to be easily eradicated, 
 even by the potent influence of his only and idolized daugh- 
 ter. He is a different type of farmer from Mr. Divine, less 
 genial in manner,* mo re reserved in speech, of a ruggeder 
 texture both without and within. The glance of his eye is 
 keener, the grasp of his hand looser, than those of my large- 
 hearted host. Doubtless, he is shrewder at a bargain, closer 
 in calculation, more astute of policy. Certainly, his affairs 
 thrive better. The Divine acres are diminishing in number, 
 year by year ; the Volger estate threatens to swallow an 
 entire district. 
 
 Mr. Volger's daughter, only, brings anything resembling 
 an illumination to his face. She is the sunshine of his heart, 
 as well as of his dwelling and farm. Witnessing the cheery, 
 widely-diffused influence of her joyous and active tempera- 
 ment, one is half persuaded that the corn grows and the 
 grass greens by it. One moment, she is out in the ten- 
 acre lot, picking corn ; another, down by the brook, gather- 
 ing wild iris ; the next, out on the lake fishing ; anon, bring- 
 ing in wood from the woodpile ; then, in the kitchen con- 
 cocting a favorite dish (too abstruse to be entrusted to 
 Hagar, the black cook) ; next, at the piano practising new 
 music ; by and by, up on the haymow, hunting hen's nests ; 
 soon after, in the parlor, entertaining friends ; and finally, 
 saddling or harnessing her dumpy little Canadian pony, 
 and riding or driving off to Clay Corner, or " up street ; " 
 nodding, as she goes, to every man, woman, child, negro, 
 Irishman, and whatever other varieties of human nature 
 are to be met with, on the road. Everybody knows her ; 
 everybody smiles at sight of her; everybody who has a 
 trouble that seeks outlet, a difficulty that needs to be 
 talked over, a joke that wants to be laughed at, a sorrow 
 that craves sympathy, a message designed for anybody on 
 her way (or even a little out of it), stops her on the road, 
 and presses her remorselessly into the service. She brings 
 the mail ; she goes for the doctor ; she carries prescriptions
 
 250 SHILOH. 
 
 to be filled ; she delivers messages and parcels ; she has an 
 eve ifter stray cattle ; and she gives every footsore travel- 
 ler a lift ; and every ragged, unwashed urchin, playing at 
 marbles or mud pies, by the roadside, a ride. Her spirits 
 are often so vivacious and wildly effervescent as to seem ut- 
 terly careless of boundary-lines : yet in virtue of some in- 
 herent sense of propriety, never step over them. She is 
 not exactly lady-like, in the conventional sense of that 
 much abused term ; but she is something far more health- 
 ful, efficient, and delightful. She would seem to have 
 been created for some Arcadian state of society, where that 
 term is as yet unknown, or that meaning still unfolded. 
 Her exact type is rare enough, even in New England ; I 
 doubt if it is to be met with elsewhere. 
 
 It is manifest that she was a charming hostess. An 
 hour with her checked off more milestones from the jour- 
 ney of acquaintanceship than a day with most people. 
 She soon put Alice more at her ease than I had ever seen 
 her (to be sure, they are far-away cousins, and fast friends) ; 
 and Ruth quickly felt, and responded to, the frank cordial- 
 ity of her manner, and the breezy vivacity of her spirits. 
 Yet there was a marked difference in the character of their 
 mirth ; Essie's was that of a heart which had never known 
 sore cross or heavy sorrow ; Ruth's, even in its brightest 
 flow, never lost some subtly pathetic quality. 
 
 After tea, we rambled doAvn to the shore of the lake 
 aforementioned, which bounds one side of the farm. We 
 were guided thither by a funny little brook, that prattled 
 and gambolled, like a child, all through the meadows, and 
 then tumbled headlong down the hillside, in order to fling 
 itself, laughing, into the placid bosom of the lake, as on to 
 a mother's breast. A light skiff lay by the bank ; and Es- 
 sie rowed us out into the sunset light, and sent a merry 
 " Halloo ! " over the shining water, to wake an echo sleep- 
 ing somewhere among the hills. The answer came back 
 soft and subdued, as if from the lingering influence of a
 
 SHILOH. 251 
 
 happy dream ; and then Ruth's tender, pathetic voice 
 hushed ft to silence and to sleep again with the lovely mel- 
 ody of " Allan Water." In the evening, there was music ; 
 and I was agreeably surprised to find that Essie plays un- 
 usually well as playing goes with a smooth, gliding 
 touch, and much taste and feeling. So well, indeed, that 
 after we had arrived at that point of familiarity where it 
 ceased to be an impertinence (a point quickly reached with 
 her), I ventured to tell her that it was a sin and a shame 
 that she did not play even better ; that is to say, a better 
 class of music, with a deeper comprehension of musical 
 ideas ; a profounder knowledge of the depths from which 
 they come, and those to which they address themselves. 
 This brought forth much musical talk, and comparison of 
 studies and masters, to which Ruth listened like one en- 
 tranced, and Alice with her usual quick insight, making her 
 lawful prey of analogies and metaphors : which resulted 
 in an agreement that we that is, Essie and I should take 
 up the practice of duets together, beginning with Beet- 
 hoven's symphonies. By reason of which tuneful copart- 
 nership, we have come to be " Essie " and " Winnie " to 
 each other. 
 
 We discussed the melodeon, too, and to cut that mat- 
 ter short it is now doing its best to engender and pro- 
 mote harmony in that little loft of a gallery at St. Jude's, 
 under Essie's skilful fingers. She entreated me, humbly 
 and earnestly, to play it ; but I steadily declined, mindful 
 of Bona's emphatic discourse on that head. Her musical 
 ability was amply sufficient for the need, and there was no 
 excuse for me to thrust myself into the matter ; and so de- 
 prive both the parish and herself of the benefit of whatever 
 increase of interest or of energy might be developed in her, 
 by the position. I attend the rehearsals, however, by re- 
 quest ; and am made, by tacit concurrence, a sort of musi- 
 cal director. 
 
 Next, there has been an arrival of uncommon interest
 
 252 SHILOH. 
 
 in Shiloh ; causing something more than the usual ripple of 
 interest and talk consequent on the advent of a stranger, 
 in a community so small, so remote, and so largely made 
 up of life-long residents, the fabric of whose daily lives, 
 moreover, is woven of threads too even and too sober- 
 tinted to allow of many home-made excitements. The new- 
 comer is an artist, with the peculiar, though indefinable 
 air of his 'class about him ; and but recently returned to 
 his fatherland, after an absence of some years spent chiefly 
 at Rome in the study and exercise of his art. He first 
 came hither in company with a friend of Mrs. Danforth, 
 for a day's fishing ; but he was so charmed with Shiloh's 
 quietude, freshness and isolation, in short, with its exces- 
 sive ruralness, that he forthwith looked up a boarding- 
 place for himself and his easel, established the twain there- 
 in, and is said to divide his time about equally between 
 painting and rambling over the country. 
 
 I have met him but once. A few evenings ago, I found 
 him seated in Mrs. Danforth's moonlighted porch, listening 
 to the fluent, sparkling talk of the mistress of the mansion ; 
 who at once presented to me, " Mr. Cambur." The moon- 
 light revealed distinctly enough albeit, it here whitened 
 them into marble, and there darkened them with deeper 
 shadows than ever daylight gives features clearly and 
 finely cut ; a wide brow, deep-set eyes, a straight nose, 
 and a mouth apparently capable of much and varied ex- 
 pression, though thickly veiled by a brown beard. 
 
 The talk soon turned toward Italy ; and as I listened to 
 the artist's fresh, animated narrations, awaking and bright- 
 ening my own fond reminiscences of that pleasant land, I 
 seemed to be there once more ; a part of its vai'ied, pictur- 
 esque life ; breathing the ethereal gold of its sunshine, and 
 soothed by the kindly balm of its air. His enthusiasm cul- 
 minated in the exclamation, 
 
 " Surely, no one who has lived for any length of time 
 in Italy, and felt the charm of its sky and its atmosphere,
 
 SHILOH. 253 
 
 and the loving-kindness of its earth, need count himself 
 homeless, though some tremendous catastrophe should 
 sweep every other country from the face of the globe ! " 
 " You are talking nonsense," rejoined Mrs. Danforth, with 
 her characteristic frankness ; yet accompanying the words 
 with a gesture that divested them of any appearance of 
 discourtesy. " It is all very well for artists and poets who 
 make their living out of the picturesque, to rave about It- 
 aly. But for people of sober minds and pursuits, with so- 
 ber predilections for cleanliness and comfort, any American 
 home, even^this hideous, square, white pine-box over our 
 heads ! is vastly to be pi-eferred to those shiftless, dingy 
 Italian farm-houses, or great, grand, cheerless Roman paW 
 aces. To my taste, age is no recommendation in a house. 
 I don't want to spend my life in scrubbing off my great- 
 grandfather's smoke and dust, mould and grime ; nor in 
 fighting the rats, mice, moths, roaches, and other vermin 
 he congregated under his roof; any more than I want to 
 wear his shoes and his periwig, or set up his skeleton in my 
 dining-room. On the contrary, I should like a new house, 
 newly furnished, once in five years. And as for the his- 
 toric associations upon which you lay such stress, they used 
 to make me feel as if the air in Rome was a great deal too 
 thick and heavy to breathe ; it had been used over so many 
 times since the days of the Caesars as to seem to have no 
 healthful property left ! I hope it will be a long time be- 
 fore our new, fresh, vigorous country shows any of that 
 sort of picturesqueness that you artists love so Avell ; 
 made up of one part, age ; two parts, decay ; three parts 
 dirt ! " 
 
 " Amen ! " said Mr. Cambur, heartily. " Beautiful as 
 Italy surely is, I do not want to see her features or her life 
 duplicated here. Our country has her own genius, mission, 
 destiny ; let her work them out in her own way ! " 
 
 As the talk went on, I found that he knew many of the 
 artists who most frequented my father's study, in Rome,
 
 254: SHILOH. 
 
 and could give me their subsequent history ; so many, in- 
 deed, that I began to wonder that I had never encoun- 
 tered nor heard of himself, while there. 
 
 " You would not remember me if you had," he replied. 
 " Reflect that the later years of your stay in Rome were 
 the earlier ones of mine ; and .that I was but a beginner in 
 Art, worshipping both her works and her workers humbly 
 and afar-off. To be sure, I am little more than that, 
 now: I will venture to say that the name of Gambia- 
 is so strange to the trumpet of Fame as never to have 
 reached your ears," and he ended with a peculiar, mean- 
 ing glance at Mrs. Danforth. 
 
 " If it has not," said she, laughing, and returning the 
 glance with one equally expressive, " I am sure Miss Frost 
 will say, after she has seen your pictures, that it is Fame's 
 own fault. I shall bring her to your studio some day, and 
 you must show her ' Dreams.' " 
 
 " With great pleasure," he replied, bowing. " Only, 
 let me suggest that the said ' some day ' does not arrive 
 until next week. I am expecting a box of pictures, art- 
 curiosities, etcetera, shortly ; then, my studio will be in bet- 
 ter order for the reception of such visitors, and I shall have 
 more to show you." 
 
 " Too much, I suspect," said I. " In looking at pictures, 
 I am always troubled because I am asked to look at too 
 many ; and expected to begin to comment as soon as I be- 
 gin to look. Whereas, when I find a picture that I like, 
 that suits my mood, that has anything at all to say to me, 
 I want to sit down silent before it for an hour. And I do 
 not want to look at anything else, till next day ! " 
 
 " I promise you that you shall look at my pictures in 
 just your own way," said he smiling ; " at least, so far as 
 I am concerned." 
 
 "And I promise you that you shall not!" exclaimed 
 Mrs. Danforth, with humorous earnestness, " that is, if I 
 am your companion."
 
 SHILOH. 255 
 
 Throughout the conversation, I was tantalized by one 
 of those strange memories or resemblances, I could not 
 tell which, at once so pertinacious and so elusive. Some- 
 thing in Mr. Cambur's face, or voice, or manner, had a curi- 
 ous familiarity in unfamiliarity, for which I could not 
 account. I took my leave without finding any clue to 
 it, and was haunted and perplexed by it half the way 
 home. 
 
 Moreover, Mrs. Taylor arrived duly ; and the Divine 
 household, including Winnie Frost, did itself*the honor to 
 wait upon her very soon. A blithe, active, black-eyed little 
 woman ; fresh and naive in many of her A\ r ays as a child ; 
 yet with a sufficient fund of wholesome common sense about 
 her an excellent addition to the joint stock. She straight- 
 way individualized her home by a few careless touches, and 
 interfused into its atmosphere some new and delightful 
 quality ; as if she had brought a trunkful of sunbeams, or 
 a few boxes of mountain dew, and flung them around at 
 random. She is, plainly, the delight of Mr. Taylor's eye, 
 and the joy of his heart, as plainly, she is the balance- 
 wheel of the domestic and conjugal machinery ; after her 
 advent, I felt more at ease about his future career in Shiloh. 
 With so wise a counsellor and so ready a sympathy at his 
 hearthstone, I fancied that his chances of daily contact with 
 wayside thorns would be considerably diminished, and his 
 certainty of daily cure very much increased. 
 
 The character of the twain may be further elucidated 
 by an anecdote that went roaming about Shiloh, soon after 
 their housekeeping commenced; eliciting much laughter; 
 which, nevertheless, was often curiously entangled with a 
 tear. It arranges itself, almost inevitably, in the dramatic 
 style. 
 
 SCENE. A. chamber in the G-wynne Place. Time. 
 Sunday Morning. MRS. TAYLOB, sola, with a bandbox be- 
 fore her. 
 
 MRS. T. Why ! what can have become of my bonnet ?
 
 256 SHILOH. 
 
 I certainly put it here. (Rummages in closet and bureau.} 
 Not to be found ftnywhere ! what does it mean ? 
 
 Enter MR. TAYLOR. 
 
 MB. T. Why, my dear, what is the matter ? 
 
 MBS. T. I can't find my bonnet my best bonnet, I 
 have looked everywhere. It must have been stolen. I 
 thought you said thieves were unknown in Shiloh. 
 
 MB. T. (with the air of one well pleased to be able to give 
 a satisfactory, explanation). Oh ! is that it ? I quite forgot 
 to tell you I gave it away. 
 
 MBS. T. Gave it away ! 
 
 ME. T. Yes, dear, to that poor Mrs. Simmons, whose 
 husband was buried last Wednesday, over at Fox Swamp. 
 She said she had no bonnet to wear to the funeral, and she 
 did -not know how, nor where, to get one; it really was a 
 sorrowful case. So. I thought how fortunate it was that 
 you were in mourning, and I came home and got yours, 
 you were gone up to Mrs. Divine's to tea that afternoon, 
 you know. I meant to haye told you, of course ; but, I de- 
 clare ! I forgot all about it. 
 
 MBS. T. (cheerily}. Well, never mind, she is welcome. 
 I only wish it had been my second best ; I think that would 
 have answered for Mrs. Simmons very well ; it would cer- 
 tainly have corresponded better with the rest of her ap- 
 parel. But I must make it do for the remainder of the 
 summer. 
 
 MB. T. (hesitating). I I really am afraid I gave that 
 away, too. To Mrs. Simmon's sister, you see, one needed 
 a bonnet as much as the other ! And I thought you would 
 have time to make another before Sunday, you make bon- 
 nets so easily, out of almost nothing 
 
 MBS. T. (parenthetically). Sometimes it is difficult to get 
 the " almost," though ! 
 
 MB. T. (continuing). But what a memory I have ! I 
 ought to have told you, of course. I am so sorry !
 
 SHILOH. '257 
 
 MRS. T. (rather constrainedly). May I ask what else of 
 mine you gave away ? 
 
 MR. T. (pathetically). Do not speak in that way, my 
 dear, or I shall Avish there never was such a thing as a bon- 
 net ! I gave nothing else away, of course, nothing. Ex- 
 cept ah ! yes, one of your veils, I think it was the second- 
 best, this time. I remembered that you could not make 
 veils so easily as bonnets, my dear. 
 
 MES. T. Thank you for your consideration ! ( Then sink- 
 ing into a chair and laughing hysterically). It is too good 
 a joke ! I haven't a bonnet to wear to church, except my 
 sun-bonnet ! Would you advise me to wear that, or stay 
 at home ? , . 
 
 MR. T. (seeming not to see the point of the joke, but, 
 apparently, beginning to perceive something, more to the 
 point}. I declare ! It is too bad ! Strange that I should 
 have forgotten it so entirely ! I promise you, my dear, 
 that I never will touch anything of yours again, without 
 asking you first ! Upon honor ! ' 
 
 MRS. T. (wiping her eyes and choking down her laugh- 
 ter). Thank you, dear. That would be the better arrange- 
 ment, I think. But never mind, this time. I will run up 
 to Mrs. Prescott " acrost lots " and see if I cannot bor- 
 row a bonnet of her, for to-day. 
 
 FIXALE. Mrs. Taylor appears at church in Mrs. Pres- 
 cottfs second-best bonnet, and looks as if she had donned 
 her grandmother's head-gear, by mistake. 
 
 At present, however, " our little minister's wife," 
 (which, in Shiloh parlance, is synonomous with " our min- 
 ister's little wife,") cannot t>e expected to take any active, 
 regular part in parish work ; even the most exacting of 
 the parishioners admit that. The absorbing and never- 
 ending business known, hereabout, as " doing your own 
 work ; " added to the care of a great, fat, roly-poly baby, 
 nearly as large as herself ; furnishes employment for most 
 of Mrs. Taylor's energies within her own immediate
 
 258 SHILOH. 
 
 sphere. Yet scarcely the less is the influence of her 
 bright, cheerful spirit, her active good-will, her warm in- 
 terest and sympathy, her inherent tact, felt as a power in 
 the parish. And the little she is able to do in Sunday 
 School and Sewing Society, is doubly appreciated ; because 
 it is something more than is hoped for, instead of some- 
 thing less than is Expected. 
 
 It would be unpardonable were I to omit to state, in 
 this connection, that Mr. Taylor has already experienced 
 the benefit of his introduction to Leo. Every morning, 
 before breakfast, 'a scratch is heard at the kitchen door of 
 the Gwynne Place. Being opened, Leo enters majestically, 
 delivers a pail of new, warm milk toJYlrs. Taylor, and gra- 
 ciously offers a paw to her husband. Then, he goes 
 straight to the cradle and puts his nose in the baby's 
 face. She catches hold of it with avidity, pokes her tiny 
 fingers into his eyes, doubles up her fists and rains puny 
 blows upon his great head, pulls his long ears, kicks up her 
 chubby feet, and coos and crows at him in an ecstasy of in- 
 fantine delight. Never is Leo so softly benign of aspect 
 as in these moments. He lays aside his stateliness as a 
 garment ; his bushy tail swings gently from side to side ; 
 his eyes smile ; there is something deeply tender, even to 
 pathos, in his look. Plainly, that innocent baby-face stirs 
 his large, loving heart to its depths. 
 
 He is loth to leave his small friend, when Mrs. Taylor 
 comes with the empty pail ; and his distress is augmented 
 by the fact that she sets up a shrill scream of protest as he 
 turns away. Nevertheless, obedient to the call of duty, 
 he takes the pail in his mouth and trots briskly home- 
 ward. 
 
 Parish matters, in general, flow with tolerable smooth- 
 ness, so far ; though there are growing indications of a crit- 
 ical and unfriendly spirit in the Burcham quarter. Mr. Tay- 
 lor's foibles and they are numerous get small considera- 
 tion at their hands. Theirs are not the minds to discern
 
 SHILOH. 259 
 
 the true proportion of good in a chai-acter like his, nor to 
 realize how very small a part of him it is that is heavy with 
 the soil and the weakness of the flesh, and trails in the dust, 
 of the world. It is far easier to discern the spots in the sun's 
 disc, than to estimate the good done by his light ; less diffi- 
 cult to point out some spot where his rays do not penetrate 
 than to number the myriads of animate and inanimate 
 things that are cheered and vitalized by their influence. 
 Still, I do not expect any worse trouble from this faction 
 than a continual, irritating friction ; chiefly, it must be 
 acknowledged, because its interest in Church affairs is not 
 so strong, nor so sensitive, as to urge it into any violent' 
 quarrel in their behalf! 
 
 At large, the . little stir of life and interest caused by 
 Mr. Taylor's advent, newness, and energy, is fast settling 
 back into the old, sluggish quietude. Mrs. Prescott, to be 
 sure, works on with unflagging zeal, and is, unquestionably, 
 the salt of the parish ; without whom, there would be a dire 
 dearth of that active and preservative substance. At present, 
 she is going about armed with a subscription paper designed 
 to raise funds for painting, papering, and otherwise improv- 
 ing the little church on the hill ; which seems to have so 
 thoroughly engrossed the major part of her thoughts and 
 affections. She has even pressed me into the service, aver- 
 ring that there are hearts (or pockets) hereabouts, which 
 will open more readily to the knock of a comparative 
 stranger, with the indefinable, but easily recognized air of 
 the city about her, than to her own sharp, well-known rap. 
 So, in the rattling and rusty, but still strong and hearty, 
 Divine wagon, upon an odd, cumbrous, movable seat, de- 
 nominated a " chair," drawn by the fat, sleek, staid horse 
 accounted safe for " woman-driving," and which Mrs. Pres- 
 cott complains of as much too safe, even to the point of in- 
 tolerable laziness ; we drive round the country, stopping 
 here and there to tell over again the story that we have 
 told so many times before, as to have exhausted invention
 
 260 SHILOH. 
 
 in trying to vary it ; and receiving fifty cents, or it may be 
 a dollar, by way of liberal response. In some places, we 
 get, in addition, much good will, pressing invitations to 
 take refreshment, and whatever amount of gossip we have 
 time to listen to ; in others, the understood fare of beggars 
 few words, cold looks, and scant courtesy. 
 
 But now, I really have something to tell you ! To 
 think that here of all places in the world ! when I 
 thought I had left the little, blind god, with all his belong- 
 ings, forever behind ! But I will not, as the Shilohites say, 
 " get ahead of my story." 
 
 One bright morning, a week ago, Mrs. Divine's voice 
 came up the staircase, 
 
 " Some one to see you, Miss Frost." 
 
 I descended to the kitchen, and at the fai'ther end 
 which serves as a sort of reception room I found a slight, 
 pale, gentle-looking girl, awaiting me. 
 
 " Miss Carrie Thome a niece of Miss Caroline Bryer's," 
 said Mrs. Divine, seeing me look inquiringly at my visitor, 
 who was quite unknown to me. 
 
 " Ah ! I am glad to meet her. Is your aunt well, Miss 
 Thorne ? " 
 
 " Quite well, thank you." And, after a moment's pause, 
 she added ; " Mother sends her compliments to you, Miss 
 Frost, and would like the pleasure of your company to tea 
 this afternoon." 
 
 I was so taken by surprise that I had said, " Yes, cer- 
 tainly, thank you," before I was at all conscious what I 
 was about. The invitation 'was so unexpected, the 
 " mother " such a very unknown quantity, the messenger 
 so quietly prepossessing, the whole thing so unprecedented ! 
 If I had happened to have noticed the expression of Mrs. 
 Divine's face, I should probably have given a different an- 
 swer. She now asked, in a tone that instantly drew my 
 attention ; 
 
 " Is your mother expecting other company, Carrie ? "
 
 SHILOIT. 261 
 
 " Oh, no, ma'am. Only " (and she spoke as if from the 
 fulness of delight) " Rick is coming up." 
 
 " O h ! " said Mrs. Divine, prolongedly. " Is he going 
 to stay long ? " 
 
 " Only until to-morrow. He will drive up from Haven- 
 ton to-day, and back to-morrow morning. I will tell 
 mother you are coming, Miss Frost thank you." And 
 Carrie Thorne departed. 
 
 Mrs. Divine and I remained looking at each other in 
 silence, until the sound of her light footsteps died away. 
 Then she burst into a laugh a laiigh with something more 
 than merriment in it. 
 
 " I wish you joy of your invitation, Miss Frost ! I hope 
 you'll spend a very pleasant afternoon ! " 
 
 " Mrs. Divine, what does it all mean ? Who is this 
 ' mother ' ? " 
 
 "Who? Mrs. Thorne? She is Caroline Bryer's 
 sister." 
 
 " Well, what else ? I see there is something behind." 
 
 But Mrs. Divine's tongue which generally runs over 
 the catalogue of her neighbors' virtues and foibles readily 
 enough, and deals out their family history with most un- 
 reserved, yet not unkindly, veracity now seemed glued to 
 her mouth. 
 
 " Well ! " said she, at last, " I can talk fast enough about 
 my neighbors, when I know them well, and am sure I shan't 
 make mistakes. But I don't know Mrs. Thorne well, and 
 I might give you wrong impressions. To tell the truth, 
 the Bryers are a queer family, take them all in all though 
 Caroline is as nice a person as you'll find anywhere ; and 
 any one can see that there's no harm in that little Carrie, 
 that's just gone from here. Her mother's a widow, and 
 has lately come home to live. She isn't one of our sort, 
 nor one of your sort, either, Miss Frost." 
 
 " What sort is she, then ? " 
 
 " I can't say. If you go up there, you can find out for
 
 262 SHILOH. 
 
 yourself. I reckon you're capable of taking her measure, 
 without any help." 
 
 " I cannot .conceive," said I, in a tone of vexation, 
 " what made me accept the invitation ! Only there was 
 something so winning in that pale girl's face and voice, 
 that it made me forget everything else. But I can send an 
 excuse." 
 
 " Oh, no ; go, by all means," returned Mrs. Divine. 
 " You like to study human nature, and there's several sorts 
 up there. There's two idiots a man and a woman to be- 
 gin with." 
 
 " Yes," interposed Mrs. Prescott, who had entered, and 
 found out the subject of our discourse, " I can tell you 
 something rather funny about that. The Bryers first came 
 to Shiloh when I and my sister Susan were young girls ; 
 and we heard, in some roundabout way, that there were 
 two unmarried sons in the family. So we joked each other 
 about them, as girls will, declaring that we should set our 
 caps for them, and win them for husbands. Well, the eld- 
 est one came first Mortimer, you'll see him there, Avith 
 his hair all over his shoulders, and his head hanging down, 
 and as silent as a gravestone, he hasn't altered much, only 
 that he's grown old. So I said to Susan, ' You can take 
 that one, Sue, he" don't suit me ; I'll wait for the next.' 
 And when the next one came, 'twas the idiot ! "
 
 while I 
 The 
 
 AMONG THE BEYERS AND THORNES. 
 
 SET forth for the Bryer Farm in the dreamy 
 hush of a warm summer afternoon. The breeze 
 had swooned away in the tree-tops, and gave no 
 sign of reviving life. The shade was not a 
 " broad contiguity," but an irregular succession 
 of dark, isolated patches on the arid and dusty 
 higliAvay. I was fain, therefore, to pause for a 
 moment at the farm gateway, and take breath, 
 reconnoitered the premises. 
 
 house stood at a considerable distance from the 
 road, in the midst of a verdant mosaic of meadow, orchard, 
 and cornfield. Originally it had been of the better sort of 
 farm-houses ; and its white, expansive front must have been 
 a pleasant sight, seen through the green vista of a long 
 avenue of maples and beeches, leading up to the vine- 
 wreathed porch. But both the house and its surroundings 
 had plainly fallen an easy prey to Time's omnivorous tooth. 
 Its original white was merged into a dingy gray; its 
 shingled roof and sides were loose, warped, and weathcr- 
 gnawn ; and the missing base of one of the pillars of the 
 portico had been replaced by a rough section of a log, with 
 the bark still on. The avenue had become a grass-grown 
 lane, through which a brown thread of footpath went wan- 
 dering in a vague, aimless way, and seemed to owe its final 
 arrival at the cracked door-stone chiefly to the agency of
 
 204 SHILOH. 
 
 some happy chance. This lane was bordered on one side 
 by a row of scrubby quince trees ; on the other by a long 
 line of crumbling stumps, among which three or four grey, 
 decrepit maples stood disconsolately, unable to close up 
 their ranks over their fallen comrades, and waiting, dumb 
 and lonely, for their own stroke of doom. The fences were 
 either falling down or rudely patched ; and the gate whereat 
 I stood had the look of an "exhausted sentinel keeping 
 watch over the brief bivouac of a defeated, wasted, and 
 flying army. 
 
 Houses often have as distinct and individual an expres- 
 sion as faces of men. In this one, I soon discovered a quaint, 
 curious resemblance to the only one "of its inmates with 
 whom I was tolerably well acquainted Miss Caroline 
 Bryer. Like that gaunt, antiquated virgin, with her air 
 of decayed gentility, her manner of antique stateliness, and 
 her cherished remembrances of bygone prosperity and dis- 
 tinction, the shabby old dwelling seemed to be inwardly 
 pluming itself upon obsolete glories, and to be trying to 
 keep itself alive upon the insufficient nutriment of aristo- 
 cratic reminiscences. 
 
 I was somewhat dismayed to find, upon examination, 
 that my choice of entrance upon the scene lay between 
 climbing a stone wall and opening the aforesaid gate, 
 designed, it would appear, for the admission of carts arid 
 wagons, rather than for the use of the human species, and 
 in such a dilapidated condition that it was probable it would 
 fall to pieces at an unaccustomed and \inskilful touch. But 
 if there had ever been a smaller and more manageable one, 
 as a certain irregularity in the stone wall seemed to indi- 
 cate, it had vanished long ago, and left not a wrack be- 
 hind. I was relieved from the dilemma, however, by the 
 opportune appearance of the face and bust of Carrie Thorne, 
 in the open upper half of the front door ; looking, for the 
 moment that she stood there, framed in vine-leaves and 
 thrown out into strong relief from the dark background of
 
 SIIILOH. 265 
 
 the interior, as if some lovely ancestral portrait had de- 
 scended from, the walls and hurried to the threshold to bid 
 me welcome. She waved her hand in token of speedy help, 
 ran swiftly down the lane, wrought the incredible miracle 
 of causing that crazy gate to revolve upon its rusty hinges 
 without burying us both in its ruins, and led the way back 
 to the house. 
 
 A very different picture now filled the doorway the 
 full-length figure of Miss Bryer herself, clad in old-fashioned 
 garments of rusty black, and with a general air of rustiness 
 about her rustiness of joints, of voice, of manner, of garb 
 in admirable keeping with the rusty old roof over her 
 head. Yet let me not be understood to say one disrespect- 
 ful word of the mild, stately, decayed gentlewoman; the 
 story of whose life, if fully and rightly told, would put to 
 the blush myriads of lives that are lovelier to outward 
 view. Wealth and position slipped early from her grasp. 
 Idiocy put its woful mark upon the younger members of 
 her family. Human love lingered for a moment at her side, 
 and then passed on neglectful. Joy waved her a careless 
 adieu ; disappointment met her with a mocking salutation. 
 Death made her motherless. Despair cast her down and 
 ti % od her under foot. Then Duty came to her side, and 
 whispered solemnly in her ear. Necessity raised her up, 
 and sternly bade her move on. Care fastened its burden to 
 her back. Quietly she gathered up the scattered fragments 
 of her life and love, heaped them on the hearthstone of her 
 heart, and kindled them into blaze and warmth for the 
 narrow, stinted lives of her infirm, irritable, exacting father 
 and her imbecile brother and sister. By that quiet fireside 
 these poor paupers of existence find ever undisputed room, 
 and steady, if not vivid, glow. We will trust that, while 
 only intent upon their comfort, her own self-denying spirit 
 fails not to catch some soft, reflected light, some healing 
 warmth. 
 
 She gave me a characteristic greeting ; kind without verg- 
 12
 
 266 sniLon. 
 
 ing upon cordiality, ceremonious without being cold. Behind 
 her stood the two half-wits, one with a gaping, staring, 
 vacant face; the other silly, simpering, shuffling, restless. 
 Both were past youth ; neither would ever seem to be 
 really old. Complete childishness of expression neutral- 
 ized the effects of gray streaks in the hair, and wrinkles 
 creeping into the face. They were scarcely less children 
 now, after the lapse of forty or fifty years, than when they 
 first opened their eyes upon the earth. For them, neither 
 sorrow, ciime, care, or responsibility, exist. Yet it goes, 
 far to vindicate the course of God's providence in this 
 world, and to reconcile us to the ministry of griefs and 
 trials, to feel that none of us, whatever our lack or our 
 burden, "would willingly change places with them. 
 
 It was evident that these irresponsible old children were 
 kindly cared for ; their gannents were clean, though plain, 
 their persons in perfect order. Miss Bryer introduced them 
 w T ith a slight wave of her hand, and a melancholy, depre- 
 cating tone of voice " Betsey and Simeon, my poor sister 
 and brother." Obviously, she -was nervous about the im- 
 pression they might produce upon a stranger, but she was 
 too kind-hearted to rob' them of their childish gratification 
 in the sight of a new face, or to interrupt their settled habit 
 of following her about the house, like her shadow. 
 
 Then she opened the door into a large, dim parlor. 
 " I am glad to see you in our poor old house, Miss Frost," 
 she said, with a half sigh, as she placed me a chair. " It is 
 not what it was once, neither are we, the house and the 
 family have gone down hill together, but if you can put 
 up with such entertainment as we can give you, you are 
 very welcome. Sit down a bit ; I suppose Eliza is expect- 
 ing you to come right to her room, but you have had a 
 warm walk in the sun, and you had better rest a little and 
 cool yourself off before you go up." 
 
 " Cool yourself off before you go up " " before you go 
 up," repeated the two idiots, one after the other, in such
 
 SHILOH. 267 
 
 manner as to give the exact effect of a double echo of Miss 
 Bryer's words. 
 
 The unexpected iteration startled and confused me to 
 such a degree, that it was not until after the lapse of a 
 moment or two that I bethought myself of the necessity of 
 making my hostess some reply. 
 
 " Thank you," I said, struggling to seem unobservant 
 and at ease. " I did find it rather warm walking in the 
 sun even for me, and I am accounted among my friends a 
 sort of salamander." 
 
 " Count among my friends a sort of Sally Amanda " 
 " sort of Sally Amanda," echoed the half-wits, catching up my 
 phrase, and inevitably travestying it ; since it did not hap. 
 pen to come within the limited scope of their comprehension. 
 
 I gave an irrepressible start, and for a moment could 
 not conceal my discomposure. It had not occurred to me 
 that the idiots would find my sentences as available for 
 repetition as their sister's. 
 
 Mrs. Bryer sighed heavily. " You must not mind it," 
 she said, in a low voice ; " they don't know any better." 
 
 Then she took up the broken thread of our talk. " I 
 hope Mrs. Divine is quite well and Mrs. Prescott and 
 Alice. I told Eliza she ought to have invited Alice, too ; 
 but she said she never thought of it. The truth is, Eliza 
 has not lived with us long, only a year or so, and she 
 keeps herself so secluded that she has not found out who 
 her neighbors are. But she begins to see that Carrie needs 
 to go out more, and to have some society, the girl is get- 
 ting listless and low-spirited. And I suppose," she added, 
 betraying an inward consciousness that Mrs. Thome's sud- 
 den overture to me stood somewhat in need of explanation, 
 " she thought she would like Carrie to get acquainted with 
 you, I have often spoken about you to her. But if I had 
 known about her invitation in time, I should have seen that 
 Alice was included in it. However, Eliza is apt to act out 
 of her own head, without notice or warning."
 
 268 8HILOH. 
 
 " Out of her head, without notice or warning" " out of 
 her head without notice or warning," echoed the idiots, 
 lugubriously. 
 
 I cast a glance at Carrie Thome's slender, girlish figure, 
 waiting for me in the doorway, with an involuntary feeling 
 of surprise that I should have been sought for as an asso- 
 ciate for her. The next moment I sighed deeply. The dis- 
 parity, J knew well, was not so much outward as inward ; 
 not of years, but of feeling. To a surface-gaze, we might 
 still seem well mated enough, as mating goes, but I felt in 
 my heart that experience of life and sorrow had separated 
 us by half a century. 
 
 Nevertheless, if it was for Carrie Thome's sake that I 
 was here, I would try not to defraud any reasonable antici- 
 pation. So I rose and went near to her, in token that I 
 placed myself at her disposal. 
 
 She immediately conducted me up the crooked, oaken 
 staircase to a large, front chamber furnished as a parlor, 
 with considerable taste, and even an approach to elegance. 
 Here sat a woman, with her sewing on her lap, whom, at 
 the first glance, I took to be young ; at the second (becom- 
 ing aware of certain skilful devices of toilet, as well as of 
 unmistakable maturity of expression), to be old ; and it was 
 not until the third, and a prolonged one, that I settled into 
 the conviction that she was still in the. border-land between 
 youth and age, so far as years were concerned, but hope- 
 lessly gray and old and worn in some sort of bitter knowl- 
 edge and experience. She rose and received me with an 
 ease and self-possession that evinced considerable ac- 
 quaintance ~with life and manners ; and quietly explained 
 that she had taken the liberty of sending for me because 
 she believed that my father and her deceased husband were 
 formerly friends, though finally separated by the chances 
 and changes of life. She had even met Mr. Frost once 
 herself, and the impression upon her memory was so pleas- 
 ant that she desired to know his daughter. And as she
 
 SHILOH. 269 
 
 never went out, on account of delicate health, she had ven- 
 tured to entrust Carrie with the duty of a preliminary call, 
 and to ask me informally to tea. Her act being thus 
 relieved of any doubtful character, and brought within the 
 pale of social observance ; she passed easily to other themes, 
 showing in all some refinement, some cultivation, and a 
 rare and ready tact that could make up for any deficiencies 
 in either. 
 
 Still, I was conscious of some involuntary distrust of 
 her, from the very first. An unaccountable Conviction that 
 her claim to my father's acquaintance was not genuine took 
 possession of my mind, and would not be dislodged ; 
 though she answered, or parried, all my questions with such 
 consummate skill as to leave me no reasonable ground for 
 the belief. Somehow, she had possessed herself of a toler- 
 ably correct resume of his early life, and the places wherein 
 it had been spent ; and any inaccuracies were easily charge- 
 able to a defective memory, or to the facility with which 
 false impressions are given and received. I listened, 
 assented outwardly, and inwardly disbelieved. 
 
 To be quite frank with you, the moral repulsion or 
 whatever it was appeared to be mutual. At the moment 
 of our meeting, Mrs. Thome's face expressed, for one swift 
 instant, doubt, disappointment, and perplexity; the next, 
 she had drawn on her mask of easy affability, and nothing 
 but cordial interest and pleasure was thereafter suffered to 
 peep from beneath it. Yet I was conscious, now and then, 
 that a keen, furtive glance was resting upon and analyzing 
 me ; though I never once succeeded in surprising it. 
 
 Carrie, meanwhile, had seated herself at a window, and 
 was looking down the lane with an eager, expectant face. 
 Suddenly, she started up, exclaimed, " O mother ! Rick is 
 coining ! " and darted down the stairs. In another moment 
 or two she was at the end of the lane, fulfilling her self- 
 elected office of gate-opener. A handsome light carriage, 
 drawn by a span of spirited horses, soon came through and
 
 270 SHILOH. 
 
 stopped ; the driver reached forth his hand to assist her to 
 a seat at his side, and then drove up the lane in dashing 
 style. In a few moments, he entered the room, with 
 his sister hanging on his arm, and was duly presented to 
 me by his mother. Seeing how completely these two lives 
 were absorbed in his, I looked at him with some feeble stir 
 of interest. 
 
 But, to my surprise, I saw no new acquaintance in 
 Frederick Thorne. Although his name, in the familiar form 
 current in Shik>h, had failed to strike any chord of associa- 
 tion ; my first glance disclosed the fact that he was identi- 
 cal with a certain young " Mr. Thorne " whom I met last 
 winter ; but of whom I had known nothing, nor sought to 
 
 know, save that he was a student at College, and a 
 
 classmate of the eldest son of the Kenmores, with whom 
 he was spending the holiday vacation. They are near 
 neighbors and intimate friends of my aunt, conse : 
 quently, I saw a good deal of him during his stay. In 
 truth, I had to endure some little good-natured teasing on 
 the score of the very open and boyish admiration where- 
 with he chose to honor me. I happened to be out when he 
 made his final call, and Flora did more than justice, I sus- 
 pected, to the keenness of his regret at being prevented 
 from saying farewell in person. And so, having made but 
 a faint and transient ripple on the surface of its flow, he 
 passed out of my life, and out of my memory, as well. 
 
 Yet it was pleasant to meet him again, just now and 
 here. The sight of his open, handsome face was like a 
 cheery window-gleam by night, to a traveller over an 
 unknown road. His delight at the unexpected meeting was 
 so. evident, too ; and so frankly, yet courteously expressed ; 
 that it was impossible not to be grateful for it, and to share 
 it in some degree. 
 
 Moreover, Rick Thorne could scarcely appear otherwise 
 than to excellent advantage by the side of his mother. His 
 countenance was so full of frankness, joyousness, and careless
 
 SHILOH. 271 
 
 good-humor ; while hers was so reserved, so cool, so concen- 
 trated. His manner was as frank as his face, only tempered 
 by a fine, natural courtesy ; hers, soft as velvet, yet some- 
 how suggestive of claws underneath. Years of intercourse 
 might not avail to sound all the deeps of her character ; 
 but a very short acquaintance would suffice to read him 
 through and through ; a sunny temper, an easy-going, 
 generous, affectionate nature, a fine taste and some fancy, 
 more capacity for emotion than thought ; made to be some- 
 body's spoiled darling all his life, and certain to do neither 
 much harm nor much good in the world. In its essence, a 
 selfish character; but not, necessarily, in its develop- 
 ments ; one that we feel instinctively was never made for 
 life's sorrows, nor its storms, nor fitted to endure any of the 
 forms of martyrdom which await those who have the 
 strength and the will to enter into its conflicts, and fight 
 its battles. 
 
 It is not a character that appears to advantage on paper, 
 I know ; but it has its charm, and possibly its value, in real 
 life. Seen by the side of one so old in the world's ways, 
 and so skilled in the world's strategies as Mrs. Thome's, it 
 could not be otherwise than delightful and refreshing. I 
 gave myself up to the enjoyment of it with the more heart- 
 iness, in order to escape from the other. Seeing this, Mrs. 
 Thorne took up her work, and quietly exchanged the posi- 
 tion of actor for that of spectator ; in which she reminded 
 me of a spider lying in wait for incautious flies. 
 
 Rick's talk was lively, unreserved, and careless, almost 
 to boyishness. After the topics growing out of our last 
 winter's acquaintance were exhausted ; it ran much upon 
 his personal tastes, pursuits, and exploits. He was espe- 
 cially eloquent about his drive up from IMventon, and ex- 
 patiated at some length upon the excellent qualities of the 
 " span " which had brought him. Mrs. Thorne heaved an 
 involuntary sigh, and her brow showed a deep wrinkle. It 
 did not escape her son's notice.
 
 272 SHILOH. 
 
 " You need not look so glum, mother," said he, frankly. 
 " I suppose I might have come up with one horse, but 
 there's twice as much fun in driving two. And I didn't 
 run in debt for it, this time. I won ten dollars in a bet 
 last week ; so, you see, I could afford to give myself a 
 treat." 
 
 The frown on his mother's brow deepened, and she 
 threw him a warning glance. I was amused to think how 
 completely it was wasted. The character of her son was of 
 the sort which would inevitably reveal itself. 
 
 Tea was shortly announced. It was served in the long, 
 oak-ceiled kitchen ; within the depths of whose capacious 
 fireplace the handful of sticks which had boiled the tea- 
 kettle still blazed fitfully. Yet so remote the fire, so wide 
 the yawning, black throat of the chimney, and so free the 
 draught across the table (standing between two open 
 doors), that the flame seemed not to add one more fervid 
 breath to the sultry summer afternoon. On the contrary, 
 the old fashioned fireplace, with its broad, uneven hearth- 
 stone, its smoke-blackened jams, its cavernous oven, its 
 sooty back, its swinging crane, garnished with pothooks 
 .and trammels (on one of which the teakettle still simmered 
 drowsily), its sturdy andirons, its - h ray bed of ashes, its 
 ruddy coals, and its half-consumed sticks, falling apart and 
 sending up alternate jets of smoke and flame, contributed 
 an element of picturesqueness to the scene that I should 
 have been sorry to miss. 
 
 The half-wits did not appear at the table, a banish- 
 ment effected, doubtless, by the agency of Mrs. Thorne ; 
 though not without having left a grieved and doubtful 
 shadow upon Miss Bryer's face. But an equally noticeable 
 and disconcertinrg presence was not to be thus averted, 
 that of Dr. Bryer, the master -of the house. He was already 
 seated at the right of the tea-tray, gaunt and grim, his 
 naturally stern, harsh, and arrogant traits of countenance 
 seeming to have been intensified by old age and infirmity ;
 
 SHILOH. 2T3 
 
 as in certain ancient portraits, the fading of light and color 
 serves but to bring into greater prominence the severe, in- 
 flexible expression of the face, and to harmonize it more 
 perfectly with the known character of the original. His 
 garments were rusty, and carelessly put on ; and a broad- 
 brimmed hat, with two or three turns of coarse twine 
 around it, by way of band, deepened the shadow of his 
 overhanging brow. 
 
 o o 
 
 " You will please excuse father's hat," said Mrs. Thorne, 
 apologetically. " Old people have their whims, which must 
 needs be indulged ; and it is one of my father's never to 
 take off his hat except when he goes to bed. Indeed," she 
 added, jestingly, " it is purely a matter of supposition, on 
 my part, that he does it then, for I have not seen him with- 
 out it for years. I must also premise that he is quite deaf, 
 so much so that he does not expect strangers to talk to 
 him ; he has hard work to understand voices to which he is 
 accustomed." 
 
 Then she raised her voice. " Father, let me. introduce 
 you to Miss Frost." 
 
 " Xonsense ! " returned the old man, in a harsh, querel- 
 ous tone, " you're out of your senses, Eliza ! Who^ ever 
 heard of frost on the first of July? And after such a 
 sweltering day, too ! But why don't you introduce that 
 young woman ? " 
 
 Mrs. Thorne repeated her introduction in a still louder 
 tone. 
 
 " Corse ! " said her father, eyeing me sharply. " I am 
 glad to see you, Miss Corse ; I hope you are .very well." 
 An.d then, evidently taking it for granted that whatever 
 was inaudible to himself must needs be so to others, he 
 muttered, distinctly enough, " Corse ! Good heavens, 
 what a name ! Might as well be Corpse, and done with 
 it!" 
 
 Rick's face grew red, and he hastily lifted a glass of 
 water to his lips. The rising laugh, however, was not to 
 12*
 
 274 SHILOH. 
 
 be swallowed with the water ; the twain met in his throat, 
 and after a momentary struggle for the right of way, the 
 laugh conquered." There was a choke, an explosion, a scat- 
 tering shower, and Rick darted to the window. 
 
 Mrs. Thorne sent after him a look of smothered fury, 
 that would have made her fortune on the tragic stage ; 
 then, she smoothed her face into deprecation, and turned to 
 me. " Miss Frost, I am sure you will excuse my father, on 
 account of his age and infirmities. But as for Rick, I am 
 ashamed of him. There is no excuse for his untimely levity, 
 unless it be that 
 
 " That he couldn't help it," interrupted Rick, coming 
 back to the table. " Nothing like the truth to wipe out an 
 error. And Miss Frost would have laughed, too, if she had 
 dared. I saw it in her eyes. Nevertheless, I humbly beg 
 her pardon and yours." 
 
 Mrs. Thome's look softened involuntarily. Her son's 
 handsome face and frank, graceful manner, would have dis- 
 armed a sterner censor. 
 
 Dr. Bryer, meanwhile, liad addressed himself to the dis- 
 cussion of the edibles on his plate, in serene unconscious- 
 ness of his blunder, or its effects. He now intermitted his 
 agreeable occupation long enough to inquire, " How did 
 you come up, Rick ? " 
 
 " Drove up, sir. Had a splendid team " began Rick, 
 preparing to enter into the subject with enthusiasm, and at 
 some length. 
 
 " Plenty of steam ! " interrupted his grandfather, gruff- 
 ly. " I'll warrant it ! enough to have sent you to spit out 
 your mouthful of cigar-smoke in Kingdom Come, if there 
 had been a cow on the track, or a rail askew. I thank the 
 Lord I never yet patronized any of those inventions for 
 breaking people's necks. To be sure, young men's necks 
 ain't good for much except to be broken, now-a-days. The 
 railroads save the sheriff some trouble, I suppose." 
 
 With which gracious remark the old doctor applied
 
 SHILOH. 275 
 
 himself afresh to his biscuit and butter; and the talk 
 became general. In the midst of it, he launched a new 
 inquiry. 
 
 " Getting on well at college, Rick ? Head of the first 
 division, eh ? " 
 
 His grandson's face fell a little. " Not exactly, grand- 
 father," he answered, more seriously than his wont ; " to 
 tell the truth, it's about as much as I can do to hold my 
 own in any division. I reckon study doesn't run in the 
 Thorne blood ; if it does, it has skipped a generation." 
 
 " Zouiids, Rick !" exclaimed the old man sharply, " you're 
 too old to be skipping demonstrations. Why in the name 
 of sense don't you face your work like a man, and not 
 shirk it like a boy ? " 
 
 Rick gave a rueful shrug of the shoulders, but attempted 
 no defence; nor did his grandfather seem to expect 
 any. 
 
 " You will observe," said Mrs. Thorne to me, blandly, 
 " that we do not think it worth while to correct my poor 
 father's mistakes, when it is not absolutely necessary. The 
 attempt to explain would only lead to fresh errors, and we 
 think it better to let the subject drop in any way he 
 pleases." 
 
 " What's that you're saying, Eliza ? " suddenly demand- 
 ed the old doctor, suspending operations, and eyeing her 
 suspiciously. 
 
 Mrs. Thorne bit her lip. " I was saying that we would 
 drop the subject," she replied, rather shortly. 
 
 " Dropped what f " queried the old man, evidently at a 
 loss. "Did it break?" 
 
 Carrie tittered, Rick laughed, and no one could repress 
 a smile. Dr. Bryer looked angrily from one to another. 
 His eldest daughter hastened to explain. Putting her lips 
 close to his ear, she repeated her sister's words, in slow, 
 distinct, and not ungentle tones, that found easy access to 
 his understanding.
 
 276 SHILOH. 
 
 " Oh ! with all my heart," he responded, dryly. " Es- 
 pecially as it won't bear much handling. Addled eggs and 
 addle pates it is as well to let alone," he added, with a caustic 
 glance at his grandson. Plainly the spectacle of the latter' s 
 easy temper and sportive ways annoyed and irritated him. 
 Having himself led an active, energetic, aggressive life from 
 early youth ; in rough and often hostile contact with the 
 world ; repaying every jest with a jibe, and every scoff with 
 a scowl or a blow ; he could not understand Rick's sun- 
 shiny, laissez-faire existence, nor the touch of Sybaritism in 
 his nature, nor his good-humored endurance of his own 
 biting taunts and sarcasms. He marveled that a young 
 man, with all his life-battles yet to be fought, and his for- 
 tunes to be made or marred, should be so gay, so self- 
 indulgent, so inconsequent. If he could, he would have 
 thrown him at once into the middle of the fight ; unsuspi- 
 cious that he was as little likely to receive downright blows 
 as to give them (since the world invariably softens a little 
 to persons of his make) ; unknowing that sorrow and trial, 
 however much they might refine and spiritualize his char- 
 acter, could never make him strong with the kind of 
 strength he coveted for him. Especially was Dr. Bryer 
 disgusted with his grandson's fastidious niceties of toilet : 
 the cut of his coat, the tie of his cravat, and the polish of his 
 boots, he reckoned up against him as so many positive sins. 
 His joyousness and his amiability he threw into the same 
 category. These were not the faults of his own youth, 
 therefore the doctor had no indulgence for them. If IJick 
 had been fiery and reckless, or determined and vindictive, 
 he could have had .patience with him, and hope of his 
 future ; but for a handsome, amiable, indolent youth, whose 
 worst vice was cigars, and whose highest ambition was to 
 be dragged ignominiously through college at the tail of a 
 "Third Division," he entertained nothing but contempt. 
 If ever he felt the charm of his manner, he rebelled against 
 it. He overlooked the good in him, because it was so
 
 sniLoii. 2YY 
 
 largely negative in its character ; and he despised the evil 
 in him, for the very same reason. 
 
 His last stinging remark, however, was not without a 
 momentary effect. Rick's face flushed, and he seemed on 
 the pqint of making a hasty rejoinder; but his mother laid 
 her hand upon his arm with a firm, warning pressure, and 
 Miss Bryer nervously sought to create a diversion by be- 
 sieging me with tea-table attentions. To do Rick justice, 
 his resentment was but a flash ; and by the time I had suc- 
 cessively declined cheese, dried-beef, pickles and jelly (some 
 of them twice over, for Miss Bryer's anxiety confused her 
 recollection), his wonted good-nature resumed its easy sway, 
 and he was ready to follow up the assault with reinforce- 
 ments of cake loaf-cake, queen-cake, seed-cake, and I know 
 not what beside. 
 
 I shall record but one other tea-table topic. In some 
 reminiscence of New Orleans, Mrs. Thorne suddenly men- 
 tioned the name of Venner, and my start of surprise did 
 not escape her notice, nothing does ! 
 
 "Do you know them?" she asked. 
 
 " The bankers ? Only by reputation," replied I, evas- 
 ively. 
 
 She looked at me with keen scrutiny. "It was the 
 youngest partner that I knew well," she went on, " Mr. 
 Paul Yenner. A fine young man. Did you never happen 
 to meet him ? " 
 
 " I think I have in New York. But he was not then 
 connected with the house of which you speak." 
 
 " Indeed ! " rejoined she, with a tone of surprise. " I 
 understood him to say that he had grown up in it." 
 
 I made no reply. What need to discuss the matter ? Of 
 course she labored under a misapprehension, but many a 
 worse one, involving it may be, the happiness of a life 
 has had to pass without correction. 
 
 Mrs. Thorne looked dissatisfied and curious. " I get 
 an occasional letter from him even now," she continued,
 
 278 SHILOH. 
 
 with her eyes fixed on my face, as if bent on finding the 
 clue to my first involuntary manifestation ; " for the busi- 
 ness in which he is my agent is still unsettled, and he keeps 
 me informed of its progress." 
 
 "Ah, indeed?" said I, doing my best to assume that 
 mildly interrogative tone wherewith politeness so thinly 
 masks indifference. 
 
 She made another attempt. " By the way, did I not 
 hear a rumor that he was married, or about to be ?" 
 
 " Very possibly," answered I, gazing absently out of the 
 window, and thinking, not of Mrs. Thome, not of Madame 
 Rumor, but of Paul's face as I saw it last as I see it now, 
 and shall see it, I fear, always, changing slowly from sur- 
 prise to doubt certainty anguish; and vanishing, stern 
 and reproachful, into the gloom. "Will he wear that face at 
 the altar, I wonder ? And was it the far-off swinging of his 
 wedding-bells that made the air so close and heavy that 
 sultry summer afternoon overflooded with melody, even 
 to faintness, as sometimes with perfume ! Well ! what 
 could it possibly matter to me ! 
 
 Mrs. Thorne gave it up, and rose from the table. 
 
 " Carrie," she said, presently, " it promises to be a fine 
 sunset ; suppose you and Rick take Miss Frost over to 
 enjoy it from Sunset Rock. A spot," she added, turning 
 to me, " where the departure of day is witnessed to great 
 advantage, with whatever glories of light and cloud it 
 wraps about it, from which circumstance it derives its 
 name."
 
 SUNSET PICTURES. 
 
 
 
 HE Bryer mansion and its immediate acres oc- 
 cupied the flat crown of Chestnut Hill. To 
 the west began a gentle slope into a*wide, 
 undulating vale, robed with the varied green of 
 forest, field, and meadow, and jeweled with tiny 
 sheets and threads of water. On the brow of 
 this slope was a great, rough, irregular mass of 
 rock, Avith mosses and ferns clinging to its sides' 
 and a thrifty young oak rooted in a seam at its top ; under 
 whose boughs we sat down to view the marvelous pictures 
 that sun and cloud were jointly making. Overhead the 
 sky was clear and rosy. To the right, large masses of 
 cloud were rolling up, their bossy fronts ruddy with the 
 sun-glow, but stretching far back, dense, sombre and, threat- 
 ening. In the western horizon the sun hung low a blood- 
 red ball of fire. Just beneath- him, within a hand-breadth, 
 as it seemed, of the horizon's rim, sti-etched a long, narrow 
 line of cloud, straight and black and shai'p as if drawn 
 with ink. Toward this the sun was slowly descending. 
 
 " How strange," said Carrie Thorne, suddenly, "to 
 think that the sun which seems and is setting, to us, is 
 really rising upon another hemisphere ! " 
 
 " I am better content to forget it," I answered, speak- 
 ing out of an uncontrollable bitterness of heart (Ah ! those 
 wedding bells !). " To-night, it only saddens me to know
 
 280 SHILOH. 
 
 that other and fresher eyes discover, in the vanishing rose 
 and gold of our sunset, the waking glory of their morn- 
 ing." 
 
 She looked at me with a gentle surprise. " I do not see 
 why it should," she said, simply. " It makes me glad to 
 think that there is morning somewhere, if not just over 
 me." Then she went to gather some wild columbines 
 growing in the clefts of the rock ; and, lured on from one 
 tuft of ruby-colored, honey-laden blossoms to another, dis- 
 appeared from sight. 
 
 Rick had thrown himself upon the rock, a little apart ; 
 and was watching the sky in silence, with a face whose 
 quiet gravity might have beseemed a death-bed vigil. 
 Gifted with a quick sense of beauty, and impressionable 
 as water, his eyes dwelt admiringly on the sunset's change- 
 ful splendors, while his mood involuntarily reflected the 
 spirit of the hour and scene. 
 
 Meantime, the sun sank steadily. Ere long, his bright 
 rim touched the black strip of cloud, and vanished behind 
 it, blotted, as it were, from the universe. The landscape 
 shuddered, and the sky grew livid. From the dusky 
 cloud-bastion on the right, came a low roll of thunder, as 
 if in solemn protest. In the boughs above us, a hidden 
 bird gave a scared, iineasy twitter ; and a breeze that had 
 slept in the tree's top since morning, woke from its long 
 dream, and stirred, and sighed. Rick threw me an awe- 
 struck, appealing glance ; as if to fill up the measure of 
 his sombre delight with the certainty of another's sympa- 
 thy ; but he neither spoke nor moved. I was deeply grate- 
 ful to him for his silence. At that moment, a talkative or 
 a fidgety companion would have been intolerable. 
 
 Suddenly, a faint red gleam shot from beneath the eb- 
 ony cloud ; and on the instant the sun's lower rim emerged, 
 and slowly grew upon our view. The spectacle now be- 
 came wondrously and weirdly beautiful. The straight, 
 narrow cloud drew a belt of inky blackness across the sun's
 
 SHILOH. 281 
 
 broad disc ; above and below which, the uncovered por- 
 tions of that luminary glowed radiantly, two distinct 
 hemispheres of crimson splendor. Gradually the black 
 belt crept up ; little by little, the lower hemisphere broad- 
 ened ; the upper one diminished ; and the sun reappeared 
 to view. Round, red, and majestic, he hung for a few mo- 
 ments above the horizon, bathing the earth and sky in his 
 departing glory. Every glimpse of water became a spot 
 of roseate sheen ; every leaf and grass-blade had its face of 
 ruddy glow and reverse of purple dusk ; even the gray 
 tints of the rock whereon we sat showed dimly through a 
 lustrous, rosy veil. Thus regal, calm, and glorious, the sun 
 sank finally from sight, 
 
 " Beautiful ! beautiful ! " exclaimed Rick, drawing a 
 long bi-eath, and starting up. " I never saw anything like 
 it ! Airl I doubt if ever I do again ; however, a single 
 sunset like that may well suffice one for a lifetime. But I 
 would give a good deal to know what you saw in it, Miss 
 Frost ! Something more than sun and cloud and color, I'll 
 be boun'd." 
 
 Involuntarily I held out my hand to him. " Let me 
 thank you fy m st for keeping so still. Most people would 
 have talked, and I could not have borne it. You shall 
 have my thoughts gratis, since you are pleased to want any- 
 thing so worthless. I was only thinking how often a hu- 
 man life passes suddenly behind as black and opaque a 
 cloud as did the sun yonder ; and I was wondering how 
 many of them would partially emerge, and forever present 
 to the mind's eye the spectacle of two hemispheres of 
 brightness, with a black belt of sorrowful experiences and 
 memories between them. I did not think it worth while 
 to puzzle myself with the still harder question how few of 
 them would ever come out wholly from the cloud, to shine 
 in undimmed and unrestricted brightness for awhile before 
 sinking finally into the grave." 
 
 He gave me a more penetrating look than I had thought
 
 282 SHILOH. 
 
 him capable of. " If it were my life," he said, with un- 
 wonted energy, " it should come out from the cloud ! It 
 should come forth radiant, not to sink into the grave, but 
 to make a new morning for the new sky and the new earth 
 that are waiting for it." 
 
 I drew back, with a subtle, intuitive impression of some 
 latent meaning in his words, felt, but not understood. lie 
 paused for a moment, and then went on, more slowly, but 
 in a tone expressive of even deeper feeling. " Do not for- 
 get what Carrie said just now, that the sun which is setting 
 to one, is rising to another ; and try to derive a little cheer 
 from the reflection that, in human life also, joy often begins 
 to rise in the very spot where, from one point of view, he 
 seems to have set forever." 
 
 Both truth and comfort were in his words, if I could 
 have stopped to take them. But I passed them over 
 unheeding, intent only upon detecting and defining that 
 other suspicious, elusive ingredient ; which, however, con- 
 tinually escaped from my crucible of thought in formless, 
 intangible vapoi\ A loud peal of thunder startled me in 
 the midst of the attempt. Rick and I looked round simul- 
 taneously. Behind us stretched a dense, dull .gray canopy 
 of clouds, lit up, for an instant, with the vivid glare of 
 lightning; a chill, sullen wind breathed drearily in our 
 faces ; and two meadows beyond, between us and the 
 house, we could see and hear distinctly the heavy march of 
 the rain. 
 
 " So thaPs what the clouds have been up to in our rear, 
 while we were busy with those in front ! " said Rick, 
 with undisguised vexation. " A very well executed flank 
 movement, it must be acknowledged ! But an exceedingly 
 unhandsome trick on the part of the elements, nevertheless. 
 What has Carrie done with herself, I wonder?" 
 
 " I suppose we are to run for it," said I, gathering up 
 my skirt, preparatory to flight. But Rick stopped me. 
 
 "It won't do," said he, decisively. "You will run
 
 SHILOII. 283 
 
 straight into the rain, and your discomfort in being soaked 
 will not be mitigated by the consideration that you are 
 'neither sugar nor salt' except in a figurative . sense. 
 There is a hole under the rock a cave, if you like that 
 better where I have found shelter from many a shower, in 
 my boyhood ; and it is large enough to hold us all, if I 
 remember right. At all events, it is our only chance of 
 escape. This way the path is a little rough let me help 
 you down." 
 
 I hesitated. The "hole under the rock" had not an 
 inviting sound. Besides, I had no mind to seek its shelter 
 until I was certain of Carrie's company. 
 
 "I beg your pardon," said Rick, a little impatiently, 
 fairly lifting me from the rock on which I stood to the one 
 below, " but I see that I must take the matter into my own 
 hands, if you are not to get wet ; and I do not propose that 
 you shall, under my charge. There is a raindrop, now ! 
 And there is Carrie down below all in good time ! Run, 
 Carrie, for the ' oven,' " raising his voice, and accompany- 
 ing the injunction with an expressive gesture. 
 
 She nodded, and darted around the corner of the rock. 
 At sight of her and the raindrops, my hesitation vanished, 
 and I followed with alacrity. We were soon in the cave, 
 an oven-shaped cavity formed by the overlapping of the 
 rocks. Its ceiling was only just high enough to admit of 
 our sitting upright ; but the lateral space was ample. It 
 was beginning to be dusky, of course; though the opening 
 faced the western sky, and would catch its latest gleam. 
 
 An hour passed swiftly enough. There was even a 
 degree of enjoyment in our situation-. Almost any event 
 which transcends ordinary rules a little, without violating 
 them, is a pleasant break in a monotonous life. 
 
 Moreover, circumstances like these give a strong impe- 
 tus to acquaintance. Barriers of strangeness, of reserve, 
 of shyness, melt down insensibly. Rick, Carrie, and I, 
 were soon talking- together with much of the ease and con-
 
 284 SHILOH. 
 
 fidence of old friends. Both of my companions gained 
 thereby. Carrie showed an amiable, unselfish nature, sweet 
 and sound to the core ; and Rick, more manliness of 
 thought and aspiration than I had given him credit for. 
 Naturally, our talk took a tinge of gravity from the sunset 
 we had just witnessed ; deepened by the loud roll of the 
 thunder, the beat of the rain, and the growing duskiness of 
 our retreat. 
 
 I mention these incidents that you may understand how 
 inevitably they stimulated the growth of feelings that, oth- 
 erwise, would scarce have blossomed so soon, that might 
 have perished in their unquickened germs. 
 
 At the end of an hour, the flashes of lightning that had 
 lit up our cell from time to time, ceased ; and the thunder 
 died away in a faint far-off muttering. But the rain still 
 fell heavily. Taking an observation, Rick gave it as his 
 opinion that the shower had developed into a settled rain, 
 and that we were "regularly in for it." 
 
 " And so," he continued,' buttoning up his coat, " the 
 next thing is for me to go up to the house, and bring clown 
 a lot of outsiders for you end Miss Frost to go home 
 with." 
 
 " Outsiders ! " laughed Carrie, " what do you mean ? " 
 
 " Outsiders, sweet sis, is a generic name for things to be 
 worn outside, shawls, rubbers, overcoats, etc." And Rick 
 put on his hat, preparatory to launching himself into the 
 rain. 
 
 At this moment a faint " Halloo ! " penetrated our 
 hiding-place. 
 
 " By all that's opportune, a rescue ! " exclaimed Rick, 
 dashing out, and returning it with a will. 
 
 In brief space of time, a nondescript figure appeared at 
 the mouth of .the cavern. It had long, gray hair, keen 
 black eyes, slouching garments, and a saturnine face ; in 
 short, it was Mortimer Bryer, the hero of Mrs. Prescott's 
 anecdote, who had not before deigned to show himself to
 
 SHILOH. 285 
 
 me. He was heavily laden with " outsiders," which he dis- 
 pensed, with as few words as possible ; then, taking Carrie 
 on his arm, under an umbrella, he marched off at a great 
 pace. Rick hoisted another over me, and we followed as 
 fast as possible, but were inevitably distanced in the race. 
 Mrs. Thorne met us at the door with profuse regrets 
 and condolences. We had a merry drying by the kitchen 
 fire, and plenty of vivacious talk from Rick afterward. I 
 accepted, perforce, an invitation to spend the night ; for all 
 the celestial reservoirs Deemed to be emptying themselves, 
 as a preliminary step to a thorough renovation. At a tol- 
 erably late hour, Mrs. Thorne conducted me to a large, 
 dusky room, filled with grim, old-fa.shioned furniture. I 
 slept in a high-post bedstead ; over which a heavy canopy 
 and hangings of dark chintz brooded like a cloud. Beside 
 it, stood a tall, high-backed chair, in such a position as to 
 seem intended for the reception of some ghostly watcher. 
 Perhaps it was this that made sleep so unresponsive to my 
 call, and gave me ample time to think how strange it was 
 that Mrs. Thorne should know Paul Venner !
 
 IX THE BOWlfu. 
 
 HE morning was so clear and fair as to give 
 color ' to the fancy that nature was trying 
 to make sweet amends for the storm of the 
 preceding night. After breakfast, I announced 
 my intention of proceeding immediately home- 
 ward; but Mrs. Thorne managed, somehow, to 
 set its fulfilment aside, and to substitute a plan 
 to visit some natural curiosity called " The 
 Bower," in a neighboring bit of woods. This involved the 
 necessity of waiting for the grass to dry, and another hour 
 or two of Bryer and Thorne society, with a considerable 
 preponderance, I thought, of Rick's. In due time, how- 
 ever, we set forth, Carrie linking her arm in mine, and her 
 brother in advance. Half way across the first meadow we 
 were stopped by Mrs. Thome's voice. 
 
 " Carrie ! " she called, with her head out of the Avin- 
 dow, "I want you, just for a moment or two. I forgot to 
 measure your belt. Go on, Miss Frost, she will overtake 
 you directly." 
 
 - We went on, of course, but I had a singular feeling, for 
 the moment, that Rick and Carrie and I were only puppets, 
 whereof Mrs. Thorne pulled the wires ! 
 
 " The Bower " was worth seeing, nevertheless. A lux- 
 uriant, wild grapevine had run up and down and across the
 
 6HILOH 287 
 
 boughs and trunks of contiguous trees, and woven a^ hut- 
 like enclosure, with but a single narrow opening ; all of 
 green verdure without, all a brown network of vines with- 
 in, supported by mossy pillars of tree-trunks. Inside was 
 a rustic seat, not in the best repair. 
 
 " Sit down," said Rick, after having tested its strength 
 by a vigorous shake ; " Carrie will be here soon. She will 
 consider herself defrauded, no doubt, in not hearing your 
 first exclamation of wonder ; she would be doubly disap- 
 pointed, if we did not wait for her." And Rick folded his 
 arms, leaned against one of the gray pillars, and seemed to' 
 lose himself in thought. Some indefinable feeling made me 
 careful not to disturb it. I sat silent, listening for Carrie's 
 step, wondering how lon'g Mrs. Thorne would deem it ex- 
 pedient to keep her, and inwardly resolving that my move- 
 ments should never again be woven into the intricate web 
 of her designs. 
 
 And yet, what possible object could she have in throw- 
 ing Rick and me together ? So utterly fruitless was my 
 investigation in that direction, that I began to think my- 
 self needlessly suspicious ; and to settle down into the be- 
 lief that things had taken their natural course, after all, 
 uninfluenced by my bland and easy hostess, except as 
 she was naturally desirous of fit companionship for her 
 daughter. 
 
 Then, secure in his intense and prolonged absorption, I 
 suffered my eyes to rest upon my companion, and was new- 
 ly and vividly impressed with his wondrous personal beau- 
 ty ; a beauty similar in kind, though not at all in expres- 
 sion, to that which old masters give to Our Lord, blended 
 of both masculine and feminine traits. The exquisite 
 mould and outline, of his form and countenance had the 
 superadded charm of perfect health, the richest vitality 
 animating the most symmetrical mechanism. He stood 
 where both face and figure continually caught fresh lights 
 and changeful tints from the flickering play of sunbeams
 
 288 SHILOH. 
 
 falling through the wind-stirred roof of foliage; as if to 
 typify how capable was his inner nature of imbibing pleas- 
 ant hues and cheerful gleams of light from all points ; and 
 making me feel that, as a matter of artistic propriety, he 
 ought always to be so placed as to receive the greatest pos- 
 sible amount of material and metaphorical sunshine. Fate 
 would do him as much wrong in withholding them, I 
 thought, as in denying to ordinary men a sufficiency of 
 air to breathe. His features ought always to reflect the 
 glow of a cheerful and happy spirit ; the frown of sorrow, 
 of care, or of anger, would be as much out of place among 
 them, as on the careless, open brow of a child. Yet the 
 light veil of thought which now shadowed them, was 
 rather a beautificr than otherwise. Indeed, it did more 
 than shadow ; it informed them with a deeper and more 
 delicate intelligence, and subtly suggested (with what 
 amount of truth I know not) some latent, finer temper 
 of being. 
 
 Seeing him thus, it occurred to me how easy it would be 
 for a thoughtless, inexperienced girl to lose her heart to 
 him. I could even conceive that it were possible for a wo- 
 man gentler, tenderer, more generous, and more disinter- 
 ested than myself to lay down her life and love at his 
 feet ; content for them to be trodden in the dust, if by that 
 means his way might be made smooth and easy to the hap- 
 piness that she could so much better bear to do without. 
 There are women who might fitly be wedded to the horse- 
 leech ; they are satisfied (for a time, at least) to " give 
 give," asking little or nothing in return ; with them it is 
 enough for happiness to watch the abundant, jinobstructed 
 outflow of their own hearts. The motherly instinct is 
 strongest in them. Their supremest delight is to cherish, 
 to nurture, to nourish, whether with milk of breast, love 
 of heart, toil of hand, or ache of brow ; and, till children 
 come to divert the feeling into its more natural channel, it 
 sets strongly toward lover and husband. Such an one
 
 SHILOH. 289 
 
 might ask nothing better of Providence than the opportu- 
 nity of devoting hei-self to this beautiful, amiable, joyous 
 creature, who would always retain, even in mature age, 
 somewhat of the characteristics of youth ; and, reversing 
 the natural order of the relation of woman to man, she 
 might be content to spend her days and strength in remov- 
 ing the thorns from his pathway, and warding off from 
 him the strokes of sorrow and of trial. I might even be 
 capable of it myself, if he were 1 my brother. But my hus- 
 band if ever I have one must be more ready to shield 
 than be shielded. He must have that deepest grace 
 which comes from power, tempered with gentleness. He 
 must be strong with moral strength, and wise with heaven- 
 ly wisdom ; and whatever sort of face he wears, it must be 
 transfigured with the inward beauty of an earnest, loving 
 spirit, a disciplined will, and a symmetrically developed in- 
 tellect. In short, he must be like but what am I think- 
 ing of ! like no one that I have ever seen, except through 
 the beautifying, magnifying glass of ideality a truth dis- 
 covered too late. And yet ah ! yes, my father ! how 
 often has thy memory arisen between me and bitter, sweep- 
 ing distrust of mankind ! how tenderly does thine image 
 set itself to rekindle the failing fire of faith in human good- 
 ness, on the hearthstone of my heart ! Better man than 
 thou no woman need dream of, nor desire to find ! 
 
 I had forgotten everything the Bryers, the bower, 
 Rick's presence, Carrie's absence everything but my 
 father's face, smiling upon me more tenderly than Italian 
 skies ; my father's voice, rich and sweet with the honey of 
 wisdom, hived through long, serene years of patient 
 thought and loving research. It cost me no small effort, 
 therefore, to grasp the present again, and bring it home to 
 my mind with the necessary distinctness, when Rick sud- 
 denly broke the silence. 
 
 " Miss Frost, may I ask you how long you are to re- 
 main in Shiloh ? " 
 13
 
 290 
 
 " I really cannot say. Some weeks longer, certainly." 
 
 " And I may not be able to come up again for three 
 months ! " 
 
 Accepting the remark as conclusive, I did not answer 
 it ; but sought covertly to take out a tear from each eye, 
 that had welled up from the deep fountains so lately 
 stirred. Rick drew nearer, and spoke again. 
 
 " I have read some\vhere that parting is ' sweet sorrow.' 
 But it can only be so, I fancy, to those who are certain, or 
 hopeful, of meeting again. When and where may I ex- 
 pect to meet you again, Miss Frost ? " 
 
 " We will leave that to time and chance, if you please," 
 I answered, lightly. 
 
 " Time and Chance," he responded, shrugging his shoul- 
 ders, " are not the deities I should choose to preside over 
 this matter. To be sure, they have been kinder to me, in 
 bringing about this most unexpected meeting, than I had 
 dared to hope. But they are capricious divinities, at best. 
 Mere acquaintanceship can invoke them, if it likes ; but 
 they will not do for a stronger feeling." 
 
 Instinctively, though vaguely, I comprehended that 
 something was impending which it would better please me 
 to avert. I rose, therefore, and moved toward the entrance, 
 remarking, carelessly, " I think we may as well 'go. I 
 have done the ' Bower ' thoroughly ; I took it all in, roof, 
 floor, foliage, tendrils, green grapes, mosses, cracks in the 
 seat, and gaps in the walls, while you were in a brown 
 study just now; and I have waited for Carrie as long as 
 she can reasonably expect. I doubt if she is coming at all ; 
 probably your mother detained her until she thought it too 
 late to start." 
 
 My action only seemed to precipitate the communication 
 it was designed to prevent. Rick placed himself directly 
 in "my path, and put forth a detaining hand. 
 
 " Not yet," said he, hurriedly. " Listen to me a moment 
 indeed you must. I have no right, I know, upon so short
 
 SHILOH. 291 
 
 * 
 
 an acquaintance, to tell you that I love you, and yet," he 
 stopped and drew a long breath, " it is true ! " 
 
 Dismayed, confounded, at so sudden and unlooked-for 
 a crisis, I stood silent, uncertain what tone it were best to 
 take. He went on, with scarcely a moment's pause. 
 
 " Still, if I had known when and where I might expect 
 to see you again, I would not have spoken now. But I 
 could not make up my mind to part from you a second 
 time, and leave our future meeting, and future relation, to 
 mere accident. I was loth enough to do it last w r inter. 
 Yet my feeling for you, then, was only admiration, esteem, 
 liking, the dawn of love, while now! There are hours, 
 you know, that do the work of weeks, of months. Such an 
 Hour was yesterday's sunset, and those delightful moments 
 in the cave, and this morning's quiet talk in the porch. 
 Under such influences, love springs up as quickly as Jonah's 
 gourd, though not, I beg you to believe, with so evanescent 
 a growth. But I did not, I do not, mean to press my suit 
 upon you now. You cannot feel more strongly than I do 
 that you ought to know me better before trusting your 
 happiness in my hands. Indeed, I acknowledge frankly 
 that, at this moment, I am not worthy of you. Not 
 because my life has any depths which I would hide from 
 your eyes, but because it has, as yet, no heights which 
 I can point out to them with pride. I only ask your per- 
 mission to pursue the acquaintance so happily begun, so 
 fortunately continued. Give me opportunity to show you, 
 not only what I am, but what I can be, with the stimulus 
 of your eyes upon me. Give me time and opportunity 
 to win your love." . 
 
 The unexpected manliness and generosity of this speech 
 touched me. . Nevertheless, I had decided that it would be 
 better not to treat the matter seriously. So I said, quietly, 
 dropping, for the first time, the formal " Mr. Thorne," by 
 which I had always addressed him, 
 
 " Rick, how old are you ? "
 
 292 SIIILOII. 
 
 He looked surprised, even as was natural enough a 
 little annoyed. " I am I shall be twenty-one in three 
 months." 
 
 " And I am past twenty-four." I spoke in a tone to 
 imply that there was an end of the matter. And again I 
 rose to go. 
 
 " If you think that makes any difference to me," said 
 Rick, quickly, " you mistake me much. I love you just as 
 you are, I would not have you any different, by a day or 
 an hour. And I promise you that the outward discrep- 
 ancy if there is any shall totally disappear in a year or 
 two. If you will only let me, I will make your life so 
 happy that youth shall linger with you, loth to go, long 
 after its usual time for flight. And the -care of your hap- 
 piness, the thinking and planning and working for it, will 
 so quickly bring out all the manhood in me will make me 
 so steady, so grave, so mature, that I shall soon seem the 
 elder of the two. Ah ! see what you will thus do for me ! 
 you will give me. higher aims and new strength. Without 
 you, my life will' remain objectless, valueless. With you 
 arid through you, all pleasant possibilities of growth, of 
 achievement, of usefulness, of happiness, open to me." 
 
 No doubt he believed what he said. For the moment I 
 half believed it, too. The warm tide of his earnestness 
 bore me on with it irresistibly. And suddenly Mala stood 
 beside me, whispering in my ear. 
 
 "What better mission than this does tho world now" 
 hold for you ? " she asked, with an indescribable mixture of 
 seriousness and sarcasm. " Your life is bereft of its future ; 
 why not devote it to bettering the future of another! 
 You will never love again, with the depths and heighths 
 of your nature : why not be content with the quiet, careful, 
 elder-sisterly affection that you might bring yourself to feel 
 for Rick Thorne ! Be his providence, and take his destiny 
 into your hands. Repeat the grand miracle of the creation ; 
 breathe vital, inspiring, strengthening breath into this beau-
 
 SHILOH. 293 
 
 tiful clay. Supplement his grace with your strength, his 
 brilliancy with your depth, his amiability with' your con- 
 scientiousness, his easy temper with your steadfastness, his 
 impulsiveness with your patience. In short, make a MAN 
 of him, and find your reward in your work. Many a better 
 woman might be glad of the chance." 
 
 BOXA (with slow emphasis). Perhaps you have all those 
 good qualities in the measure required. I hope so. For, 
 very strong you need to be to undertake the work of God's 
 good providence ! Very deep, to be able to sink the lie 
 you would live out of the reach of your own self-condem- 
 nation ! Very conscientious, to walk unscathed through 
 the fiery furnace of wedded life, bare of undoubted wedded 
 love ! Very steadfast, to keep memory always muzzled, 
 and regret ever at bay ! Very patient, to wait till good 
 comes of doing evil ! Many a better woman might shrink 
 from the trial. 
 
 MALA (going on, after a moment, as if Bona had not 
 spoken}. You ought to consider yourself, too, somewhat. 
 Home, in the sweetest sense of the word, you have none. 
 Your family ties are few, and Time will make them fewer. 
 Your duties are vague and scattered a bit here, a bit 
 there. ' Your objects take no definite hold on the future. 
 In pity to yourself, give yourself a home, a tie, a duty, an 
 object, for life ! 
 
 BOXA. A home unhallowed a tie with a rotten thread 
 . in it a duty full of an endless discouragement an object 
 quick with a gnawing dissatisfaction. 
 
 The words came faintly, as if from afar. 
 
 MALA (Impatiently). Well ! suppose it is all true what 
 nave you better now ? You cannot be worse ofl" than you 
 are. 
 
 BONA (drawing near). And if ever Paul Venner 
 
 I started and shuddered. " Rick," I said, drearily, " it 
 cannot be. The truth is, I have no heart to give you." 
 
 " You are engaged ? " he asked, quickly.
 
 294 SHILOH. 
 
 " No ; but I was that is to say, I came very near to 
 being so once." 
 
 " I see. You have had a bereavement, or a disappoint- 
 ment. No matter grief yields to time I can wait. 
 Hereafter, when " 
 
 I interrupted him. " There are cases when apparent 
 harshness is true tenderness. This is one of them. I tell 
 you frankly, that there can be no hereafter in this matter. 
 It must be ended, now and here." 
 
 He looked at me quietly and shook his head. " I have 
 no doubt you believe what you say. You are cruel upon 
 principle. But I shall cherish hope, though you give none. 
 Some day you will find your heart empty. Then, seeing 
 my love so ready, so patient, so true, you will open the 
 door and let it in." 
 
 " Hush, Rick ! How can I make you understand with- 
 out giving you needless pain ? Our natures were never 
 made nor meant to be joined together. In all that you 
 have said to me, there is an intuitive, probably an uncon- 
 scious, recognition of this fact. Such a union would have 
 no firm foundation in natural fitness. Doubtless, I might 
 have loved you very tenderly as a sister, very faithfully as 
 a friend, but as a wife, wifely never ! Say no more 
 further words on this subject can only be painful to both 
 of us." 
 
 He looked at me fixedly for some moments then turned 
 away his face. I heard a deep-drawn breath, almost a sob. 
 If he would only stand aside from the entrance and let me 
 vanish quietly ! As it was, I could do nothing but avert 
 my gaze and wait. There was a long silence, which the 
 birds filled up at their leisure. 
 
 By and by, he lifted his head. 
 
 " At least, we can be friends," said he. " You will let 
 me write to you. You will allow me to keep within the 
 sphere of your good influence. Be what you just "said you 
 might have been my tender sister, my faithful friend ! "
 
 SHILOH. 295 
 
 I sent a prophetic glance down through the future. He 
 would begin by sending me mournful outpourings of hope- 
 less love ; his letters would pass through the several grada- 
 tions of tender melancholy, devoted attachment, easy friend- 
 liness, uneasy indifference (briefly struggled with), and 
 finally cease. I had watched the course of two or three 
 such friendships if they deserve the name among my 
 acquaintance ; there was no room for self-deception as to 
 their way, their influence, or their end. 
 
 MALA. Well ! what harm ? The matter will thus be 
 disposed of without giving him any sudden wrench, any 
 severe, racking struggle. And his friendship will be very 
 pleasant while it lasts. And he will never take deep hold 
 enough of your life to be missed when he is gone. 
 
 BO^A.- And he will have lost all faith in himself, bein^ 
 
 7 O 
 
 proved so weak ; all faith in any human love, having seen 
 the slow fading out of his own. Far better for him to 
 wrestle with it and conquer it nobly, as love, than to sit 
 down supinely and wait for it to waste away, under other 
 names, into nothingness ! No man was ever harmed by 
 conquering a misplaced or unrequited affection f but many 
 a heart has been irretrievably vitiated by indulging one, 
 harboring it long under divers disguises and through many 
 transformations, growing tired of it, arid finally losing it by 
 the natural process of decay. Over the grave of such a 
 love no fragrant memorL'S blossom, no soul grows tender, 
 no life grows pure and strong ! 
 
 I turned to Rick. " Forgive me if I seem inapprecia- 
 tive, ungrateful. It. is just because I am your true friend, 
 at heart, that I beg to decline the outward relation ; at 
 least, until you have come to feel only friendship for me. 
 If I did otherwise, how could I look your future wife in the 
 face ? " 
 
 " My wife ! " he repeated, bitterly, " I shall never have 
 any." 
 
 " Allow me to hope and believe that you will ; and all
 
 20 SHILOII. 
 
 the sooner that you are not encouraged to waste any of the 
 best of your heart upon me, under the mask of friendship. 
 The affection which we conquer, we keep intact for a better, 
 brighter, holier occasion ; that which we indulge unwisely, 
 we are apt to fritter away piecemeal." 
 
 " Ah," returned Rick, " if you were only as wise for 
 yourself as for me, you would " 
 
 Carrie's voice cut the sentence short. She was coming 
 along the path, singing a cheery snatch of song. Yielding 
 to a sudden, foolish impulse, Rick dashed through the side 
 of the bower, a seemingly impervious mass of vines. I 
 looked after him with a momentary fear ; but the flexible 
 branches had yielded and closed again, as if only a bird had 
 passed. Almost immediately, Cai'rie appeared at the 
 entrance. 
 
 " Where is Rick ? " she asked, in wonder. 
 
 " Looking for the fauns and dryads," I responded, di'ily. 
 " They will acknowledge him as of kin when he finds 
 them ! lie went through that wall of vines, just now, in 
 such a manner as to establish an indisputable claim to their 
 relation ship." 
 
 " Ah ! " said Carrie, with a knowing look, " he has hid- 
 den, and means to surprise or to frighten me. It is an old 
 freak. How could you betray him ? 
 
 I was delighted with the plausible explanation. " Let 
 us steal a march on him, and go home," said I. 
 
 Carrie would have preferred to wait. She had a mind 
 for her brother's society, and did not suspect that, just then, 
 he had no mind for hers. Novertheless, as she is one oi 
 those gentle, self-sacrificing beings, whose chief use of their 
 wills is to furnish pleasant parallels to other and stronger 
 ones, she yielded. Quickly we left the wood shadow and 
 seclusion behind us. I drew a breath of relief as we 
 emerged from it into the open meadow and the sunshine.
 
 XXVIII. 
 
 DKEGS. 
 
 HE worst part of our nature is seldom slow 
 to revenge itself upon the best. After 
 any strain of moral heroism, comes an 
 inevitable reaction. The soul that has strug- 
 gled up the Mount of Trial leaning on the arm 
 of the Holy Spirit, is wofully apt to slide down 
 the corresponding declivity in the grasp of 
 Satan. Sometimes, I think, the devil even joins 
 in the good work of pushing us up, that the impetus thus 
 gained may enable him the more easily to thrust us down. 
 He helps to build up our characters to some lofty height of 
 virtue, in order that they may the more surely topple over 
 into some small neighboring pit of vice. He does not 
 scruple to aid us in girding up our loins to the battle, that 
 the bivouac may fall more completely under his control. 
 
 I left Bona in " The Bower." On the way back, I took 
 bitter counsel with Mala. She offered a possible solution 
 of the problem that perplexed me ; also a suggestion or 
 two, upon which I acted in due time. . 
 
 As we neared the house, I observed Mrs. Thorne seated 
 ut her window, sewing. It is a noteworthy circumstance 
 that she is always sewing, in a characteristic fashion. She 
 sets stitches with the ease and regularity of a machine, 
 and with as little apparent interest in the process. She un- 
 dertakes nothing that exacts close attention thought of 
 *13
 
 298 SHILOH. 
 
 brain as well as motion of hand ; she chooses rather straight 
 seams, bands, and hems, work which keeps the fingers 
 busy and leaves the mind free ; which furnishes ready ex- 
 cuse for dropping her eyes, upon occasions, yet allows 
 them full liberty to wander when there is anything to re- 
 ward observation. 
 
 She regarded Carrie and me from her outlook with 
 some surprise, some perplexity. Doubtless, Rick's non- 
 appearance with us struck her as a somewhat singular cir- 
 cumstance. Possibly, too, she discerned something in my 
 face or manner suggestive of unexpected complications ; for, 
 in matters affecting her own interests, her perceptions are 
 as quick and subtle as the electric fluid. Nevertheless, by 
 the time I had ascended to her room (leaving Carrie in the 
 porch below, looking out for her brother), I might as well 
 have tried to read thought or emotion in the immovable 
 features of the Sphinx. Save for the bland smile that ever 
 plays about her lips affording as much real warmth to the 
 heart as a phosphoric glimmer would to the finger-ends 
 she was absolutely statuesque. 
 
 " Mrs. Thorne," I began abruptly, " did you ever hap- 
 pen to hear of my cousin Wilhelmina Frost ? " 
 
 She searched her memory rapidly, " No, I believe not. 
 Why do you ask ? " 
 
 " Because, madam, she is better worth your acquaint- 
 ance than I am. She is young, beautiful, accomplished, 
 and chiefest grace of all ! rich. Perhaps you are not 
 aware that there were three of the Frost brothers. The 
 eldest left home early ; he led a wandering, erratic life for 
 years ; he married late, in India. lie died there, not long 
 since, leaving a large fortune to his only surviving child 
 a daughter ; and both to the guardianship of her, and my, 
 uncle John Frost. According to the terms of her father's 
 will, she resides alternately with him and the relatives of, 
 her mother. She is now with the latter in a western 
 city."
 
 SHILOH. 299 
 
 " Ah ! " said Mrs. Thorne, meditatively. The tone 
 indicated that she had, at last, found the key to a 
 puzzle. 
 
 " Moreover," I went on, with a blind, bitter, foolish ir- 
 ritation ; partly due to the natural revulsion of feeling, 
 overwrought during ray recent interview with Rick, and 
 partly to my utter detestation of the motives and designs 
 which rightly or wrongly I now attributed to Mrs. 
 Thorne in bringing us together ; " moreover, she is 
 heart-free (so far as I know, at least) which I am not. Or 
 it might be more to the point to say that my heart all 
 that is best of it is dead and buried." 
 
 Scarcely were the words spoken ere I repented of them. 
 What folly to lay bare the hidden workings of my life, 
 its secret grievances, trials, disappointments, to a woman 
 like Mrs. Thorne, a mere calculating machine, without 
 
 7 O t 
 
 heart, sympathy, or conscience, who would at once pro- 
 ceed to incorporate them with her own schemes and use 
 them unscrupulously to further her own ends, if she found 
 them anywise capable of such subserviency ; or else throw 
 them out on the highway, to be ground into the dust by 
 every passing wheel. However, having given myself up, 
 utterly, into the hands of Mala, for the time, I could think 
 of no better way of mending the matter than by aiming a 
 threat at Mrs. Thome's maternal pride, and so enlisting it 
 on my side. I went on, therefore, with still intenser bit- 
 terness, because mingled with self-contempt. 
 
 " However, as you may imagine, this is a part of my 
 history which I do not care to put into the possession of 
 Madam Rumor. If I find it there, by any means directly 
 or indirectly traceable to this conversation, I shall consider 
 myself at liberty to offset it with a part of your son's, 
 namely, that I have just declined the honor of his 
 hand." 
 
 She gave so genuine and unmistakable a start of sur- 
 prise, that, for a moment, it confounded all my conclu-
 
 300 8HILOII. 
 
 sions. She had not expected this climax, then ? Or, was 
 it merely that she had not expected it so .soon ? I inclined 
 to the latter supposition, inasmuch as, after that first gleam 
 of surprise had passed, and the momentary Hush of resent- 
 ment which succeeded it had faded from her cheek, I fan- 
 cied I could detect, in her countenance, the serenity of easy 
 acceptance ; not altogether devoid of satisfaction. Proba- 
 bly, as matters had turned out, she was relieved to find 
 the affair ended so soon, and thus. It would save trouble. 
 
 While she reflected, I stood regarding her with a chill 
 and creeping of the flesh ; as at something not quite hu- 
 man. A curious piece of flesh-and-blood mechanism, in-, 
 formed with thought and will, but entirely destitute of af- 
 fections, sympathies, emotions ! It was plain that she con- 
 sidered the subject purely in a material way, as a question 
 of social or pecuniary advantage and loss; for her, its 
 moral or emotional side did not exist. 
 
 I am aware that my sketch of Mrs. Thome's character 
 may justly be accused of exaggeration. It is all the truer, 
 on that account. There are people whom it is nearly im- 
 possible not to overdraw. Abhorrence, like anger, can sel- 
 dom be restrained within absolutely just limits. Take it 
 with what abatement you think fit. 
 
 When she spoke, it was in the smoothest, blandest of 
 tones, carefully ignoring everything in my words or man- 
 ner that might have constituted a cause of offence. " I am 
 very sorry to hear it. Not that I blame you in the least, 
 my dear, of course you could have done nothing else un- 
 der the circumstances, but I regret that Rick should have 
 been so precipitate, and that you should have been so an- 
 noyed. But he is very young and impulsive, and you are " 
 she hesitated a moment, and I fancied there was a faint 
 tinge of sarcasm in the tone wherewith she finished the 
 sentence " very attractive. I think you can afford to for- 
 give him for the compliment (for such it was, after all), not- 
 withstanding it was a little ill-timed. Allow me to say,
 
 SHILOH 301 
 
 furthermore, that it gratifies me to know that your rejec- 
 tion was based on grounds quite disconnected with his 
 merits, and that I shall, of course, respect every confidence 
 with which you have honored me, and so we will dismiss 
 the subject and forget it ! " 
 
 She paused, as if expecting a reply, but as I made none, 
 she continued, after a moment, 
 
 " Let me trust that this untoward little incident may 
 not interrupt the course of the acquaintance so pleasantly 
 begun. Rick leaves us this afternoon, you know, and will 
 not return for some months. And Carrie takes such a 
 fancy to you ! you seem to have bewitched both my chil- 
 dren ! And I own that I had hoped for much benefit to 
 Carrie from your society. ' She really has none, at present. 
 I am, perhaps, needlessly particular about her associates ; 
 but I want her to retain the tone and manner of the sphere 
 in which I moved so long, and I am afraid she might lose 
 it, if she mingled too freely with Shiloh people. Not," 
 she hastened to say ; as if conscious that this implied too 
 sweeping a censure, or she might have seen the involuntary 
 curl of my lip, " not that I suppose there are no persons 
 here with whom she might fitly associate ; but, as I never 
 go out myself, I have no means of knowing who they are, 
 so I have preferred to keep her at home altogether. If re- 
 port says true, your heart opens freely enough to any claim 
 upon its kindness if not upon its deeper affection. Do 
 me the favor, as an old friend of your father, to number 
 her among your friends, or proteges ! " 
 
 To say truth, I never felt less inclined to confer a favor 
 in my life, " That," said I, coldly, " must be as circum- 
 stances determine. Friendships are apt to take their own 
 course." 
 
 " True," she returned, with imperturbable good-humor, 
 " and I think yours will set towards Carrie, if allowed to 
 take its own course. She is both lovable and loving, ca- 
 pable of blind adoration and unquestioning trust to a de-
 
 302 SHILOH. 
 
 gree which, to a person as old and worn and disillusionized 
 as I am, seems absolutely Quixotic." 
 
 I was well aware of it. And it was an endless riddle 
 to me how a character so gentle, so trustful, so affection- 
 ate as Carrie's, and one so frank, careless and buoyant as 
 Rick's, could have sprung from the dark and tortuous wind- 
 ings of Mrs. Thome's nature. Neither, it was certain, 
 could be in her confidence, nor aid directly in her pro- 
 jects. Still, I would promise nothing, on Carrie's behalf; 
 though I foresaw, clearly enough, that if she chose to seek 
 me out, and cling to me, I should not have the heart to 
 cast her off. The worst of it would be that I should sus- 
 pect that the seeking was partly, if not mainly, the result 
 of the mother's promptings ; and I should be sure that 
 it was entirely in accordance with the mother's aims. 
 
 But why did Mrs. Thorne desire the continuance of the 
 acquaintance ? "VVonderingly I asked the question. Mala 
 furnished me with an answer -conjcctui'al, of course. Mrs. 
 Thome's cold egotism quietly swallows or rejects whatever 
 comes in its way, men, women, events, possibilities, ac- 
 cording as they can, or cannot, be made instrumental to 
 the attainment of her own ends. With hei', feelings, sen- 
 sibilities, principles, prejudices, affections, go for nothing, 
 except as they count for or against her own game. My re- 
 jection of Rick weighed not the value of a grain of dust 
 against the possibility of my being of future use to her. 
 Through me, Rick might yet be presented to the young 
 heiress with whom she had, at first, confounded me. 
 Through me, Carrie might be brought into contact with 
 a sphere of society that she had no other present means of 
 reaching unto. Mrs. Thorne would put no card out of her 
 hand which might ultimately win her a trick. So I rea- 
 soned, with what disgust, both at her and myself, it is im- 
 possible to say ! 
 
 Rick's voice now sounded from the porch, low, listless, 
 dispirited. With it Carrie's gentle, loving tones went
 
 SHILOH. 303 
 
 twisting in and out, in silken threads of regret, explana- 
 tion, and sympathy. Evidently she believed that his mood 
 was due to that recent running away from him, of which 
 she fancied herself to be guilty never once imagining, 
 guileless little soul ! that it was he who had fled from her, 
 blindly, recklessly. His replies were vague and preoccu- 
 pied. He was glad enough, doubtless, to find that he was 
 supposed to be the victim rather than the culprit ; and that 
 explanation was to be received instead of given ; but his 
 mood did not clear up, and Carrie was disconsolate and re- 
 morseful. Seldom is mortal blessed with such entire devo- 
 tion and unlimited faith as she gave to this brother. In 
 her eyes, he could have no fault. That was the one prin- 
 ciple at the centre of all things. So secure was she of his 
 right, that she took it for granted that . she, and everybody 
 else, was wrong. 
 
 Mrs. Thorne offered no further opposition except such 
 as the merest courtesy required to my departure. The 
 whole household, with the notable exceptions of Dr. Bryer 
 and the saturnine bachelor, Mortimer, assembled in the 
 porch for the ceremony of leave-taking. Mrs. Thorne, 
 with her most gracious air of the courteous hostess ; Miss 
 Bryer, with real kindliness of heart under her formal man- 
 ners ; Rick, leaning with folded arms against the dilapi- 
 dated pillar, and looking after me moodily ; Carrie, hanging 
 round me affectionately to the last moment, promising to 
 come and see me soon ; and, finally, the idiots, catching up 
 every farewell word and courteous phrase, and repeating 
 it over and over, like a couple of parrots. 
 
 I went slowly down the hill, and wondered if it were 
 true that only a day and night had passed since I climbed 
 it ! A day and night of quick-flowing events of interest 
 approaching to excitement of something which, if it were 
 not pleasure, went, far to fill its place, in a monotonous life. 
 I felt a strange dislike to go back to the old, quiet routint 1 . 
 Doubt and discouragement took possession of me. Woul.l
 
 304: SHILOH. 
 
 not my life have been richer, at least, if not happier, if I 
 had admitted into it that prospect opened to me by Fred- 
 erick Thorne ? Had I really done well in refusing so de- 
 cisively his love his friendship the opportunity for doing 
 him good ? I declare to you, Francesca, that, as I went 
 moodily down the hill that day, I could not tell ! 
 
 Of one thing only was I tolerably certain that I thor- 
 oughly despised myself. After taking so high a tone with 
 Rick, it was humiliating to have descended into the depths 
 of meanness with his mother. Yet, as human beings are 
 prone to do, I excused myself by blaming her. There are 
 some natures (I argued) that inevitably soil and degrade 
 whatever comes in contact with them. There are certain 
 moral atmospheres, through which we are quick to detect 
 evil and slow to recognize good, or they hopelessly confuse 
 and confound the two. It must be a mind of steady poise 
 or of very little susceptibility to influence, that can main- 
 tain such intercourse without harm. I felt that I detested 
 Mrs. Thorne, and all the more because some perverse part 
 of my nature had shown itself so unexpectedly amenable 
 to her influence. 
 
 In such a mood, I reached the gate of the Divine home- 
 stead. As usual, Uncle True was at the woodpile, chop- 
 ping wood. Mrs. Prescott was also there, picking up 
 chips in her apron. Both watched me as I came up the 
 road, and Uncle True laid down his axe. 
 
 " Good mornin', Miss Frost. Had a good time ? " 
 
 " I don't know yes I believe so." 
 
 " Sorry you ain't sure on't, 1 ' returned he, wiping his 
 brow. " Howsomever, it's a door that's got more'n one 
 hinge to swing on, a good un, a bad un, and another be- 
 tween 'em that's neither one nor t'other, but passable. 
 And that's the hinge that things swing on the most, 
 thank the Lord ! " 
 
 " I don't see what there is to thank the Lord for in that," 
 said Mrs. Prescott, shortly.
 
 SHILOH. 305 
 
 " "Wall," replied Uncle True, " Agur, the son of Jakeh, 
 did. He said, ' Lord, give me neither poverty nor riches' ; 
 and I kinder think he meant suthin' more'n the sort of pov- 
 erty and riches you carry in your pocket. I reckon most 
 on us might pray, ' Lord, give me neither a good time nor 
 a bad 'un, but jest kinder passable,' with good reason. 
 For, you see, in a good time we're apt to forget the Lord 
 that sent.it ; and though a bad 'un may drive us to think 
 of Him a leetle more, still wall, we don't any of us exact- 
 ly hanker arter trouble, you know ! " 
 
 " Children don't cry after picry, as a general thing," 
 responded Mrs. Prescott, drily. Then she turned to me. 
 " Well, what do you think of Mrs. Thorne ? " she asked, 
 abruptly. 
 
 " Mrs. Prescott, I don't think of her at least, not 
 now." 
 
 " Umph ! " said Mrs. Prescott, " any one who can't 
 translate that into, ' Least said is soonest mended,' had 
 better go and sell his head for a soap dish ! " And, put- 
 ting a final chip into her apron, she marched into the 
 house. 
 
 Uncle True gave no heed to this little episode, but went 
 on with his own train of thought, not stopping to supply 
 the missing links. " There's that bird, yonder, in the ma- 
 ple ; there's no doubt about his havin' a good time, is there 
 now ? Jest hear him sing ! " 
 
 There was no question about it, whatever. His song 
 was the distilled essence of a spirit jubilant within. 
 
 " As long as he gits any sort o' stuff to peck at, and 
 ain't actooally gobbled up and carried off and made a 
 meal on, he seems to think his time's good 'nough. But 
 we human critturs is more onreasonable. Some on us want 
 fine clothes, and some on us want fine victuals, and some 
 on us want larnin', and most on us want our own way. 
 Now, that bird is satisfied with the Lord's way. He 
 builds his nest of what comes nighest to hand, and
 
 306 SHILOH. ' 
 
 ain't partic'ler what sort o' feathers he lines it with. He 
 don't growl, nor grumble, nor fret, nor swear, if he has to 
 take up with a caterpillar instead of a gi'ound worm for 
 breakfast, nary one on 'em sticks in his crop to spile his 
 song. He'd abeout as soon have rye as wheat for dinner ; 
 and he's willin' to sing the same hymns his forefathers did, 
 way back to Noah's ark, and to larii 'em to his children. 
 I wish more of us had his sense, or his religion, or his 
 instinct, if that's what you'd ruther call it. I think 
 t'would pass for either on 'em pooty well." 
 
 And Uncle True set up a stick on end, and sent the 
 halves flying in different directions with one swing of his 
 axe, by way of climax to his speech. 
 
 " Still," said I, after a moment, " a bird's life is not 
 quite like a human life. The latter has so many more outs 
 and ins, responsibilities and duties, and takes so many un- 
 expected shapes, and has to be looked at from so many dif- 
 ferent points of view." 
 
 " Um ! " said Uncle True. " You see that little cloud 
 up yonder. What does it look like to you, now ? " 
 
 " A little like a dipper." 
 
 " I was thinkin' t'was suthin' like a shovel. Wall, now 
 the wind has jammed in the handle, and puffed out the 
 body, what is't like ? " 
 
 " Like a shield." 
 
 " I was agoin' to say the ace of spades. But it don't 
 matter what shape it takes, nor what it looks like to you 
 nor me, so long as it keeps like its Lord about the 
 Father's business. Which I take to be for a cloud to 
 gather up all the damp it finds floatin' around loose, and to 
 go where it's sent, never doubtin' that it's the Lord that 
 blows it, and not a senseless wind (for the wind's the breath 
 of His mouth !) ; and then, to drop down wherever lie wants 
 it to, and refresh the earth." 
 
 I went thoughtfully into the house. I suspect it was 
 greatly due to Uncle True that I found Bona there in my 
 closet, " the door being shut."
 
 SIIILOH. 307 
 
 Not that Mala was absent. The twain discoursed with 
 me, at some length ; but I have given so faithful a report 
 of the circumstances which formed the text of their dis- 
 course, that its tenor is easily divined. And I confess that 
 I am in haste to have done with the subject. Turn it 
 which way I will, I find no comfort in it : it leaves me 
 with a heavy weight of self-dissatisfaction, and (as a nat- 
 ural consequence) of dissatisfaction with everybody else.
 
 XXIX. 
 
 AN AFTERNOON AT THE SEWING SOCIETY. 
 
 HAVE been thinking, Francesca, how oddly 
 Life often leads us to the very point we meant 
 to shun. He who enters upon any path, aiming 
 at whatever goal, foresees little of the way by 
 which it will lead him. I did not imagine that 
 
 O 
 
 la grande passion would get into, this sober 
 chronicle ; to say truth, I had a set purpose of 
 keeping it out. Yet there it is, in spite of me. 
 And its right to its place is all the more indefeasible, doubt- 
 less, for the reason that I cannot now discover (and never 
 may, this side of the veil) what is its special business there. 
 In real life, events do not arrange themselves with the unity, 
 the continuity, the steadily unfolding plot, of the critic's 
 pet novel. Half the scenes and characters with which our 
 days are filled might be spared, we are wont to think, with- 
 out affecting the result. Possibly they might, if God's 
 purpose in them were the bringing about of certain marked 
 events, rather than the training of immortal spirits. The 
 good or evil work they do, in tempting, restraining, devel- 
 oping, and disciplining us, is none the less real that it often 
 passes for a void in our experience. " 
 
 And yet, it would seem that we ought to recognize God's 
 hand even more certainly in these scattered, inconsequential 
 events starting up in our path unexpected and undesired 
 than in those which are the more legitimate offspring of
 
 SIIILOII. 309 
 
 our own efforts, and work harmoniously into our plans. 
 The eye of faith, methinks, studying them carefully, would 
 catch a hint here, a clue there, to show that His pui*pose 
 was shut within, if it did not shine through, them ; and 
 would be made plain to our sight, and beautiful and just to 
 our comprehension, in the great Day of Revealing. 
 
 To be frank, however, I made my visit to Bryer Farm 
 the subject of no such study, to no such comfortable end. 
 Its only present fruits were mortification and regret. And 
 on the morrow I woke as from a long, involved, oppressive 
 dream. The events and personages that had stood out in 
 such bold relief from the surface of the two preceding days, 
 now assumed so vision-like a consistency as to seem un- 
 deserving of serious consideration. Most gladly I turned 
 my back on them. Life settled to its usual flow, and seemed 
 not more monotonous than was morally wholesome. 
 
 IH the afternoon the Sewing Society had its weekly meet- 
 ing. To my surprise, I found Came Thome there. The 
 surprise was, by no means, a pleasurable one. It showed 
 that my late adventure was not all a dream ; and it afforded 
 fresh evidence of Mrs. Thome's determined and pertinacious 
 character. She would leave no channel untried by which 
 her daughter might find a way into my affections, or, at 
 least, into my interests. Yet Carrie herself was so plainly 
 guiltless of any ulterior design that it was impossible to be 
 unkind to her, even with the vision of her mother looming 
 in the background. She brightened up at sight of me as if 
 I had been the sunshine of her existence, and immediately 
 came to put herself under my orders. She seemed to have 
 come hither with the single object of keeping near me and 
 constituting herself my slave ; led by that simple, enthusi- 
 astic admiration, akin to worship, arid beautiful because so 
 disinterested, which a young girl often cherishes for a wo- 
 man a little older than herself. 
 
 In response to her entreaty that she might be made of 
 use, I led her to the work-table. " Take your choice of
 
 310 SHILOH. 
 
 patchwork and plain-sewing ; or, if you have any gift or 
 grace at fancy-work, set yourself about some ' airy nothing ' 
 or other, for Mrs. Danforth's fair." 
 
 " Mrs. Danforth's fair ! " repeated that lady, suddenly 
 flashing all her diamonds before my eyes, " I should just 
 like to know when that name was given, and who stood 
 sponsor ! " 
 
 " Impossible to tell. It is like a hundred other things 
 current in the community, everywhere received, and no- 
 where acknowledged. Easier to find the source of the Nile 
 than theirs. Never mind ; the name fits, does it not ? " 
 
 " Fits like a duck's egg in a hen's nest ! " 
 
 " The simile does you credit. For, if the idea of the fail- 
 did not actually originate with you, you have so kindly 
 adopted it, and kept it warm, that I really think no one is 
 so fairly entitled to the honor of its paternity." 
 
 " All right ! " replied she, good-humoredly. " It can 
 pass for ' Mrs. Danforth's fair ' till it brings a hundred dol- 
 lars, or two, into the treasury ; then, see how quick it will 
 become the ' child of the regiment,' that is to say, of the 
 Society ! " 
 
 " Likely enough," I rejoined, laughing. " Only, Mrs. 
 Danforth, I promise you that you shall wear your honors 
 undivided, so far as I am concerned." And I attempted to 
 move on. 
 
 " Not so fast ! " she exclaimed, catching me by the arm. 
 " There is a twang in your voice that does not escape my 
 observation. Have you anything against my fair ? " 
 m " No, since it is not mine." 
 
 " Well, if it were yours." 
 
 " The supposition is not to be entertained, for a mo- 
 ment." 
 
 " Why not ? " she urged. 
 
 " Because Miss Essie is waiting for me to help her about 
 marking that quilt." 
 
 She gave me a look of keen scrutiny. " There is more
 
 SHILOH. 311 
 
 than that in the way ; I see it in your eye. Come ! out 
 with it ! " 
 
 I drew her aside. " Mrs. Danforth, if you will insist 
 upon making me say what you will not like to hear ; at 
 least, let me say it where it will not do you a mischief. 
 Since a fair has been decided upon, by vote of the Society ; 
 I am not disposed, by so much as a word or a look, to lay 
 a straw in its way. I will even do what I can for it, in the 
 way of preparation ; I hope never to be classed among 
 those who cannot engage in any work, or forward any end, 
 unless they are allowed to do it just in their own way. 
 Still, if the truth must be told, it is not a work that com- 
 mends itself very strongly to my sympathies, and not at all 
 to my better judgment. Do not ask me, therefore, to take 
 any active part in its management. I cannot attempt to 
 persuade people that they are giving liberally to God and 
 His Church, when they are only spending money, more or 
 less foolishly, upon their own pleasure. Neither can I 
 convince myself that I am doing God service by selling 
 ' chances ' a softer name for lottery tickets." 
 
 Mrs. Danforth shrugged her shoulders. " The motive 
 makes the deed," said she. 
 
 " Why not the deed the motive, as well ? Easy to fit a 
 bad deed with a good motive." 
 
 " Murder, for instance ! " she returned, with the air of 
 having uttered a poser. 
 
 " Certainly. It puts a good man beyond the reach of 
 the sorrows and vicissitudes of earth." 
 
 "How, if it's a bad one?" 
 
 " It prevents him from adding to the catalogue of his 
 sins, and so increasing his condemnation." 
 
 " Goodness gracious ! What have you to say for rob- 
 bery?" ' 
 
 " The robbed has an opportunity to exercise the virtues 
 of patience, forbearance, and self-denial. The robber in- 
 tends to do good with his money, to found a hospital or 
 build-*-or remodel a church."
 
 312 siiiLoii. 
 
 Mrs. Danforth raised her hands and her eyebrows. 
 " Two birds and one stone ! Only I am in doubt whether 
 I am the stone or one of the birds ! But what is the use of 
 taking it so seriously ? I do not believe that ever a young 
 man was made a gambler by buying a chance in a pin- 
 cushion. And people will spend money foolishly, anyhow ; 
 they scour the whole earth for an opportunity to do it ; 
 why not give them one where the money will be converted 
 to some good purpose ? " 
 
 " That is to say, why should not the Church make 
 money out of the vices of the world ? " 
 
 " How you do put things ! If the world won't give to 
 the Church dii'ectly, it must be made to do it indirectly, 
 no thanks to it, of course ! but the Church gets the money 
 all the same, and does good with it." 
 
 " Perhaps so. Still, I incline to the opinion that Christ 
 expects His people, by their liberality and self-denial, to 
 support His Church ; and not the World, either directly or 
 indirectly. To be sure, they need not decline the latter's 
 contributions ; but neither must they descend to worldly 
 methods of securing them. They should prefer to make up 
 any deficiency by greater love, faith, perseverance, and 
 self-sacrifice, on their own part." 
 
 "Well, is not that just what we are doing?" exclaimed 
 Mrs. Danforth, triumphantly. " Some of us, certainly, are 
 working hard enough, and self-sacrificingly enough, to de- 
 serve some little credit for labors of love. Many cannot 
 give money, but they gladly give work where it brings 
 money. You would think it a righteous act if they put 
 their work in a fancy store for sale, and gave the pro-* 
 ceeds to the Church, why not, then, in a fair ? " 
 
 " Such arguments have convinced many, Mrs. Danforth, 
 and I respect their conviction, but I do not find them 
 quite satisfactory to my own mind. If fairs were conduct- 
 ed in the sober manner, and on the equitable principles of a 
 sale, if they were disconnected with every unlawful or
 
 SHILOH. 313 
 
 doubtful practice, tending to confuse the ideas of right and 
 wrong in those who take part in them, above all, if they 
 were unattended with the putting forward of young girls, 
 as saleswomen, in a manner from which every instinct of 
 delicacy should revolt ; and which, moreover, can scarcely 
 fail to give them a disrelish for quieter, safer, more prayer- 
 ful methods of work, my objections might cease. But, in 
 those very things, I suspect, lies the secret of the fair's suc- 
 cess, and of the readiness of many to engage in it. With- 
 out them, it would be but an indifferent mode of raising 
 money. But why waste more words ? both our minds are 
 made up. Besides, it would take the whole afternoon to 
 discuss the subject, in all its bearings. Had we not better 
 leave it where it is at least, until you get this present fair 
 off your hands ? " 
 
 "With all my heart. Only, if those are your senti- 
 ments, I am obliged to you for your consideration in declin- 
 ing to proclaim them on the housetops. A division in the 
 camp, just now, would be a disaster, indeed ! But you 
 shall not always escape me so easily. Some day, when dis- 
 cussion is safe, I will corner you and convert you to 
 fairs ! " 
 
 " If you can ! " returned I, coolly. 
 
 Toward the close of the afternoon, Mr. Taylor appeared. 
 Having made the tour of the room, and said a pleasant 
 word to each of the workers, he came to my corner. " I 
 congratulate you, Miss Frost, upon an enlarged prospect of 
 usefulness." 
 I looked at him inquiringly. 
 
 "At last, I have succeeded in scraping together a Sun- 
 day School class for you." 
 
 " Indeed ! I was not aware that you had any such task 
 in hand. I suppose you must be thanked." 
 
 " As you please. Perhaps you think it should have 
 been done sooner. But the old teachers had the first claim, 
 I thought. The old teachers and the old scholars naturally 
 14
 
 tJ14 SIIILOH. 
 
 went together. And new scholars are not always to be 
 had for the asking, I find. However, by the opportune 
 arrival of two, and by a judicious weeding of the old, I 
 have been able to collect a class of five for you to begin 
 with, next Sunday." 
 
 " Is there no one else who w r ould like it ? " 
 
 He looked surprised and disappointed. " Am I to un- 
 derstand that you would not like it ? " 
 
 " Not quite so bad as that. Only, I should like permis- 
 sion to do better if I'can. I have a theory that the best 
 class for a teacher who really means work, and loves it, is 
 the one that she gathers for herself, from the wayside, by her 
 own personal magnetism of smile, voice, touch. No other 
 will interest her so deeply, task her resources so thoroughly, 
 or reward her labors so abundantly. For 'some time, I have 
 had it in my mind to gather such a class from the waste 
 places of Shiloh. I take shame to myself that I have not 
 set about it sooner. But I will commence at once, if you 
 will give me permission." 
 
 " Not only that, but my heartiest thanks," said Mr. 
 Taylor, shaking my hand warmly. "I wish there were 
 more of your mind. Half my burden would roll off my 
 back. But have you had any experience of this sort of 
 work?" 
 
 " Yes, sir, a little. I once taught in a Sunday School in 
 one of the worst districts of New York. Every new teacher 
 was sent into the streets, literally to pick- up his or her 
 class out of the gutter. Some of the matei'ial thus brought 
 in was as rough and gnarled and heterogeneous as could be 
 imagined ; and it was occasionally necessary to call in the 
 police to keep chaos from coming again." 
 
 " I wonder," observed Aunt Vin, without the smallest 
 intention of satirizing the civil force, "that some of the 
 ' light-fingered sentry' didn't pick your pockets." 
 
 "They did. But new and suspicious comers were 
 searched at the door, before their exit, if anything was
 
 SHILOH. 315 
 
 missing. And a few Sundays generally smoothed down 
 the roughest of them, in a manner to seem little short of 
 miraculous. It gave one new confidence both in God and 
 human nature." 
 
 " But, Miss Frost, isn't it rather like taking the clergy- 
 man's own work right out of his hands, to go round hunt- 
 ing up children for the Sunday School, in a regular parish ? " 
 
 " I claim the right to answer that question," said Mr. 
 Taylor, quickly. " No, Mrs. Seber, most emphatically, no ! 
 A clergyman would need a hundred hands, and as many 
 heads, to do all of such work that cries out to be done. 
 Moreover, a layman or a laywoman can often do it better 
 than he. These wild children are apt to be afraid of him ; 
 they scatter at his approach like so many blackbirds. But 
 let some pleasant-faced, soft-voiced lady stop and speak to 
 them in the street, tell them a story, and promise them a 
 picture-book, a cake, a penny, whatever tempts them most 
 (I hold that nearly any bribe is lawful, at the outset), 
 if they will come to her class next Sunday, and ten to 
 one she gets them. Their way is thus made clear to 
 them. No strange teacher to be encountered, they have 
 felt the touch of the hand that is to lead them and feed 
 them, and are sure that they like it. Of course they 
 "will not all follow any one man or woman; one will be 
 taken by one face, another by another, this will yield 
 to one inducement, that to a different one, but I believe 
 that all might be brought in, if there were only scouts 
 enough out after them. The child's heart being won, the 
 parents are, of coui'se, visited and asked to consent ; some- 
 thing about their circumstances and way '-of thinking is 
 learned and reported to the clergyman; and his way is 
 made straight for him to visit them and do them good. 
 As straight, that is, as any way can be, in these crooked 
 paths of earth. If laymen only felt their duty in this 
 matter ! " 
 
 "But everybody hasn't the time for such business,"
 
 316 SHILOH. 
 
 objected Mrs. Burcham. " Now, I like a class in the Sun- 
 day School, I have always had one, but, good land ! I 
 shouldn't have, if I had to go round and hunt it up in that 
 way ! " 
 
 " For such teachers," said I, " there are the ready-made 
 classes. That reminds me, Mr. Taylor, that you have one, 
 awaiting a teacher. Let me recommend Miss Thorne." 
 
 Carrie blushed, and at first, declined. But she finally 
 accepted. And I fell straightway into a brown study of 
 the ramifications and results of influence. Extricating my- 
 self, with an effort, I went in search of Mrs. Danforth, and 
 drew her aside. " I believe your children are not in the 
 Sunday School. May I have them as the nucleus of a 
 class ? " 
 
 She held up her hands in amazement. " Well ! that is 
 what I should call by its right name, if I were not pre- 
 vented by a due regard for decorum ! What do you mean ? 
 Did I not hear you say, awhile ago, that you were going 
 out into the highways and byways, to 1 rake in the offscour- 
 ings of the earth ? and you begin with me ? Compliment- 
 ary, to say the least of it ! " 
 
 "Mrs. Danforth, you quite mistake the matter. In this 
 favored corner of the earth there are no 'offscourings.' 
 Shiloh recognizes only different degrees of prosperity, 
 some of them tolerably low down in the scale ! He Avho is 
 lowest, balances matters by increased independence and 
 sensitiveness. If it were whispered about that Miss Frost 
 designed to make up a class from the children of 'poor 
 'folks,' not a child would be permitted to enter it. None 
 of us are poor'folks, please to understand, except when we 
 are asked to give something to support the Church, and 
 then, most of us are ! But we are not to be confounded 
 with paupers ! Self-respect is the last thing that dies in a 
 genuine Yankee. But, you see, if Mrs. Danforth's Effie and 
 Gordon are in my class, not a word can be said. Let me 
 have them, just for a little while, please ! I will take good
 
 SHILOH. 317 
 
 care that they receive no harm; and their presence and 
 influence will do much to insure the success 'of my experi- 
 ment. Pray consent ! " . 
 
 Mrs. Danforth is the incarnation of good-nature. Des- 
 pite her ingrained pride, and her occasional hauteur^ no 
 woman of my acquaintance finds it so hard to say " no " to 
 a direct appeal for help. She looked half-amazed, half- 
 pi*ovoked, but amusement prevailed at last. Bursting into 
 a loud laugh, she said, with a most expressive outward 
 gesture of her jewelled hands, 
 
 " Take them ! take all ! But don't send them home to 
 me with vermin outside their heads, nor Yankee phrases 
 inside them, or the compact does not hold good a moment 
 longer. But what would Mark Danforth say if he knew I 
 had let his children go into a Ragged Class ! Shouldn't I 
 get ' Hail Columbia,' and every other tune that would send! 
 a body quickly to the right-about-face ! "
 
 XXX. 
 
 GATHERING IK. 
 
 }EXT morning, I began the real work of 
 gathering in. The first step was easy-: it 
 took me to a house where I had twice 
 watched, and where Death had prepared the 
 way for me. The sad-faced widow promised 
 me her little Jamie without a dissenting word. 
 Only, she feared that his wardrobe was not all 
 that could be desired. A suggestion that its 
 deficiencies might be supplied did not brighten her face. 
 
 I stopped next before a rough, weather-browned house, 
 in the midst of a potato field ; above Avhose low roof a 
 huge stone chimney rose like a Avatch-toAver. Here, I had 
 often noticed, in passing, two- or three neglected looking 
 children playing around the bar-place which served in lieu 
 of gate. The premises seemed to be. deserted, now ; never- 
 theless, I knocked at the door, and, getting no answei*, 
 lifted the latch. It admitted me into a small, dingy 
 kitchen. A sturdy boy sat on the hearth, amusing himself 
 by sifting ashes through his fingers into his "hat ; near the 
 window was a cradle with a sleeping babe in it ; and by 
 its side sat a pale, quiet, little girl, rocking it with a pa- 
 tient foot and face, as if she had come unusually early to a 
 comprehension of what was to be her chief business in life. 
 Both stared at me. 
 
 " Where is your mother ? " I asked.
 
 SHILOH. 319 
 
 " She's gone a-washin'," said the girl. 
 4 " And left you to take care of baby and brother ? " 
 
 The small hero in the ashes resented the implication. 
 " She takes care o' baby, but she don't tetch me, I 
 can tell ye ! I takes care o' myself," with immense 
 dignity. 
 
 " And he loill get inter the ashes," added the small 
 woman. " Though mother said he mustn't, and she'll give 
 it to him, when she gets home." The prediction being ut- 
 tered, not with a righteous exultation over merited punish- 
 ment, but in the sad tone of a prophet heart-heavy with 
 his own foresight. 
 
 "Did you ever hear the story of Cinderella?" I in- 
 quired. 
 
 Libby shook her head ; Bob vouchsafed no answer. 
 
 " If you will come here," said I, addressing the latter, 
 " I will tell it to you." 
 
 He looked tempted, but doubtful. He was balancing 
 the attractions of stories and mischief. I settled the mat- 
 ter by lifting him quietly by the collar, giving him a little 
 shake, to clear him of the ashes, and setting him down on 
 the other side of me, remote from the hearth. He put his 
 finger into his mouth, and looked at me, speculatively. 
 He was uncertain whether to take offence or not. With- 
 out giving him time to decide, I commenced the story of 
 Cinderella with variations. The heroine's worst trial was 
 a boy-brother, ingenious in methods of torment, and with 
 a perverse inclination for ashes. The fairy godmother gave 
 him wonderful gifts ; but, precisely at the wrong moment 
 they turned to ashes in his hands, or his mouth. The de- 
 tails were harroAving, and the finale was made to suit this 
 new version. When I finished, the eyes of my audience 
 were like saucers. 
 
 Then, without more pause than was necessary to discon- 
 nect the two, I told the story of Samuel. It was not re- 
 ceived with the breathless, wide-eyed interest awakened by
 
 320 si-iiLoii. 
 
 the other ; but, having won the ear of my audience with 
 that, it listened quietly and soberly to this. 
 
 " Tell me another," commanded my male auditor, when 
 I stopped. 
 
 " Not this morning. But if you will come to me, in 
 the church, next Sunday noon you and Libby I will tell 
 you another, with pleasure." 
 
 His face fell. 
 
 " And I should not wonder if it would be about the 
 tigers and crocodiles in Africa, that eat up women and 
 children," I went on. 
 
 He looked eager. " Shan't I have ter larn lessons ? " 
 
 " Not unless you choose." 
 
 " Then I'll come," pronounced he, decidedly. 
 
 " I'm afraid mother won't let us come," said the little 
 woman, sorrowfully. 
 
 Not to burden my narrative with too many details, I 
 left a note for the mother, begging her to let the children 
 come to me ; and departed, in the firm conviction that the 
 young rascal who stood kicking his heels together on the 
 doorstep would give her no peace until he had worried a 
 consent out of her. Which proved to be well-founded. 
 
 My next visit was to a red-haired vii'ago, who had just 
 set her foot into the middle of a pie sent her by a kind 
 neighbor, as the readiest way of resenting the implica- 
 tion that she needed charity ; while the bearer stood by, 
 crimson with mortification and discomfiture. She lost no 
 time in giving me to understand that " stuck-up city folks," 
 meddling with what was " none o' their business," need not 
 look for much better treatment at her hands. Neverthe- 
 less, by dint of a few good-humored, but sharp retorts, 
 which seemed greatly to her taste, I got her first to listen 
 to me, then to ask a question or two, and finally, to say, 
 grumpily ; 
 
 " If Mr. Taylor wants my younguns in his Sunday 
 School, he'd better come arter 'em."
 
 SHILOH. 321 
 
 " I think he has called," replied I. " He did not find 
 you at home." 
 
 " 'Twouldn't hurt him to come again, would it ? " 
 
 " Doubtless he will come again, in due time. You 
 must recollect that he has been in Shiloh only a few 
 weeks." 
 
 " Who's agoin' ter be in yer class ? " 
 
 " I have but three promised positively Jimmy Lang " 
 (her lip curled), " and Mrs. Danforth's two children." 
 
 " Mis' Danforth ! that's the city woman down on Hope 
 Plain ; ain't it ? " 
 
 " The same." 
 
 " Did ye ask her if she was willin' ter hev' her young- 
 uns go with mine ? " 
 
 " Did I ask you if you were willing that yours should 
 go with hers ? " 
 
 " Um ! Be they all go'n' ter set in the same seat ? " 
 
 " Certainly, if the seat will hold them." 
 
 " What's yer idee in gittin' up sech a class ? " 
 
 " To keep myself out of mischief on Sundays." 
 
 Her stern features relaxed into a smile. " I guess ye'll 
 make it out, if they're all- like my Jim an' Bess. Ye'll 
 hev' yer hands full, with them two younguns, an' no mis- 
 take ; they're as full of the Old Nick as an egg is of meat. 
 If ye think ye kin git any on't out on 'em, ye kin hev' 'em, 
 an' welcome." 
 
 " Thank you ; I will try. Please give me their names 
 in full." And I wrote them down with great satisfac- 
 tion. 
 
 Shiftlessness reigned absolute in the dwelling . which I 
 visited next. It creaked in the crippled gate (swinging 
 painfully on one hinge), it looked out of the patched, dingy 
 windows, it greeted me in the* pots and pails round the 
 doorstep, it had made the kitchen its headquarters, and it 
 smiled me a good-natured welcome from the mistress' face. 
 
 She was a woman athirst for knowledge. Before I had 
 14*
 
 322 SHILOH. 
 
 fully explained the object of my visit, she interrupted me 
 with, 
 
 " Ye're from York, ain't ye ? " 
 
 " I am." 
 
 "Bornthar?" 
 
 " No, not in the city." 
 
 " Lived thai- long ? " 
 
 " Four or five years." 
 
 " Didn't ye like the place ? " 
 
 " I did not dislike it." 
 
 " What'd ye leave for, then ? " 
 
 " On account' of my health." 
 
 " What ails ye ? " 
 
 And so on, for full three quarters of an hour, yet in a 
 manner quite free from any taint of impertinence. By the 
 end of which time, I had given her all pressingly needful 
 information relative to my origin, education, friends, age, 
 means of support, the cost of my garments, and a hundred 
 appendant matters of interest. In requital, she graciously 
 allowed me to write down as my scholar a certain white- 
 haired, pug-nosed girl, Mehitabel Baker by name ; and, 
 to all appearance, a second edition of the mother. 
 
 But all this was scarcely more than preliminary skir- 
 mishing. The true tug of war was to come, I imagined, at 
 Mr. Warren's. I wanted to capture Jack for my class, and 
 I had reason to know that he was made of material as slip- 
 pery as his father's was unmalleable. To win the adhesion 
 of the one and the consent of the other, would be no easy 
 task. At sight of the little brown house, I gathered to- 
 gether my forces, and reviewed my weapons, as ior a bat- 
 tle. Nor did I forget to invoke higher aid. God has put 
 into the hands of His children two powerful agencies, labor 
 and prayer. The first we use moderately, the other we are 
 prone to neglect. Yet it is, I believe, the mightier of the 
 twain. Used in conjunction with the other not flown to 
 as a last and only resource, when that has failed it would
 
 SHILOH 323 
 
 be powerful, I think, for all things. The two were meant 
 to go together, as the helve with the hatchet. Divorcing 
 them, no one has a right to complain that either is ineffi- 
 cient. 
 
 During all these weeks, I have not lost sight of the 
 "Warrens, though my intercourse with them has been 
 limited to a few moments' chat at the door, or the gate, in 
 passing ; and there has been no occasion for bringing them 
 into these chronicles. After Maggie's death, the small 
 cares and petty business of life flowed in and tilled up the 
 vacant place, to outward appearance. A deeper shade of 
 gravity on the mother's face ; a look of fixed abstraction, 
 easily kindled into irritation, upon the father's ; these were 
 the only ripples on the surface of Life's sea, to show where 
 a soul had gone down. Neither of them inclined to talk of 
 her much ; the one had been so long unused to sympathy 
 as to have lost the impxilse to seek it, the other shrank from 
 it as fi-om friction on a sore. Yet the voices of both soft- 
 ened to me, I fancied, as to none other ; and it needed no 
 words to show that they never saw me without a memory 
 of their dead daughter in my arms. 
 
 I found Mr. Warren, as was his most frequent wont, 
 smoking a clay pipe at the one point of ingress to the 
 house, namely, the kitchen door. He moved aside for me 
 to enter, but remarked, as he did so, that there was " no 
 one within. Mrs. Warren was washing, out under the 
 woodshed. Could he do anything for me ? " 
 
 " Truly you can," said I, seating myself on the door- 
 step. " I came expressly to ask a favor of you." 
 
 " Am I to grant it ' unsought, unseen,' as the children 
 say ? " asked he, good humoredly. 
 
 " I I well, yes." 
 
 He gave me a keen look, " That moment of hesitation 
 was fatal to you, n said he. " To a frank, spontaneous ' yes,' 
 I would have given a blind consent, but not to cool calcu- 
 lation. Since you take time to consider, so must L"
 
 324: SHILOH. 
 
 " It does not matter," said I, trying not to show my 
 disconcertion. " I only came to beg Jack of you for my 
 Sunday School class. I am naturally desirous that it should 
 reach a respectable number, the more, that I have under- 
 taken to gather it on my own responsibility, unprompted 
 and unhelped." 
 
 "You choose your phrases well," returned he, with a 
 cynical smile. " To an old sinner like me, the vice of am- 
 bition, and the sturdy, everyday virtue of independence, 
 are better motives to allege than a simple wish to do good." 
 
 I was provoked into a satisfactory directness. " What 
 need to bring my motives into the matter, unless they 
 were inimical to you or Jack, which you well know they 
 are not? The question simply is, whether as a personal 
 favor, or out of regard for nu>, or from indifference, or for 
 any other reason, good or bad, secret or acknowledged 
 you will let me have Jack ? " 
 
 " Miss Frost, woujd you not object to send your son to 
 be 'taught what you did not believe ? " 
 
 " Not unless I had something better to teach him that 
 I did believe." 
 
 " What right have you to assume that I have not ? " 
 
 " What have you taught him, Mr. Warren ? " 
 
 He made a kind of grimace. " Little enough, to be sure. 
 But he is too young yet to know about these matters. He 
 cannot understand either the dogmas of religion t or the 
 systems of philosophy." 
 
 " Of philosophy, I grant you. He may be a good deal 
 older without being much more apt ! But of religion, yes. 
 Those ideas of a God, a Hereafter, Human Responsibility, 
 Reward and Punishment, an Atonement, etc., whereat 
 gray-headed sages and philosophers so stick and bungle, 
 are always comprehensible enough to a child. I never 
 knew the dullest to profess any difficulty in understanding, 
 nor hesitancy in receiving, them. Indeed, most children 
 catch at them readily, if there is opportunity, even when
 
 siiiLon. 325 
 
 there is no direct effort to inculcate them. If jou are wil- 
 ling to make the experiment, we will find out, on the 
 spot, whether Jack has them; or whether, having them 
 not, he makes any difficulty of understanding and accept- 
 ing them." 
 
 Mr. "Warren puffed away in silence for some moments, 
 then he uplifted a stern call of " Jack ! " It found that re- 
 markable urchin in some remote corner of the premises, 
 and brought him hither, at breathless speed, with mixed 
 feelings of awe and curiosity. There was a tone in his 
 father's voice, to which he was unaccustomed; and he 
 doubted whether it boded him good or evil. 
 
 Not to linger on this part of my story, a few questions 
 served to show that Jack, being gifted with somewhat un- 
 usual powers of memory and observation, had a tolerably 
 correct notion of the Christian scheme, derived from vari- 
 ous chance sources of information. He knew who made 
 him and all things, believed that God saw him at all 
 times, and was especially conscious of His clear-seeing eye 
 upon him when he had been doing wrong, and afraid of 
 His wrath, his idea of the Heavenly Father being plainly, 
 somewhat colored by his experience of an earthly one. 
 Also, knew the main incidents of the life of Christ and the 
 object of it, had read about Him in the Testament at 
 school. On being asked if he believed the Testament, 
 averred that he did ; though a similar inquiry with refer- 
 ence to Mother Goose and other stories, elicited only a dis- 
 dainful curl of the lip. Furthermore, under considerable 
 pressure, acknowledged that he expected to go to hell, if 
 he died just as he was, knew he was a bad boy, but 
 couldn't seem to get to be any better, though he sometimes 
 tried. And having thus made his Confession of Faith, 
 Jack was dismissed to his work, or play, or mischief, to 
 wonder within himself, doubtless, what it all meant. 
 
 Mr. Warren smoked on silently, seeming to be the prey 
 of bitter and corroding thought. After a little, as he said
 
 326 SHILOII. 
 
 nothing, I remarked, drily, that it appeared I had not much 
 to teach Jack, in the way of Christian doctrine. The most 
 I could do was to show him how to- apply his knowledge to 
 his own heart and life, by faith, so that lie might continue 
 his struggle to be a better boy more successfully. And I 
 inquired, furthermore, with somewhat sarcastic emphasis, 
 if he (Mr. Warren) had any new truths to impart to him, 
 likely to afford him more efficient assistance in the good 
 work, than those old ones, which had so imperceptibly 
 made their way into his understanding ? 
 
 " Pshaw ! " said Mr. Warren, impatiently. " Take him, 
 in Heaven's name, and do what you like with him ! Since 
 he cannot come to the study of these subjects with an un- 
 prejudiced mind, as I had hoped, why, let him leai'n what 
 he can of one side before he takes up the other. It will 
 not make much difference in the long run. I read the 
 Testament, too, when I was a boy but it did not pre- 
 vent me from turning out what you, I suppose, would call 
 an infidel." 
 
 " Or an unbeliever," said I, composedly. " What rea- 
 son have I to call you anything else ? In all our acquaint- 
 ance, you have never shown me anything but unbelief. 
 Of your creed, if you have one, I know nothing." 
 
 He reflected a moment, then he burst out with, " I do 
 not believe in the inspiration of the Bible." 
 
 I could not repress a smile. " There it is ! " said I, 
 " you see you know not how to say anything but ' I do not 
 believe.' Now, creed comes from credo, I believe. The 
 Mohammedan has one, so have the Chinese and the Afri- 
 can. It is only philosophers and sceptics, lost and bewil- 
 dered amid the mazes of their own imaginations, or dwarfed 
 to the stature of their own dust-clogged reason, that have 
 to content themselves with negations." 
 
 He looked a little piqued. " Wait a moment ; I have, 
 at least, one article of belief, if that constitutes a creed. 
 I believe in a God or a Somebody, or Something, which
 
 SHILOH. 327 
 
 may as well be called by that name as- any who made the 
 universe, and governs it." 
 
 " Dp you also tremble ? " asked I, audaciously. Not 
 in truth, that I risked anything. I knew well that, the 
 sharper the repartee in which I indulged with Mr. "Warren, 
 the better he liked it. 
 
 " No, I don't," said he, with a grim smile. " And, 
 therefore, it is fair to conclude that I am not what you so 
 politely insinuate." 
 
 " I gladly accept the conclusion. As for your creed, it 
 is good, so far as it goes. Which is about as far, I take it, as 
 the most uncultivated savage would go, before he tried to 
 embody this Deity in, or to represent Him by, an image of 
 wood or stone, the work of his own or some other hands. 
 Go on ; let me see how you do that. Do you accept the 
 pantheism of Spinoza, or the materialism of Hume ? " 
 
 " Which would you recommend ? " asked he, coolly, be- 
 tween two puffs of his pipe. 
 
 " Hume, by all means." I replied, rising. " For it is 
 most fit that a man who begins by getting rid of the Gos- 
 pel, a Saviour, and all that the renewed heart holds most 
 dear, should end by getting rid of himself and everybody 
 else as does that most subtle and abstruse philosopher ! 
 For, having proved to his own satisfaction ! that he has 
 no identity apart from the perceptions conveyed to him, he 
 goes on to say that if any one has a different notion of him- 
 self, he cannot longer argue with him ! See to what absurd- 
 ities men are reduced, who reject the revelation of God, 
 and the guidance of the Holy Spirit ! " 
 
 And I turned to go. 
 
 " Sit a moment longer," urged Mr. Warren, " I want to 
 ask you a question, or two." 
 
 " To what purpose ? " said I, still standing. " It will be 
 the old story endless discussion and no result. Besides, 
 I do not care to treat serious matters any longer in this 
 light way."
 
 328 SIIILOH. 
 
 " I won't discuss," returned he, " I will only question- 
 And you may be as serious as you like." 
 
 I sat down reluctantly. 
 
 " Seriously, now and honestly Miss Frost, do you 
 believe the Bible, every word of it ? " 
 
 " Yes, I do." 
 
 MR. W. And yet, you are, I take it, a pretty well edu- 
 cated woman ; as much so as if you had been through 
 college ? 
 
 I. I cannot say as to that, I only know that, in most 
 respects, my father gave me the same education that he 
 would have given a son. 
 
 ME. "VV. And you have traveled in Europe ? 
 
 I. Yes, and elsewhere. But to what end this cate- 
 chism ? 
 
 ME. W. I am coming to it. I can understand how these 
 ignoramuses around us can believe in the Bible's absurdities 
 and impossibilities ; but it passes my comprehension how a 
 thoroughly trained and informed mind can do it. 
 
 I. Lord Bacon was a profounder thinker than Voltaire. 
 And Bishop Butler was a more learned man than Tom 
 Paine. 
 
 ME. W. Have you read the " Age of Reason " ? 
 
 I. Yes, my father would have me read it, under his 
 supervision. 
 
 ME. W. And what do you think of it ? 
 
 I. I think it as shallow a work as was ever palmed off 
 oh a credulous public for a product of profound thought. 
 
 ME. W. (raising his eyebrows). A sweeping assertion. 
 
 I. Not at all. The book is nowhere profound. You 
 can read it all through, from title-page to finis, at one sit- 
 ting, and not once need to pause and reflect ; nor have a 
 worse headache at the end than a shilling novel would 
 give you. 
 
 ME. W. So you classify books, as some do wines, by the 
 amount of headache in them !
 
 SHILOH, 329 
 
 I. No, not quite. But I think it might not be amiss to 
 rate them according to the amount of heartache they cure. 
 I doubt if the " Age of Reason " ever cured any ! Whereas, 
 the Bible has cured more heartache, and cured it more 
 thoroughly, than any other book known. Notwithstanding 
 its difficulties and obscurities what you are pleased to call 
 its absurdities and impossibilities, the fact remains that, 
 for hundreds of years, every kind of human, misery has 
 gone to it, as to a well of consolation, and found what it 
 sought. Is there nothing in this fact, oh, contemptuous 
 scoffer at its claim to Divine inspiration ! to make you 
 pause and reconsider your dictum ? There are older books 
 than the gospels, why have they not equal power ? There 
 are works of stronger fascination as mere specimens of hu- 
 man genius, why have they not the same effect ? 
 
 Mn. W. (thoughtfully). Probably, because none of them 
 profess to answer so categorically those three great ques- 
 tions that continually haunt and perplex the human mind, 
 " Whence came we ? Why are we here ? " and " Whither 
 do we go ? " Most people prefer to take up with any ap- 
 parently authoritative answer than to have none at all. 
 
 I. Unwittingly, you have said more for the Bible than 
 you can say against it ! To admit that it is, after all, the 
 one answer to those questions which best satisfies the uni- 
 versal mind, the loftiest and the lowest alike, though 
 human wit and wisdom and genius have exhausted them- 
 selves in vainly trying to find out a better, is tantamount 
 to admitting that it is inspired. If of human origin, why 
 does no other work displace it ? Other books die, and are 
 forgotten. Early scepticism is well-nigh lost Celsus and 
 Julian are best known by the refutations of Origen and 
 Cyril. Early moralists are shelved in learned libraries. 
 Early historians are superseded by works embodying their 
 substance. But the Bible remains intact. Though a moun- 
 tainous mass of commentary, criticism, and discussion, has 
 been written upon and against it, nothing has ever sup-
 
 330 8HILOH. 
 
 planted, nothing permanently injured it. Does this fact 
 also go for nothing, oh, bold contemner of its truths ! that, 
 during all the long march of the ages, with the help of 
 their accumulated light, knowledge, experience, and skill, 
 human labor and human genius have failed to prbducc any 
 work which so embodies its gist, incorporates its wisdom, 
 exhausts its meaning, or weakens its influence, as to super- 
 sede it ? The existence and the power of the Bible in the 
 world are stubborn facts for sceptics. It has been truly 
 said that it is a standing miracle. 
 
 MR. W. Are not some of your remarks equally applica- 
 ble to Homer and Virgil ? 
 
 I. Who reads them, beyond a certain educated class ? 
 Who cares for them, in translations ? Will the time ever 
 come, think you, when a translation of them will be found 
 in every house, and the mass of mankind go to it for com- 
 fort and guidance in every sort of trial, bereavement, doubt, 
 difficulty ? 
 
 MR. W. Well, perhaps not. But our talk has drifted 
 away from the point where it started, and which interested 
 me most the influence of education on Christianity. 
 There have been more leacned freethinkers than Tom Paine. 
 Is it not true, after all, that men of the acutest minds and 
 the profoundest learning have been opposed to Chris- 
 tianity ? 
 
 I. Certainly. But the argument, if it proves anything, 
 proves more for Christianity than against it. For, in the 
 first place, men of mightiest intellect and vastest erudition 
 have given it their loving adhesion and service ; and, in 
 the second, see how little the adverse learning, power, and 
 genius have availed to injure it ! I think God has allowed 
 some of the finest talent to waste itself in attacking it, just 
 to show the futility of the work. Do you remember Vol- 
 taire's boast that, though it took twelve men to establish 
 Christianity, he would show that it needed but one to over- 
 throw it? Yet Christianity is stronger to-day than when
 
 SHILOH. * 331 
 
 he assailed it. Whereas, Voltaire is but little read, even 
 by his own countrymen. No writer enjoys so wide a repu- 
 tation upon hearsay. The great proportion of those who 
 adopt his views and use his arguments, never read a line of 
 his works. They take them at second-hand. Lucky for 
 them that they do ! To be obliged to wade through some 
 five or six thousantl closely printed pages, wherein attacks 
 on Christianity are mixed up with all sorts of subjects, to 
 say nothing of gross indecency, ill-timed buffoonery, vehe- 
 ment denunciation, unscrupulous ridicule, one-sided, dis- 
 torted, inaccurate statements, and unwarrantable conclu- 
 sions, would go far to dampen the ardor of the devoutest 
 disciple, if it did not make him sick of the very name of 
 Voltaire ! The more, that he would find so little positive 
 belief, to balance unbelief. He would find Voltaire's creed 
 slipping through his fingers, as it seems continually to have 
 been doing through his own. For his later works show a 
 marked deviation from his earlier opinions; arguments 
 which he characterizes as sophisms at one point of his life 
 prevail with him, at another ; objections which he states 
 and answers here, overcome him there ; his mind oscillates 
 perplexingly between two opinions ; and the whole makes 
 nothing quite so clear as that very little was quite clear to 
 himself. In all his works, there is a most striking contrast 
 between the arrogancy of his processes of reasoning, and the 
 humility, not to say meanness, of the results. One is con- 
 tinually amazed that he should have trusted so implicitly 
 to human reason, if it could only lead him to such timid, 
 qualified, and sombre conclusions. 
 
 MK. W. (moodily). I cannot disprove your statements. 
 You have read more widely than I, even (bowing with 
 mock respect) of infidel writings. But it does not matter. 
 I pin my faith upon no man, nor school ; I judge for my- 
 self. I bring all things to the test of my own reason. 
 
 I. Does it tell you why and how an inanimate seed in 
 the earth springs up to life, and grows and bears fruit ?
 
 332 ' SHILOH. 
 
 If not if you cannot discover the vital principle, nor 
 how it works why believe that the seed has life and brings 
 forth .fruit ? . Would it not be more reasonable to deny 
 both propositions, and plant no more seeds and eat no 
 more fruit ? 
 
 Mr. W. I don't see what you are driving at. 
 
 I. Your boasted reason cannot discdrn the vital princi- 
 ple of inspiration in the Bible, nor of supernatural power 
 in Christianity, though it lives and germinates and bears 
 fruit in countless human hearts. Deny that it exists, there- 
 fore, and refuse to yourself, certainly to others, if you can 
 its health-giving, life-giving sustenance. 
 
 MK. W. So does Mohammedism live and bear fruit. 
 
 I. True, for Mohammedism is a religion and a worship, 
 not a chill system of philosophy. It believes in God, and 
 does not wholly reject Christ. The Koran borrows much 
 that is good from the Bible. Its errors have their legiti- 
 mate fruit in the condition of Mohammedom to-day. Con- 
 trast it with Christian countries, if you would test the two 
 religions by their fruits. 
 
 MR. W. Ah ! I would like to read the Koran once ! 
 
 I. Read something better, read the Bible ! Read care- 
 fully one of the gospels, or an epistle, and then read two or 
 three chapters of the " Age of Reason," and see if you do 
 not get a faint glimmering, at least, of the reason why one 
 lives indestructibly, while the other is on the high road to 
 oblivion.' Having done that, perhaps you will be willing to 
 try still another plan. Instead of puzzling yourself with 
 the mysteries, discrepancies, and obscurities of the Bible, 
 see what light it can throw upon the dark places of your 
 own nature, upon the follies, contradictions, and intricacies 
 of your heart and life. Though you may not be able to 
 understand and expound it, you will find that it very fully 
 understands and expounds you. Thereby you may get a 
 hint of the several offices of the Bible and the human mind: 
 the latter was not put into the world to explain and harmo-
 
 SHILOH. 333 
 
 nize the former, but the former to explain and harmonize 
 the latter. Finally, if you still doubt the Divine origin of 
 the Scriptures ; try, for just one week, to live up to its sim- 
 ple, undoubted precepts. And if you find it even a harder 
 task to practice its plain parts than to comprehend its diffi- 
 cult ones, perhaps you will ask yourself the question how a 
 human mind ever happened to frame and enjoin a code of 
 morals so irksome to human nature, so opposed to the hu- 
 man will, and so impossible of perfect human attainment ! 
 
 " And now," I concluded, " I must really go. Where 
 do you suppose I shall find Jack ? He has not yet been 
 asked if he will be my scholar." 
 
 "There will be no two words about that," said Mr. War- 
 ren, gruffly. " If I say he is to go, he goes." 
 
 " Nevertheless, I prefer to consult him. I want no un- 
 willing disciples." 
 
 Not to make a long story longer, I bribed Jack, unscru- 
 pulously. He had longings unutterable, I learned, after a 
 four-bladed knife. I did not hesitate to promise him the 
 best one procurable at Clay Corner, so soon as he could re- 
 peat to me, without error, the whole of the Catechism ; and 
 with the most unhesitating fluency, the Lord's Prayer, the 
 Creed, and the Ten Commandments.
 
 XXXI. 
 
 THE STOLEN SKETCH. 
 
 3T more than a day or two after the expe- 
 dition recorded in my last letter, I made 
 one of a totally different character, in com- 
 pany with Ruth, Alice being away on a 
 visit. The day's programme comprehended : 
 first, a diligent gathering and pressing of 
 ferns, in the dense, dim. wood at the foot of 
 the glen, for use in winter decorations ; next, 
 the ascent of a neighboring hill, for the sake of the view 
 from its summit ; and, finally, a return up the glen to 
 the shady, rock-barricaded nook long ago described to 
 you, to which, last point Mrs. Divine promised to send 
 Leo, at noon, with a lunch-basket ; and where, moreover, we 
 purposed to spend as much of the afternoon as should seem 
 good to us, resting, dreaming, chatting, 'or reading aloud, 
 according to mood. Days thus spent out-of-doors, are 
 especially good for Ruth ; they are an important part of 
 my crusade against her home-keeping, sedentary habits. 
 Under their genial influences, the rose in her cheeks is 
 deepening fast, the light brightening in her eyes. Needless 
 to add that she grows more beautiful, day by day ! 
 
 The 'first part of our programme had been faithfully car. 
 ried out, our books filled with ferns, the hill climbed and 
 the view enjoyed. We were now in the hollow, resting on 
 the basin's bank of luxuriant moss ; sometimes talking, but 
 oftener listening in dreamy silence to the fresh, clear voices
 
 SHILOH. 335 
 
 of the foliage above and the water below. The hollow had 
 the essential charm of such a spot perfect solitude. We 
 might linger there for hours, unseen and undisturbed, shut 
 in by the interlacing boughs, the hoary rocks, the clear 
 basin on which their heavy shadow ever fell, 'and wherein 
 their forms were distinctly mirrored. In truth, so perfect 
 was the reflection, so faithful the reproduction of every 
 line, tint, and motion, that the basin seemed to hang be- 
 tween two forest solitudes, either of which might be taken 
 for the reflected image of the other. Stooping over the 
 water, we saw faces, too, bending forth from the green 
 foliage of that under world to meet our gaze, answering 
 to our smiles, our gravity, our gestures, moving their lips 
 to the sound of our words, and making us feel vague and 
 visionary by their very distinctness ; as if the truth and 
 vividness of their representation were so much abstracted 
 from our actuality. The notion made us gay, as became 
 shadows and unrealities, mirth being of so airy and eva- 
 nescent a quality as to associate readily with whatever is 
 illusive and unsubstantial ; while grief is heavy and opaque, 
 and must needs give an account of itself and justify its ex- 
 istence, before we give it leave to pass into our sympathies. 
 
 Ruth's eyes and cheeks were alight and aglow with 
 gayety and color, yet she was weary, too; the long walk 
 had been somewhat trying to her poor, little, crooked feet. 
 Seeing. this, I drew her head down on my lap, that she 
 might rest the easier, and began reading aloud Tennyson's 
 " Daydream " ; whose fanciful theme and easy-flowing meas- 
 ure were well, suited to the time, place and circumstance. 
 For, as the fairy-prince entered the spell-bound chamber, I 
 saw Ruth's eyelids droop slowly, and the long lashes rest 
 upon the fair cheek : the rippling water, the musical rhyme, 
 had lulled her to sleep. Nor could any " Sleeping Beauty " 
 of fairy-tale or poet's dream have been lovelier than she ! 
 
 For some moments, I read on softly ; then, my thoughts 
 wandered, my voice died away, the book fell by my side,
 
 336 SHILOH. 
 
 with one finger^ between ks leaves, external objects faded 
 from my sight, I had strayed as far into the Land of 
 Reverie, as Ruth into that of Dream. 
 
 Thus, a half-hour, or more, stole by. I was rous'ed by a 
 rustling tread in the open meadow, on the other side of the 
 stone fence ; in a moment Leo came over, basket in mouth, 
 and dropped, lightly enough, upon the soft moss. I raised 
 my hand with a warning gesture ; Ruth's slumber was still 
 so deep that I did not care to break it. The dog understood 
 and obeyed. He came noiselessly to my side, set down his 
 basket, and rubbed his head lightly against my shoulder, 
 by way of mute, yet cordial, greeting. He then surveyed 
 Ruth, for some moments, with a curious, grave intentness ; 
 as if he were wondering what sort of thing was this sleep 
 of mortals, which held them in such deathlike embrace. 
 Possibly, he contrasted it with the lighter slumbers of his 
 own race, broken by the softest tread, the faintest sound, 
 and, doubtless, greatly to the advantage of the latter. 
 Suddenly, he raised his head, dilated his nostrils, and 
 glanced suspiciously around. Then he ran quickly down 
 the brook's bank, alternately putting his nose to the ground 
 and lifting it in the air. I watched him idly, through the 
 intervening boughs. At a point a little below, where the 
 widening stream is crossed by stepping-stones, he seemed to 
 strike a trail : his manner became more assured ; he crossed 
 the brook swiftly, smelling at the stones as he went; and I 
 soon saw, by the waving of the ferns and bushes, that he 
 was coming up on the other side. Some moments elapsed, 
 and I was fast sinking into reverie again, when, suddenly, 
 there was a strange commotion behind the screen of foli- 
 age which topped the steep bank opposite me. Partly by 
 dint of straining my sight through the clustering leaves, 
 partly by means of suggestive sounds from behind them, 
 I made out that Leo had surprised some intruder upon 
 the scene : an acquaintance, however, it appeared, for the 
 dog was leaping and fawning upon him, with short, quick
 
 SHILOH. 337 
 
 barks of unmistakable delight ; while the new-comer sought 
 to repulse him quietly, but in vain. At length a voice 
 exclaimed, in distinct, impatient, and not altogether unfa* 
 miliar tones : 
 
 " Down, Leo ! down, sir ! down ! " 
 
 Ruth opened her eyes dreamily; Leo's bark subsided 
 into a low whine. 
 
 The next moment the screening boughs opposite parted ; 
 in the opening appeared a young man's head and shoulders ; 
 on his face was an expression of mingled chagrin, amuse- 
 ment, and deprecation. 
 
 " Fairly caught in the act you see ! " said he, lifting- his 
 hat and bowing with a somewhat exaggerated humility. 
 " Trespassing and (ugly word !) stealing. The culprit 
 surrenders at discretion. He throws himself upon your 
 mercy, Miss Frost." 
 
 Ruth started up into a sitting posture, and gazed at 
 him with wide open eyes of amazement, still soft with the 
 haze of slumber. I saw him glance at her admiringly. 
 
 " Mercy ? " I repeated, dryly, " I doubt if my stock 
 on hand is equal to the demand. Take justice, instead; it 
 is the rarer article, Mr. Cambur." 
 
 " True," he rejoined, gravely. " If we could always get 
 perfect justice at the hands of our fellow-men, we should 
 not so often be obliged to ask for mercy. Well, I will try 
 the quality of yours ! I suppose I may come into eourt. 
 Criminals on trial do not usually stand outside, looking in 
 at the window ; though some of them, doubtless, would 
 not object to such a position ! You will take it as an evi- 
 dence of my guiltlessness of evil intent, I hope, that I volun- 
 tarily place myself completely in your power." 
 
 So saying the artist swung himself down the rock, by 
 the aid of a pendent bough, and sat down upon a huge, 
 outcropping tree-root at its base. The brook flowed and 
 rippled between us. 
 
 " There ! " said he, putting his hat on the ground be- 
 15
 
 338 SHILOH. 
 
 side him, "that is the proper arrangement. This bank 
 serves for the criminal's box, that for the judge's bench. I 
 await your sentence, Miss Frost. I am curious to taste the 
 flavor of your justice." 
 
 I did not answer : my attention was fastened upon Leo. 
 He had followed the artist down the bank ; and, being for- 
 bidden by a second energetic " Down, Leo ! " to spring 
 upon him, he had cast himself at his feet, looking up at 
 him with great, piteous, imploring eyes, and giving vent to 
 his emotions by low, irrepressible sounds, mingled of bark, 
 whine, and howl, yet full of ecstatic joy. In short, he 
 seemed to have unexpectedly encountered the friend of his 
 heart, after a separation of months or years. 
 
 " I was not aware that Leo had the honor of your ac- 
 quaintance," I remarked, glancing significantly at the dog. 
 
 "I I, " the artist stammered and hesitated, drawing 
 his hand across his brow, " That is to say, dogs always take 
 to me, instinctively," he concluded, somewhat incoherently. 
 
 "I should think so," responded I, dryly, "if Leo's 
 present performance is the usual measure of their ' taking 
 to ! ' Do you always ' take to ' their names instinctively, 
 too?" 
 
 He reddened and bit his lip. "Leo? ah, yes, to be 
 sure ! " said he. " Well, you see, I once had a dog of that 
 name myself; and it seems to come to my lips spontane- 
 ously, whenever I speak to one of his kind. Odd that it 
 happens to be your dog's name, too ! " 
 
 " Very," returned I, with quiet irony. The explanation 
 was plausible enough ; but I was too well acquainted with 
 Leo's habitually reserved and dignified deportment toward 
 strangers, to believe, for one moment, that this was his first 
 meeting with Mr. Cambur. Still, if there were a mystery, 
 it was not my business to pry into it. The artist had a 
 right to the possession of his OAvn affairs ; the more indis- 
 putably, because there was something in his face and bear- 
 ing strongly indicative of inward integrity, and seeming to
 
 SIIILOH. 339 
 
 be a sufficient guarantee that the ambiguity wherein he 
 chose to leave the present circumstance did not imply any- 
 thing wrong. Besides, Mrs. Danforth and her friend had 
 vouched, most emphatically, for his character and anteced- 
 ents. I took pity, therefore, upon his embarrassment at 
 Leo's persistent attention, so inevitably suggesting a pre- 
 vious acquaintance that he preferred to ignore, and made 
 an attempt to relieve it. 
 
 " Leo ! come here ! " said I. " Mr. Cambur can dispense 
 with your further attendance. Come to me, sir !" 
 
 To my extreme surprise, the dog only turned his head, 
 gave me a pathetic, pleading look, wagged his tail, and 
 resumed his adoring contemplation of Mr. Cambur. 
 
 That gentleman looked more annoyed than ever. " Go 
 to your mistress ! " he exclaimed, in a tone of impatient 
 command, accompanied by a gesture of dismissal ; but ad- 
 ding, with an immediate assumption of playfulness ; " No" 
 need to stand guard over me any longer, thou black consta- 
 ble ! I have given myself up to justice, and I shall bide 
 its course, parole cFhonneur." 
 
 At his first word, Leo rose, slowly crossed the brook, 
 and threw himself down by my side, with a heavy sigh and 
 a deeply wounded air. 
 
 " Now," continued Mr. Cambur, looking much relieved, 
 " I should be glad of the learned judge's decision, if it is 
 ready." 
 
 "We will put you on the witness-stand first, if you 
 please. What were you doing, over yonder ? " 
 
 " Urn sketching." 
 
 "The landscape, doubtless," observed I, in a slightly 
 satirical tone. " You might have chosen a better point of 
 view ; your look-out from thence could not have been ex- 
 tensive." 
 
 " If the truth must be told," he responded, with a mirth- 
 ful gleam in his eyes, " it was not so much the look-out as 
 the look-m which attracted me."
 
 340 SIIILOH. 
 
 " Humph ! Let me see your sketch." 
 
 He looked steadily in my face, for a moment, as if seek- 
 ing to read my purpose there ; then, he shook his head du- 
 biously. 
 
 " Of course, you have a right to demand it," said he ; 
 " I do not dispute that. Only, listen to me a moment, first ; 
 I will make a clean breast of the whole matter. I have 
 been rambling over these hills and dales, all the morning. 
 I struck this brook in that dark wood, down yonder, and 
 followed it up ; crossing on the stepping-stones, below there, 
 and coming up on this side. Seeing this group of ti'ees, and 
 suspecting that a green nook was here concealed, with -a 
 pretty bit of rock and water, I looked in. Imagine my sur- 
 prise and delight at seeing two nymphs of the foun- 
 tain (for such I immediately pronounced them) seated 
 by its brim ; the one asleep, the other lost in thought. 
 Of course, I gazed, it is an artist's delight, nay, his very 
 life, to look ; by it he breathes, feeds, and has his being. 
 Spontaneously, the nymphs had assumed attitudes finer and 
 more picturesque than I could have hit upon, if I had tried 
 for months. In the basin below, the picture was repeated, 
 line for line, tint for tint, as if they were creatures 
 doubly existent on the earth and in the water, at the 
 same moment. The artist's instinct awoke within me. I 
 sought in my pockets for paper ; I found the blank page of 
 a letter; I laid it on the top of my hat, and sketched away 
 as for dear life ; trembling lest some chance movement 
 should spoil those charming attitudes, and change those 
 graceful lines, before I could fix them on paper. But my 
 unconscious sitters were immobile as statues the waking 
 one not less than the sleeper. As I sketched, I saw the fin- 
 ished picture before me ; every line, every color, perfect. 
 It hung in a gallery, richly framed, an admiring crowd of 
 spectators before it. Underneath was written, ' Dream 
 Reverie Reflection.' Treat it kindly, I pray you, Miss 
 Frost ; upon it I base my hopes of earthly immortality ! "
 
 SHILOH. 
 
 He ended in a tone between jest and earnest, and handed 
 me the sketch across the ripple of the brook. Ruth looked 
 at it with me, leaning over my shoulder. 
 
 The figures were clearly, boldly outlined; the back- 
 ground not even hinted at, which Mr. Cambur explained 
 by saying he could come and sketch that, at his conven- 
 ience. My face was indicated by a few rapid strokes only ; 
 it was on Ruth's that he had concentrated his attention. 
 That had been drawn with a lingering tenderness of touch, 
 betraying how deeply his artist-nature had been stirred by 
 a thing so beautiful. The likeness was exact : Ruth's face 
 
 ~ * 
 
 needs no idealizing ; it is, in itself, as fair and ideal a coun- 
 tenance as ever hovered in the outer haze of an artist's 
 imagination. The original blushed with pleasure, as she 
 looked at the sketch, drooping her head low; she could 
 not help seeing how lovely it was. 
 
 "I think," said I, after examining it carefully, "that I 
 must needs confiscate this. I have long wished for a pic- 
 ture of by the way, I suppose you must be introduced ; 
 Miss Winnot ! Mr. Cambur : " 
 
 (The artist rose and bowed low ; Ruth bent her head, 
 blushing) : 
 
 " But," I continued, " I did not care for a picture of her, 
 taken under the depressing, stiffening influence of a daguer- 
 rian gallery. Now, this sketch of yours will do very well. 
 Only, I wish the eyes were open ! " 
 
 " So do I," responded the artist. " Certain it is, that no 
 one who has once seen them open, could thereafter be 
 wholly satisfied with any picture which only represented 
 them closed. Miss Frost, I think this matter can be ar- 
 ranged to our mutual satisfaction. Permit me to keep my 
 stolen sketch, I am loth to part with it. Bring Miss Win- 
 not to my studio, some day, and I will make you a sketch 
 of her, in color, that cannot fail to satisfy you better than 
 this ; though I should need to dip my pencil into some 
 marvelous mixture of dawn red, sunset gold, and twilight
 
 342 SHILOH. 
 
 h 
 
 shadow, adequately to represent her unutterable hair and 
 eyes ! I shall be richly rewarded for my labor, if I ani al- 
 lowed to keep a copy for myself." 
 
 And thus it was settled. 
 
 After a little more talk, I took up the lunch-basket and 
 lifted the cover, remarking gravely : 
 
 " I suppose artists never have a literal appetite, for 
 actual food ; as you observed a moment ago, they live on 
 looking, sketching, and the like. But Miss Winnot and I 
 are commonplace persons, with commonplac'e wants. We 
 have spent the morning in gathering ferns and climbing 
 hills ; we are tired at least, we were; certainly, we are 
 hungry. Leo, sable messenger of Providence and Mrs. 
 Divine ! has brought us seasonable food. Suffer iis to 
 partake thereof. You can look on, and sketch, as a com- 
 panion piece to the other, ' Refection ' ! " 
 
 He made a comical grimace. 
 
 " Or," I proceeded, taking out the contents of the 
 basket and spreading them on the moss, " if you think a 
 taste of the edibles will tend to make your sketch of them 
 more spirited, step across the brook, and seat yourself on 
 that moss-cushion." 
 
 What a merry lunch we had ! The artist brightened it 
 with the gleam of a certain quiet humor peculiar to him, 
 and Ruth her shyness being quickly overcome with the 
 responsive sparkle of an almost childlike gayety; while 
 sunshine and shadow and sylvan scenery gave each it's 
 kindly charm. 
 
 Ruth was soon the gayest of the party. Though more 
 commonly inclined to melancholy, she is yet quite capable 
 of that high carnival of the spirits which is its natural offset, 
 and richly compensates, by its brief brilliancy, for many 
 sombre hours. In truth, it would not be difficult to believe 
 that two maidens, the one mirthful, the other melancholy, 
 were magically bound together by the zone which clasps 
 Ruth's waist ; and that you saw their faces alternately,
 
 SHILOII. 343 
 
 while their voices twisted together in one rich chord of 
 harmony. The fancy gains color from the fact that there 
 was always, even in the most joyous ebullition of her 
 spirits, some faint intimation of hidden mournfulness, 
 which was yet the bewitching final touch, the ultimate 
 charm, of her mirth. It was plain that the effervescing cup 
 must be quickly quaffed, ere its sparkle and piquancy were 
 over. The artist felt this, I saw. As became the professor 
 of an imaginative art, he was endowed with a quick, 
 spiritual insight into many matters not within the scope of 
 actual vision. He threw himself into the frolic with a zest 
 that betrayed his sense of its evanescent character. For 
 some flitting moments, we seemed to have strayed far 
 within the limits of Arcadia, leaving the dusty, cumbrous 
 habitudes of modern life at its golden gate. Or, our feet 
 had been lifted from the heavy soil of earth into a region 
 of myth and mirth inaccessible in ordinary moods and 
 moments ; and all the more eagerly enjoyed because we 
 knew it was so doubtful if ever again we should find the 
 way thither. 
 
 To say truth, the foregoing remarks apply better to 
 Ruth and the artist than to myself. I soon subsided into 
 little else than A mere spectator of their mirth ; encourag- 
 ing, but scarcely sharing, it ; seldom catching the ball of 
 jest and playfulness which they tossed back and forth, 
 through the flicker of the sunshine and the dance of the 
 leaf-shadows, except to save it from an untimely fall to the 
 ground. It suited me better to lean back against the trunk 
 of an overarching tree,- and watch the airy grace and skill 
 with which they kept it up. Thus, I happened to note how 
 Mr. Cambur's face, ordinarily somewhat graver and ma- 
 turer of expression than fairly belongs to his years, had 
 grown animated and youthful under the happy influence of 
 the moment ; and so, the clue to that perplexing resem- 
 blance, before spoken of and which had not been less 
 troublesome throughout this second interview was sud-
 
 344 SHILOH. 
 
 denly supplied. Through the first gap in the conversation, 
 therefore, I sent the following quiet remark ; 
 
 " I have just remembered, Mr. Cambur, who it is that 
 you resemble so strongly." 
 
 He started as if it had been a missile of some sort. 
 " Ah, indeed? " said he, giving me a quick, keen glance. 
 
 " Yes : a young painter who came to Rome a year, or 
 more, before I left there, Mr. Archum, or Harry Archum, 
 as everybody called him ; for he was one of those frank, 
 genuine, generous youths, whose Christian name comes 
 most easily to the lips. He used to come often to my 
 father's study ; I remember him well. Your resemblance 
 to him is striking ; yet there is a marked difference, too. 
 He was yoiinger, slenderer, gayer, than you are, and he 
 wore no beard, only a light, curling moustache. Still, I 
 think you could pass for his elder brother. Do you not 
 know him ? I' 
 
 " Know him ? certainly, quite well," he answered, with 
 his eyes fixed on the brook, in a half-sad, half-meditative, 
 way. 
 
 " My father used to think him a most promising neo- 
 phyte in art," I continued. " Does he fulfil that promise ? 
 Is he doing well ? " 
 
 " Not so well as he ought to do." 
 
 " Indeed ? I am sorry to hear it ! Yet a friend of mine, 
 in Rome, mentioned a picture that he had recently painted 
 called ' Waiting,' I think in no measured terms of com- 
 mendation ; and I have much respect for her opinion in 
 such matters. . Have you seen it ? " 
 
 " I have." 
 
 " And how do you like it ? " 
 
 " Not very well ; that is, it does not satisfy me, at all." 
 
 I felt provoked. " I might have known better than to ask 
 you," I rejoined, caustically. " Artists are not much given 
 to the praise of one another's works. I never yet knew a 
 painter to bestow any hearty applause on a fellow-painter's
 
 SHILOH. 345 
 
 picture, in his particular line of art ; nor a sculptor to turn 
 an admiring gaze upon anybody's lump of moist clay but 
 his own ! " 
 
 The artist might have been excused if he had shown 
 himself hurt or indignant at my speech ; but he only looked 
 at me with a curious, inexplicable smile. " When you 
 know me better, Miss Frost," said he, quietly, " you will 
 recall such part of that sweeping censure as you intend for 
 me. I do admire, heartily, whatever of truthful beauty or 
 of beautiful truth I find in anybody's work ; either in con- 
 ception, execution, or intent. So far from being captiously 
 or jealously critical of other men's labors, I hold that any 
 picture, or sculpture, or engraving, however imperfect, 
 which 1ms brought help, comfort, or aspiration, to one 
 human soul, has thereby acquired a gracious and inde- 
 feasible rio;ht to be." Pie ended in a tone that showed he 
 
 O 
 
 was deeply in earnest. 
 
 This lapse into seriousness was the inevitable turning- 
 point in our mood. The hour of careless gayety was over. 
 Our talk waxed grave ; possibly dull. I am sure it would 
 be so on paper. 
 
 Ere long, the artist rose. "Your sylvan hospitality is 
 so pleasant," said he, " that I am in danger of trespassing 
 on it too long. It is 'time for me to go back to my solitary, 
 shadowy studio. Pray remember, Miss Frost, that I am 
 at your service, in respect to Miss Winnot's picture, when- 
 ever you please to bring her thither. Addio I " 
 
 He bowed, and took his way down the glen. Leo 
 started up, and, after some hesitation, followed him. He 
 soon returned ; but with a more satisfied air. He had not 
 been dismissed, I fancied, without some compensating kind- 
 ness, a word to soothe, or a caress to delight, his faithful, 
 affectionate heart. 
 
 MALA (suddenly); Wherever there is concealment, there 
 is usually something wrong. 
 15*
 
 346 SHILOH. 
 
 BONA. Is it out of the truth, purity, transparency, of 
 your own heart that that suspicion arises ? 
 
 MALA (insisting). But where there is nothing wrong, 
 there can be no necessity for concealment. 
 
 BONA. Say, rather, Where thei'e is anything really, 
 radically wrong, it is difficult, wellnigh impossible to con- 
 ceal it. If evil has taken up its abode in the heart, it is 
 sure to betray its presence in unguarded looks arid tones, 
 and in chance words. Whereas, the invariable language 
 of Mr. Cambur's features and bearing is as you have felt 
 intuitively, and acted upon that intuition truth, honor, 
 generosity, kindness of heart. Besides, there is a difference 
 between concealing and being silent. A man may have no 
 disposition to hide his affairs ; who yet does not feel called 
 upon to discuss them with every chance comer. Reticence 
 is oftentimes but the natural offspring of painful recollec- 
 tions. Mr. Cambur has a right to your charitable con- 
 struction of his silence, till you have better reason for sup- 
 posing him to be unworthy of it. 
 
 I. At all events, I will ask Mr. Divine where he got 
 Leo. 
 
 BONA. Would it not be more delicate and generous, 
 more in accordance with the Golden Rule, to leave the mat- 
 ter just where the person most concerned chose to leave it ? 
 
 To confess the unlovely truth, I turned a deaf ear to 
 this inquiry. Going home, I met Mr. Divine at the gate, 
 on his swift way to the barn, and put the question with 
 reference to Leo, not stopping for a second thought. The 
 answer was brief, definite, and conclusive : 
 
 "I got him of Major Burcham's Irishman, when he 
 wasn't much more than a pup." 
 
 It left me more in the dark than ever !
 
 XXXII. 
 
 AN ARTIST'S STUDIO. 
 
 FORTNIGHT went by ere I claimed the 
 fulfilment of Mr. Cambur's promise ; but 
 it was not a fortnight fruitless in results, 
 as regards the growth of our acquaintance. 
 During its progress, the elfish force, or fate, 
 called Circumstance, seemed to delight in 
 throwing, us together at every turn. I called 
 upon Mrs. Danforth, and found the artist ten- 
 anting her porch, placidly awaiting her return from a visit 
 to a neighbor. I met him twice or thrice at Essie's ; for he 
 had early won the freedom of the Volger premises, and ap- 
 peared equally at home in the field discussing soils and 
 crops with the farmer, and in the parlor listening to his 
 daughter's piano. A thorough liking, which promised 
 to blossom out into warm and lasting friendship, sprang 
 Tip between him and Mr. Taylor, and I seldom went to 
 the Gwynne Place, without encountering him in sitting- 
 room or study, tossing the crowing, gurgling baby up 
 to the ceiling, or dissertating earnestly upon Italy and 
 Art to the clergyman. Lastly, by way of climax, I 
 came suddenly upon him, one morning, seated at his ease 
 beside Aunt Vin's cheese-press, regaling himself with choice 
 1 moi-sels of the curd, and listening, with an extremely di- 
 verted face, to the maker's conversation. I could not but 
 marvel to see how quickly all Shiloh had opened its doors 
 to him, how easily he had won a place in its friendly re-
 
 348 SHILOH. 
 
 gard, and how readily he adapted himself to an unaccus- 
 tomed manner of life and a strange people. 
 
 In many of these encounters, Ruth had been with me. 
 It was rather on the assured footing of acquaintance, 
 therefore, than as mere art-visitors, that we finally knocked 
 at the door of Mr. Cambur's studio. It was opened by 
 the artist in person, palette in hand. 
 
 A painter's studio is a spot which, to our preconceptions, 
 at least, seems always situated a little way above the dust 
 and sordidness of the actual world, in a region of dream, 
 vision, and enchantment, enriched with beauties of scenery 
 and of being far beyond anything to be met with in the 
 domain of reality. It is a sort of half-way station between 
 earth and heaven, we think, from whence the artist paints 
 both, with pencils dipped alternately in remembrance and 
 in prophecy. And though the present example did not 
 fully realize this ideal (as in truth, no studio ever did), 
 but, rather, served to show that the steps by which Art 
 climbs to her grandest heights must all be taken toilsomely 
 Upon the earth, yet indications were not wanting that ifc 
 was a room marked out from the uses and pleasures of or- 
 dinary life by a purpose and a character of its own. 
 
 The windows were carefully darkened, save one, whose 
 upper half showed a small square of sunless sky, and ad- 
 mitted that partial light which, with its concomitant of 
 . strongly-defined shadow, best develops the pictorial char- 
 acter in objects, or imparts it to them. Near the middle of 
 the room stood an easel, with a picture just " sketched in " 
 upon it ; one or two others, awaiting but the final touch, 
 hung where the light visited them most kindly ; unframed 
 canvases leaned against the wall, turning their backs churl- 
 ishly on the visitor ; and pencil-sketches were pinned up 
 here and there, or made an artistic confusion on the table, 
 assisted by many curious little shreds from the skirts of ' 
 Antiquity, gems, seals, coins, ivory-carvings, etc., found 
 in and about the soil of Rome.
 
 SHILOH. 349 
 
 " At last ! " exclaimed the artist, with a genial smile. 
 " Yoxir welcome has been w r aiting for you long." 
 
 " I hops it has not cooled by the delay." 
 
 " Certainly not : it is too genuine for that. Sit here, 
 Miss Winnot." 
 
 He placed chairs for us, and, after a little talk, brought 
 forward such of his works as he cared to show. 
 
 The first was the picture of which Mrs. Danforth had 
 spoken, " Dreams." A beautiful girl, lost in a sunset 
 reverie that was all the detail to be put into words. But, 
 as you looked, you saw that not only the girl, but the 
 drapery, the sky, the atmosphei-e, dreamed, too. Gazing 
 upon it long, you also dreamed ; your ideas became vague 
 and visionary, your imagination spread its wings and 
 floated off unawares in the immaterialized gold of the 
 sunset air. For the atmosphere was the really wonder- 
 ful thing about the picture. Soft, rich, luminous, serene ; 
 neither mist, nor haze, nor sunshine, but with something of 
 the brightness, the softness, and the vagueness of each ; it 
 might have been the very ether wherein a poet dreams 
 and paints his ideal pictures. 
 
 Mr. Cambur next uncovered one half of a large canvas, 
 leaving the other still veiled. 
 
 " The cuiiain conceals \vhat was once a failure, and is now 
 an unsightly daub, which I spare you the discomfort of look- 
 ing at," said he, as he stood before the picture, arranging 
 the folds. " It was my design to paint a Wise and a Foolish 
 Virgin, believing that the aim and significance of the para- 
 ble might as clearly be brought out by two typical figures as 
 by ten. I succeeded tolerably well with the representative 
 of folly, but the other was wholly unsatisfactory: I have 
 rubbed it out, and am waiting until a better mood, better 
 influences, a whiter inspiration, shall enable me to take it 
 up again with a clearer probability of success." 
 
 He stepped aside, and the Daughter of Folly was re- 
 vealed to view ; fast locked in sleep, her graceful limbs all
 
 350 SHILOII. 
 
 unstrung, a marvelous languor diffused throughout her 
 frame, and her empty lamp slow sliding from her uncon- 
 scious hand. Fair and foolish not wicked, that would 
 have made her unbeautiful ; merely a lover of pleasure, 
 of ease, of brightness : over whose soul no tides of living 
 waters had flowed, to quicken the spiritual life, or had 
 flowed in vain. A type of mere physical beauty, warm 
 with life and health, rich in color and grace, not devoid of 
 many soft and womanly attributes ; yet so manifestly of the 
 earth, earthy, that you sighed a.s you gazed, to feel how 
 utterly useless it would be to awaken her. She would but 
 half open upon you beautiful, soft, vague eyes, murmur 
 faintly, " A little more slumber ! " and close them again in 
 a deeper sleep than before. 
 
 We looked at the picture long and in silence. The 
 artist gazed upjon it also, with a thoughtful face. 
 
 " I suppose you know the story of Andrea del Castagno," 
 said he, at length. 
 
 " I do not," replied Ruth, quickly. " Tell it to me, 
 please." 
 
 " Andrea del Castagno was a painter of Florence, who 
 lived and wrought in days when Art's power and progress 
 were greatly limited by the poverty of her means ; when 
 she was obliged to content herself with the comparatively 
 meagre and feeble effects produced by painting in distem- 
 per, as it is called ; that is, with colors mixed with gums, 
 size, whites of eggs, etc. Dissatisfied with the limited 
 resources of his palette, and ambitious of distinction, An- 
 drea was constantly dreaming of some "new method which 
 should more perfectly reproduce the subtile refinements of 
 Nature's coloring, the exquisite quality of her tints, the 
 transparency of her lights, the soft clearness of her shadows, 
 the far inward shining of gems and of human eyes ; and her 
 wonderful blending of them all, light beneath shade, color 
 gleaming through color : he dreamed and he despaired. 
 
 * About this time, came a rumor that a new and efficient
 
 SHILOH. 351 
 
 method of preparing colors, by which all these effects might 
 be faithfully represented, had really been discovei-ed at the 
 north ; and, shortly after, there appeared in Florence a 
 young Venetian, Domenico by name, who was acquainted 
 with the process of painting in oil. Andrea quickly won his 
 friendship, his confidence, and his secret. Then he foully 
 assassinated him, that he might remain sole possessor of the 
 new art, in Florence. He returned to his studio and his 
 easel, unsuspected; and innocent persons suffered for his 
 crime. But, from that moment, all his work revealed, with 
 terrible power and distinctness, the fearful fact of a guilty, 
 remorseful soul hidden in the bosom of the worker. Day 
 by day, his pencil recorded that soul's history on canvas, 
 for the reading of future ages, its temptation, its fall, its 
 growing burden of horror and remorse, till, on his death- 
 bed, he confessed the special crime which had first stained 
 it, and henceforth colored all its conceptions." 
 
 " How strange ! " said Ruth, drawing a long bi-eath ; and 
 then giving the Foolish Virgin a look that seemed to ask 
 what possible connection could exist between that heedless 
 damsel and this story of crime. 
 
 The artist answered it as if it had been articulate. " My 
 story, Miss Wiunot," said he, "was intended to point the 
 moral that a painter's canvas reflects the character of his 
 life as perfectly as a mirror reflects his features. My Fool- 
 ish Virgin points it, also. "When I began that picture, I 
 was in Florence ; dissolved and lost in its inexpressibly 
 beautiful life, with its endless gratifications for the senses 
 of sight and hearing ; overcome by the Lotus-breath of its 
 stealing south wind, the heavy scents of its flowers, the 
 whisperings of its leaves and fountains, the lulling song of 
 its bells, .the rich languor of its sunshine. In short, I was 
 leading a dreamy, sensuous, self-indulgent life ; all whose 
 influences were favorable to the conception of the Foolish 
 Virgin and to that only. For it, I needed little more 
 than a rich profusion of color, a beautiful model, a south-
 
 352 SHILOH. 
 
 warmed fancy; all these and all outside influences, as 
 well were easily made harmonious with the principal note 
 of my theme, and reduced to a perfect chord. But, for 
 the Wise Virgin, something more was demanded the 
 beauty of holiness ; and that is beyond the power of mere 
 pigments. It must be conceived in the clear regions of an 
 undefiled, heaven-enlightened imagination ; and wrought 
 out by the aid of an active, divine life-principle within. 
 Despite their many and glaring technical faults, this spirit- 
 ual beauty has never been so clearly represented on canvas 
 as in the works of Fra Angelico, the monk who ' never 
 began a picture without a prayer,' and whose whole ai't-life 
 has justly been termed 'a hymn of pi-aise.' Nowhere else 
 do we find faces of saints and angels so purged from all 
 earthliness, and so irradiated with heavenly glory. What 
 Paul Akers said of one of them, applies with nearly equal 
 force to all, ' It comes to me as beauty and purity im- 
 materialized, and my soul entertains it as a guest whose 
 footsteps shook not the threshold of sense.' If I could but 
 borrow of the gentle monk's pure inspiration, while I paint 
 my Wise Virgin ! " 
 
 " The source from whence it was drawn is still accessi- 
 ble," I observed, quietly. " But what was your concep- 
 tion of the Daughter of Wisdom ? " 
 
 " I scarce remember what it was / I can give you an 
 idea of what it is. I see her springing swiftly forth to 
 meet the Bridegi*oom ; her newly-kindled lamp is in her 
 hand, throwing a strong light upon her pure, noble fea- 
 tures, which are still further illuminated from within by 
 joyous anticipation. She looks straight before her, with 
 an eager, intent gaze, as if already catching sight of the 
 Bridegroom, in the distance, while her whole sovd goes out 
 to meet him : yet, with a tender, unfailing charity, she 
 touches her sleeping sister as she passes her by, loth to go 
 without a last attempt to waken and warn her. Her face 
 is so full of earnest impulse, and her figure of airy motion,
 
 SHILOH. 353 
 
 that she seems actually stepping forth from the canvas 
 ah ! if I could only fasten her upon it ! " 
 
 " You will do it some day," said I ; " for the conception 
 is too beautiful to be lost." 
 
 Then, he set before us a female head, saying simply, 
 " The Call." 
 
 It was not needed. The fair, listening face, slightly 
 raised ; the eyes, gazing intently in the direction of the 
 voice just heard, and recognized; told their own story, 
 and told it so well that we looked and listened, too. 
 
 The next was also a head, '.' Repose." I had not looked 
 at it*" many moments, when, with the fine, quick insight 
 which belongs to the true artist, he laid it aside, saying, 
 
 " You do not care for it, I see. Yet artists rate it higher 
 than the other. They account it a tolerable success in the 
 department of color." 
 
 " I do not care for color, unless there is a soul a signi- 
 ficance under it," returned I, with more frankness than 
 courtesy. 
 
 Mr. Cambur turned a surprised face upon me, and his 
 eyes lit. " Not care for color!" he exclaimed, "why, it 
 is the darling child of light, the very crown and glory of 
 the material universe. To be consistent, he who does not 
 care for color should not care for light ; since, as color 
 without light is impossible, so light without color would 
 be unendurable. Color is to the eye what tone is to the 
 ear ; capable, in its combinations, of the most varied and 
 exquisite harmony. Color is the most vivid of all the 
 ideas that make up my conception of heaven. It is never 
 the form of the holy city the new Jerusalem, descending 
 fromGod which enraptures my imagination, but its in- 
 effable, entrancing glory and magnificence of color; the 
 yellow gleam of its golden streets, the fadeless green of its 
 tree of life, the dazzling whiteness of its gates of pearl, the 
 myriad changeful hues of its walls of precious stones -jas- 
 per, sapphire, jacinth, amethyst, and all the shining gems
 
 .354 siiiLoir. 
 
 between, lit by the glory of God, and radiating colors too 
 gorgeous for mortal vision. What endless joy for the eye 
 is stored up in that splendor and opulence of color ! Take 
 it away from the inspired description, and see how much of 
 the charm is fled ! " 
 
 " True," said I. " But what if the color were only a 
 thin crust of paint ? " 
 
 He stared, uncomprehending. He had entirely lost 
 sight of the point where the discussion began. Recol- 
 lecting himself, after a moment, he said, with a good- 
 humored laugh, 
 
 "Upon my word, I had quite forgotten that unlucky 
 picture of mine ; do not set down my rhapsody for a tilt 
 in its defence. I am not such a fool as to attempt to argue 
 with the feeling stirred by my pictures, be it indifference or 
 dislike. Artists, as well as authors, must take such measure 
 of appreciation as is vouchsafed them, and be thankful. In- 
 appreciation " He hesitated. 
 
 " They can attribute to ignorance," said I, laughingly 
 finishing the sentence. 
 
 " ~No not always. Oftener, it is the offspring of a lack 
 of sympathy with their mood or intent. The worst of it 
 is, the critic himself seldom recognizes it for that. Instead 
 of saying, ' This picture does not suit me,' he pronounces, 
 ' It is good for nothing.' The first he has an xindoubted 
 right to say, anywhere, of anything ; the last he should be 
 careful of saying unless he is reasonably certain that his 
 disapprobation has its deep foundation in the immutable 
 laws of life and art, and not in mere individual taste. But 
 here is something, Miss Frost, which perhaps will please 
 you better." * 
 
 He held up a pencil-sketch, the first rough jotting-down 
 of his ideas for a picture of Faith and Guidance. It repre- 
 sented a young girl, walking meekly along a narrow path, 
 lit, for a few footsteps in advance, by the small, bright 
 flame of a lamp in her hand. Beside her, but unseen, a
 
 SHILOH. 355 
 
 watchful, protecting angel walked, too ; whose white wing, 
 pointing upward into the sky, cast a deep shadow across 
 her brow and eyes. 
 
 The artist gave the sweet key-note of the sketch, by 
 saying, quietly ; " I suspect that many of our trials are 
 but the shadows of angels' wings." 
 
 My eyes filled with sudden tears. If we could always 
 think that, how much easier to bear the trial ! 
 
 This sketch interested me most of all, partly on ac- 
 count of the beauty and pathos of the subject ; and partly 
 because it still glowed with the fire of inspiration, bringing 
 the spectator closer to the heart and imagination of the 
 artist than the picture to be elaborated from it would ever 
 do. For this was genius in its first fervent heat, its swift 
 moment of effervescence ; unadulterated by any colder or 
 staler mood ; full of the animating power of a single, earn- 
 est thought. It affected me so deeply that I turned away, 
 not caring to see anything more. Here was the gospel 
 the good word for which I had come hither. Leaving Mr, 
 Cambur explaining another sketch to Ruth, I walked away 
 toward the window. 
 
 But, as I went, my skirt caught on one of the unframed 
 canvases standing against the wall, and threw it down, face 
 upward. I stooped to pick it up, and, involuntarily, my 
 gaze fastened upon it. 
 
 It was an exquisitely lovely female head ; the features 
 pure and delicate, the coloring rich and soft. But its chief 
 charm was in the expression of the face, an earnest look- 
 ing forth, blended with something of solicitude, something 
 of hope, something of submissiveuess, all held together in 
 that fine equilibrium so essential to a work of high art. 
 
 " This is the best thing I have seen yet," said I. "What 
 do you call it?" 
 
 "It is called " the artist hesitated long, and the word 
 seemed to be drawn forth, by Truth, from some exceeding 
 deep well, where it would fain have hidden itself " "Wait- 
 iris."
 
 356 SHILOH. 
 
 " For what is .she waiting ? " I asked, after a pause. 
 
 " For whatever you please," returned he, smiling. " I 
 have long since learned that the interpretation of my pic- 
 tures varies with the eyes and the moods that look upon 
 them. They never tell exactly the same story to any two 
 persons, the details differ, if the substance is identical." 
 
 I continued to survey the picture attentively. Sud- 
 denly, the mystic chord of association stirred within me. 
 " ' Waiting ! '" I exclaimed, giving Mr. Cambur a surprised 
 look, " why that was the subject of Harry Archum's last 
 picture, the one which has been so favorably " I stopped, 
 confounded. I had just discovered the initials, " H. B. A.," 
 painted, artist-wise, in one corner of the canvas. 
 
 " Yes," replied Mr. Cambur, in a slightly constrained 
 tone ; " this is a copy" of that. He painted it for me." 
 
 Involuntarily, I glanced at "The Call," and was at 
 once struck by the great similarity of style and treatment 
 in the two pictures. Impossible to believe that they had 
 not been conceived in the same imagination, and executed 
 by the same hand. The first breathing of an odd suspicion 
 went through my mind. He colored ; his quick perceptions 
 detected it at once. 
 
 Ruth, less interested in the " Waiting," had gone back 
 to the " Foolish Virgin," and was studying her attentively. 
 The artist drew near to me. 
 
 " Can you keep a secret ? " he asked, in a low voice. 
 
 " I can keep my own secrets," I answered, lightly, " and 
 I recommend others to do the same, except where intimate 
 friendship warrants or enjoins their disclosure." 
 
 He drew himself up. " You wish me to understand that 
 you are not my friend," said he. 
 
 " Well, perhaps not in the closer and truer sense, that 
 is. Not enough your friend to have any good claim upon 
 your confidence ; yet too much your friend to listen to any 
 forced, unpremeditated revelation, of which you might re- 
 pent to-morrow."
 
 SHILOII. 357 
 
 " Pardon me, but it was not so much confidence as 
 explanation that I was about to offer you." 
 
 " Believe me when I say that I do not need it. Know- 
 ing that you are Harry Archum, and remembering how 
 highly my father thought of you, I am satisfied that your 
 motives for your present incognito are good, or, at least, 
 innocent." 
 
 He looked down on me, gravely smiling. " Trust with- 
 out friendship ! " said he, musingly, " well, it is better 
 than friendship without trust." 
 
 " Friendship, Mr. Cambur, is generally of slow growth ; 
 trust is often intuitive, and springs up in a moment." 
 
 " In some cases, friendship is partially the offspring of 
 the will," he replied. " Miss Frost, just now you alluded 
 to your father. You do not know how strongly I was 
 attached to him, nor with what good reason. He it was 
 who when I sank down, bewildered, speechless, before the 
 mighty tide of art that swept over me on my arrival in 
 Rome ; crushed with the sense of my own littleness and 
 feebleness, and wondering that I had ever dared to call 
 myself an artist, he it was who lifted me up and gave me 
 new hope and confidence. He first spoke to me words of 
 kindly, intelligent, discriminating praise. I vowed to my- 
 self that I never would forget it, and I never have forgotten 
 it. It so happened that I was in Florence at the time of 
 his death, or I should have been at your side, caring for 
 him as a son, for you as a brother. He went so suddenly, 
 at the last ! I did not even know that he was gone, \intil 
 you had left Italy. I returned to Rome, to find only a 
 vacant place, where I had always before found ready sym- 
 pathy, wise counsel, seasonable encouragement, a cordial 
 welcome. And, for his sake, you see, do you not ? that I 
 must needs be his daughter's friend, whether she will be 
 mine, or no. My willing service, my faithful regard are 
 always at her disposal. Whenever she needs them, she has
 
 358 SHILOH. 
 
 but to reach out her hand, and take them up. They will 
 be ready for her." 
 
 My eyes were fast filling with tears. Seeing them just 
 ready to fall, he gave my hand a gentle, sympathizing pres- 
 sure, and, with instinctive delicacy, went to join Ruth. 
 
 As for me, I sat down and settled accounts with my 
 pride. For it was that which had repelled the artist's con- 
 fidence. It had haughtily declined to listen to any confi- 
 dential communication from Harry Archum which was not 
 spontaneous, but merely forced out by circumstances. In 
 return, he had heaped coals of forbearance and generosity 
 on its head. I need not say that I found no balance in its 
 favor ! 
 
 In a few moments, Ruth came toward me, with an ap- 
 pealing look. 
 
 " Mr. Cambur asks if I am ready to sit," said she. 
 " Won't you come ? " 
 
 The necessary arrangements were quickly made, and 
 the sitting began. 
 
 For a time, I sat and watched the twain. They made 
 a pleasing picture, in 'the artfully arranged lights and 
 shadows of the studio ; the absorbed and delighted artist, 
 standing at his easel ; the beautiful sitter, blushing beneath 
 his intent gaze. I wondered if the opening chapter of a 
 pleasant little romance might not be shaping itself before 
 my eyes. What more could an artist need or ask than 
 to have that surpassingly lovely face always at his side, for 
 inspiration, model, comfort, blessing ? 
 
 Then, as R\ith grew to be more at ease in her position, 
 and began to respond to the artist's efforts to engage her 
 in conversation, I went and sat down before the " Wait- 
 ing," letting it sink into my heart. Ah, Francesca ! if I 
 could but look forward to my future in just the spirit which 
 softens and beautifies that face !
 
 XXXIII. 
 
 THE UNOPENED LETTER. 
 
 URING the few weeks past, some of the 
 hitherto disconnected threads of this nar- 
 rative have become curiously entangled. 
 It is typical, perhaps, of the way in which 
 lives and characters, apparently the most 
 remote, will be found to have been intimate 
 in relation and recipi-ocal in influence, when 
 the day of knowing as we are known shall 
 enlighten ou.r souls. 
 
 To make you understand it all, I must 'go back to a cer- 
 tain morning near the end of August. What a morning 
 it was ! There had been a shower in the night, and the 
 earth still fair with undimmed summer greenness and 
 glory seemed as daintily fresh and sweet as a newly- 
 washed babe. The sight stirred Mrs. Prescott's instincts 
 of neatness into renewed activity. Soon after break- 
 fast, . I heard her energetic footsteps overhead in the 
 garret, mingled with enlivening sounds of brushing 
 and scrubbing; and the staircase was quickly monopo- 
 lized by a procession of brooms, dustpans, mops, pails of 
 water, etc., of which Alice acted as the unwilling marshal. 
 A little later, I heard the busy household reformer's voice 
 projected from the garret Avindow toward Mrs. Divine at 
 the well-curb. 
 
 " You have no idea, mother, how nasty this garret is ! 
 I shouldn't suppose it had had a thorough cleaning out
 
 360 sniLon. 
 
 since the year One. The dust is half an inch thick under 
 the eaves, and there's cobweb enough hanging from the 
 rafters to make a carpet for the floor, if 'twas all spun and 
 wove ! " 
 
 " Um ! " returned Mrs. Divine, in a tone to indicate that 
 her mind was busy with some other subject, and declined 
 to qui^ it for the consideration of the one thus brought to 
 her notice. 
 
 " For my part," pursued Mrs. Prescott, seeing that no 
 further response was to be hoped for, and with a slight ac- 
 cession of sharpness in her tone, " if there's anything I 
 like, it's to be clean. I can't abide nastiness. I don't 
 mean to wallow in the dirt till I'm buried in it. And 
 that's the worst thing about being buried, to my mind ; I'd 
 rather be burnt up, or dissolved in a barrel of aqua fortis." 
 
 " Priscilla," remarked Mrs. Divine, mildly, yet not 
 without a certain decision in her tone, " the garret's clean 
 enough for my purpose, just as 'tis ; if it ain't for yours, 
 you've got the privilege of scrubbing it till it's suited to 
 your mind. But don't expect me to bother about it ; I've 
 got my soap to attend to, which you use up faster than I 
 can make it. I reckon dirt is only one of the miseries that 
 Eve brought on us by eating the apple, and I don't mean 
 to spend all my strength in fighting that, so I shan't have 
 any to bring to bear on the rest. When the earth gets too 
 filthy for decent folks to live in, perhaps the Lord'll be 
 good enough to send another deluge, and give it a good 
 washing out." 
 
 " He's more likely to send a fire," rejoined Mrs. Pres- 
 cott, grimly. " And that reminds me, there's the greatest 
 lot of old, useless trumpery up here that was ever got to- 
 gether ; if I had my way, I'd make a bonfire of it. I can't 
 think what you're saving it all for ! Do let me clear some 
 of it out ! " 
 
 Mrs. Divine quickly let go the dripping bucket, and 
 mounted the stairs, in terror for the safety of her cherished
 
 SHILOH. 361 
 
 accumulations. Some of that " trumpery," doubtless, was 
 yery closely entwined with her heart-strings. Time, while 
 making it vulgar, dingy, and ridiculous to others, had 
 apotheosized it to her sight. Moreover, it was better than 
 a chronological table of her life. 
 
 At the foot of the garret stairs she stopped, as if struck 
 by a sudden thought, and called out to me ; "Miss Frost, 
 if you've a mind to step up garret a minute, I guess I can 
 show you something that'll interest you. There's a whole 
 secretary full of curiosities up there, that brother Horace 
 brought home from sea." 
 
 The secretary proved to be a time-battered combination 
 of desk and bureau, such as was in vogue a century ago, 
 minus two claw-feet, half the brass rings that did the duty 
 of modern knobs, and the lid which had .been converti- 
 ble into a writing-table. The top was composed of the 
 oddest little drawers and pigeon-holes ; enough, it would 
 seem, hopelessly to confuse the memory of whoever sought 
 to make use of them ; even a ghostly owner (and it must 
 have had more than one) would need all his spiritual attri- 
 butes to discover in which of them he had deposited his 
 mortal secrets. Altogether, it looked just fit to be the re- 
 pository of the curious medley stored within it, shells, 
 corals', uncut gems, coins, medals, buckles, amulets, seeds, 
 Aveapons, African fetishes, and whatever of rare or curious 
 the deceased captain (who appears to have had a very 
 pretty taste in such matters) had been able to pick up dur- 
 ing his lifelong employment, in one capacity or another, in 
 the merchant service. Many an odd or obsolete knick- 
 knack, for which a virtuoso would give half his fortune, 
 was here hidden ; and likely to remain so till the dry- 
 rotted rafters overhead should fall and bury them in their 
 ruins. 
 
 I was vainly trying to pick out and comprehend the 
 curiously-recondite stitch of a piece of Fejeean embroidery, 
 while listening to Mrs. Divine's animated rendition of an 
 16
 
 302 SHILOH. 
 
 odd legend attached to it ; when she "broke off abruptly, 
 and uttered an exclamation that instantly drew my atten- 
 tion. She was holding a letter up to the light a large, 
 thick letter, written on a sheet of extraordinary size, and 
 folded and sealed as was customary before envelopes came 
 into use. The paper was yellow as parchment, and the 
 seal was unbroken. 
 
 " If that don't beat all ! " she cried. " Here I've found 
 a letter stuck fast in the crack between the back and the 
 bottom of that drawer; and the direction is in Horace's 
 handwriting ; and it's never been opened ! And he died 
 fifteen year ago, last spring! Can you make out that 
 direction, Miss Frost? My spectacles don't seem to see 
 quite so well as they used to." 
 
 I took thft letter, and read, " Frederick Thorne, Esq., 
 No. 49 Street, New Orleans." 
 
 " Why, that's stranger yet ! " exclaimed she, staring at 
 me in great amaze. "That must be Mrs. Thome's hus- 
 band, who died eight or ten year ago, at least, and I 
 never heard Horace mention his name, and didn't suppose 
 he knew him ! A letter from a dead man to a dead man, 
 and the seal never broke it's not quite comfortable ! " 
 And Mrs. Divine looked around as if she half-expected one 
 or the other of the interested parties to gather up his bones 
 and his ashes, and whatever shadowy habiliments came to 
 hand, and come forth from the dimmest corner of the ecarret 
 
 ' O 
 
 to claim his forgotten property. 
 
 " What's the use of wasting so much time on the out- 
 side?" demanded Mrs. Prescott, impatiently. "Open it, 
 and see what is in it." 
 
 Mrs. Divine looked at her, meditatively. " I don't fed 
 certain I've got any right to do that," she answered slowly ; 
 " I reckon Mrs. Thorne or Rick's got the best right to open 
 Mr. Thome's letters." 
 
 " Nonsense ! " exclaimed Mrs. Prescott, " when the 
 person the letter is written to, is dead, it's always sent 
 back to the writer."
 
 SHILOH. "363 
 
 " When he's alive," returned Mrs. Divine, " but, you 
 see, Horace ain't. And it's beat into my mind, somehow, 
 that he never wrote to Mr. Thorne, except on Thome's own 
 business. And I don't feel no call to pry into that man's 
 affairs, dead or alive." 
 
 Mrs.- Prescott launched another suggestion. " Most 
 likely Horace concluded not to send it, after 'twas writ- 
 ten." 
 
 Mrs. Divine gave it a momentary consideration, and 
 shook her head. " If he had, he would have destroyed it. 
 No, no, Priscilla ; either he thought 'twas sent ; or he was 
 taken away before he had a chance to send it. You re- 
 member he died on a return voyage, within sight of port." 
 The matter was finally referred to Uncle True. Having 
 turned the letter over and over, spelled out its address, 
 weighed it on his palm, and balanced it on his forefinger, 
 the wood-pile philosopher decided thus : 
 
 " If a man's doin's died with him, and was buried five 
 foot under ground, as he is, the best thing to do with such 
 a letter as this, 'ud be to put it right inter the middle of a 
 good, hot fire, and look t'other way while the ashes was 
 agoin' .up chimney. But we're all links in a chain, and it 
 don't do to let go of one on 'em till it's hitched on to an- 
 other. A man's papers gen'rally does that. There's one 
 chance to nine that this letter was meant to do suthin' o' 
 that sort. And we mustn't send that chance a scurryin' 
 up chimney in smoke. Put on your bonnet, Hannah, and 
 go up to Mis' Thorne, and you and she open the letter to- 
 gether." 
 
 Mrs. Divine looked, aghast. " Land sakes ! I can't 
 do any such thing ! I'm right in the thick of soap- 
 making." 
 
 " Wall, send Priscilly, then." 
 It was Mrs Prescott's turn to demur. 
 " What ! and leave all that muss on the stairs and up 
 garret ! Not for forty letters ! I shan't stop and dress up
 
 SIIILOII. 
 
 till I'm through, and that won't be before night. Besides, 
 I don't know Mrs. Thorne, and I don't want to." 
 
 Mrs. Prescott, be it understood, is not one whit less fas- 
 tidious about her acquaintance, in her own way, than Mrs. 
 Thorne herself. 
 
 There was a moment of perplexed silence. Curious as the 
 party undeniably were, their curiosity was not to be gratified 
 at the expense of personal integrity, nor of household order. 
 
 " Well," said Mrs. Divine at last, " it must wait till to- 
 morrow, then." And she turned slowly away. 
 
 Uncle True looked dissatisfied, and scratched his head 
 reflectively. " It strikes me that a letter that has waited 
 fifteen year to be opened, has waited about long enough," 
 said he. " News and peaches often spile by keepin' just a 
 leetle too long. I'd go up thar myself, only my old chair 
 ain't able to travel quite so fur. Perhaps Miss Frost 'ud do 
 it, now; she's allers obligin'. Besides, she knows Mis' 
 Thorne. She'd do up the bus'ness right, and bring us hum 
 a full report." 
 
 And as this plan seemed best to .satisfy the homely up- 
 rightness of the parties, leaving a way open for the speedy 
 gratification of curiosity, or interest, without interfering 
 with the day's labors, it was decided xipon. 
 
 I found Mrs. Thorne in her old place, at her old occupa- 
 tion. She listened to my communication attentively, and 
 then fell into a fit of profound thought ; apparently she 
 was digging deep into her recollections, and weighing the 
 letter's possibilities with extreme care. Rousing herself, 
 she took up her work again, with something like a sigh, 
 and said wearily ; " It is probably some unimportant mat- 
 ter of business. Mr. Thorne was once, for a short time, 
 in a shipping house. Oblige me by opening the letter and 
 reading it aloud." 
 
 To enable you to understand its contents better than I 
 did, I give you, in advance, the explanations with which 
 Mrs. Thorne favored me after the reading.
 
 SHILOH. 3G5 
 
 When she married Mr. Thorne, he was the presumptive 
 heir of his uncle, Marcus Thorne, a moderately wealthy and 
 immoderately eccentric bachelor. The marriage, however, 
 or the bride, or something, for she did not make this point 
 qxiite clear, so displeased the uncle as to cause a partial 
 estrangement; which continued, with little diminution, 
 till her husband's death. Up to this period she believed 
 that the old gentleman had contemplated no other disposal 
 of his property; but after that event she had heard of his 
 making some efforts to learn the fate or the whereabouts of 
 one Cyrus Thorne, an elder half-brother of her husband, 
 who had put the seal to a reckless youthful career by com- 
 mitting some petty crime, and then running off to sea; 
 since which time he had never been heard of, and was be- 
 lieved' to be dead. Nothing came of them, however, and 
 Mrs. Thorne had quietly settled down to the belief that her 
 son's prospects were bright and sure ; when, two or three 
 years afterward, Marcus Thorne went to his kindred dust. 
 The reading of his will disturbed that conviction. After 
 providing for Rick's college expenses, and naming a certain 
 sum to be paid to Carrie on her wedding-day, or, failing 
 that, on her twenty-fifth birthday ; it left the bulk of his 
 property in trust for Cyrus Thorne, or his heirs, who were 
 to be sought for with all speed and diligence. Whenever 
 undeniable evidence of their death was forthcoming, it 
 might be divided between Rick and Carrie in proportions 
 specified by the will; an instrument inspired, it would 
 seem, partly by a latent affection for the runaway, and 
 partly by a bitter determination that none of his property 
 should ever pass into Mrs. Thome's possession. 
 
 Twelve years had elapsed. Cyrus Thorne, or his heirs 
 were still to be heard of, and Mrs. Thorne had grown old 
 in suspense, longing, resentment, and despair. 
 
 Imagine, then, how her eyes first gloomed, and then 
 sparkled, as she listened to Captain Hart's letter, which 
 was long, and which I epitomize for you.
 
 366 SIIILOH. 
 
 The honest seaman wrote that he believed it to be his 
 duty to inform Mr. Thome that, in a small seapoi-t of South- 
 ern Italy, into which he had been driven by stress of weather ; 
 he had encountered a pale, sombre, consumption-stricken 
 man, who had made himself known to him as Cyrus Thorne. 
 He had with him a child, a motherless girl, his love for 
 whom seemed to be the sole sentiment of. his waning life ; 
 and whose future engrossed his thoughts. Would Captain 
 Hart touch there on his return ? If he were still alive, lie 
 would embark with him for America ; if not, he would find 
 the child at his lodgings, witli full poAvers and instructions 
 for conveying her to her relatives. 
 
 The Captain did " touch," and was greatly shocked to 
 learn that Cyrus Thorne had died very suddenly of hemoi'- 
 rhage within a few days of his departure. So suddenly, 
 indeed, that he had had no opportunity to give any direc- 
 tions concerning the child ; and her nurse had finally sur- 
 rendered her to the charge of an American gentleman, who 
 had stopped in the town for a few days with his family ; and 
 whose interest in the orphan was, doubtless, heightened by 
 the fact that his own little daughter was about the same 
 age. He had promised to find out her friends, if possible ; 
 if not, to take kind care of her future. But the nurse went 
 on to state that the party went up to Sondrio, and that she 
 had learned through a friend employed as a servant in the 
 principal inn that the child had sickened and died there. 
 To enable Mr. Thorne to satisfy himself of the truth of this 
 story, Captain Hart had taken pains to find out, by dint of 
 patient inquiry in the town, that the said gentleman was 
 
 from Philadelphia, and that his name was . But here I 
 
 was completely at fault. The Captain's hand was crabbed 
 and difficult enough, in straightforward sentences; and 
 names, to which the context gives no clue, are always most 
 puzzling in manuscript. By dint of united effort, we made 
 out the Christian name to be Chester ; but the surname was 
 absolutely undecipherable. Mrs. Thorne thought it looked
 
 SHILOH. 8G7 
 
 something like Sanford ; so it did* but between the " some- 
 thing like" and identity was a sufficiently wide margin. 
 
 She gave up the perplexing study, and rose with a 
 dawning triumph in her eyes. " You will leave me this 
 letter ? " she asked. " It will be wanted in evidence. Rick 
 and I shall set out for New Orleans to-morrow." 
 I assented. 
 
 " And Rick," she went on, as if unable to suppress her 
 growing exultation, " Rick will have his rights, at last ! 
 He ought to have had them before, but it is not yet too 
 late. He has not yet learned to have a will distinct from 
 his mother's." 
 
 She thought only of Rick Carrie was forgotten ! Or, 
 it might be truer to say, she thought only of herself. In 
 Rick's good fortune she saw but her own elevation to 
 wealth, position, power. What an utter dislike I felt for 
 her, as I listened ! And Mala told me decidedly that, 
 however glad she might be for Carrie's, or even for Rick's 
 sake, she shoiild have chosen to be the bearer of such 
 tidings to anybody on earth rather than Mrs. Thorne. To 
 which Bona replied, quietly, that that was, perhaps, the 
 very reason why I had been selected for the office. 
 
 " Read that ! " continued Mrs. Thorne, possessed by the 
 restless, garrulous spirit of excitement, and thrusting an 
 open letter into my hand, " read that, and see What I have 
 had to endure so long ! Mr. Paul Venner will write me no 
 more such letters, I fancy ! " 
 
 I glanced at it mechanically, intending to push it aside, 
 and remained staling at the open page in amazement. I 
 forget the contents, a curt intimation that Rick's expenses 
 must be diminished, I think, but the handwriting was to- 
 tally unknown to me not a familiar line nor letter in it 
 anywhere. I could not help saying : 
 
 " This is not Paul Venner's writing it must be that of 
 some clerk." 
 
 " It is his, unquestionably," she replied, bitterly. " I
 
 368 SHILOII. 
 
 have good reason to know it well. It first made me ac- 
 quainted with the fact that, instead of being left with a 
 comfortable support, I had almost nothing ; and I have 
 often watched Mi % . Venner write while he was drawing up 
 papers for me to sign." 
 
 I went home bewildered. Is Paul Venner so altered, 
 then, that even his handwriting partakes of the change? 
 But what is it to me ? 
 
 It is curious to note how quickly, when one link of the 
 solution' of a mystery is found, others start up to complete 
 the chain. Near the church, I met the artist. Something 
 moved me to tell him the strange story to which I had been 
 listening. 
 
 " What did you say was the nurse's name ? " he asked, 
 when I had done. 
 
 "Paola Valpino." 
 
 "Then I can tell you just where she is to be found. 
 Doubtless, her deposition will have to be obtained. She 
 left La Pizzo years ago, and, on account of some family 
 difficulties, took good care to leave no trace behind her. 
 
 She had charge of the house in the Via del , at Rome, 
 
 where I had my studio ; and she once told me this very 
 story, that is to say, what she knew of it." 
 
 My report elicited not a few exclamations of wonder, on 
 my return home. Mrs. Divine stared at me alternately 
 over and under her spectacles, as it went on ; and did not 
 bethink herself that it would be easier to take them off, 
 until it was finished. Then she remarked : 
 
 " Well ! I certainly didn't think that Priscilla was about 
 any special business of the Lord's, when she went to clean- 
 ing that garret ! And if I hadn't taken it into my head to 
 show you Horace's curiosities, that letter might have lain 
 there another fifteen year ! I'll never think anything is of 
 no consequence again ! " 
 
 " Umph ! " said Mrs. Prescott, drily, " the next time the
 
 SIIILOH, 369 
 
 Lord sets us to find anybody's fortune in our garret, I hope 
 it'll be our own ! " 
 
 " Fortune," observed Uncle True, " is a word I ain't 
 partial to. It's so apt to get a ' mis ' tacked on to the fust 
 end on't afore you know it ! If the Lord ever uses it 
 which I doubt, I'm sartin He never applies it to houses, 
 nor lands, nor bank-stock. I reckon your an' my fortunes, 
 Priscilly, '11 never be found in the garret, unless we take 
 to keepin' our Bibles an' sayin' our prayers thar ! " 
 
 That afternoon, I sent the address of Paola Yalpino, so 
 unexpectedly obtained from the artist, to Mrs. Thome ; and 
 felt that my part in the affair was ended. 
 16*
 
 XXXIV. 
 
 DAIST. 
 
 ^ the following day Mrs. Thorne left for 
 New Orleans. I told myself frankly that I 
 was glad she had gone. There ai'e some 
 I S^^^T naturcs the association with which tends inevit- 
 \ ''Qwfft^' ably to debasement, a lowering of the moral 
 tone, and a darkening or obliquation of the 
 moral vision. It must be a strong mind, a 
 tenacious idiosyncrasy, a most alert and \inyield- 
 ing will, that can long endure their contact without deteri- 
 oration. I had learned to dread Mrs. Thome's. There 
 was some dull, remote chord in my heart that seldom failed 
 to acknowledge the subtle power of her influence, by giv- 
 ing forth a harsh and discordant sound. I breathed freer 
 therefore, in knowing that influence would be felt no more. 
 The temporary twisting of our life-threads was over ; here- 
 after each would be spun separately to its end. She would 
 not return to Shiloh until after my departure ; or she would 
 only come to gather up such of her personal effects as were 
 worthy of ti'ansferring to another and a different sphere. 
 Four or five days afterward, Mr. Divine having kindfy 
 placed the " woman-horse " (the current phrase for an ani- 
 mal suited to feminine use), and the small top-buggy (a 
 recent purchase), at my disposal, I set forth alone, purpos- 
 ing to call upon Mrs. Danforth, shop a little at Clay Corner, 
 and visit the railway station in search of a package of 
 music, etc., to be sent me by express.
 
 SIIILOH. 371 
 
 Mrs. Danforth came first in order. . After we had dis- 
 cussed various affairs of the Sewing Society, and arranged 
 for a full report of its acts, to be read at the next meeting, 
 as the speediest and most effectual way of causing certain 
 grumblers to regale themselves in the fashion known as 
 " eating one's own words,"^the stream of her talk began 
 to eddy around various points of personal or family history, 
 of no special interest to me. I waited absently, therefore, 
 for a gap in the narrative through which I might civilly 
 take my leave, when a name, carelessly tossed upon its sur- 
 face, caught my attention. 
 
 " I beg your pardon, but of whom were you just now 
 speaking ? " 
 
 " Of Chester Danforth, my husband's brother." 
 
 A fac-simile of that illegible name in Captain Hart's 
 manuscript, stereotyped on my memory by a long process 
 of patient study, instantly rose before me. Danforth 
 Chester Danforth ! certainly ; how blind I was not to have 
 seen it before ! 
 
 "Do you know if he was ever in the south of Italy?" 
 I asked. 
 
 "To be sure he was, as we have sorrowful cause to 
 remember. He lost his only child there by the malarial 
 fever." 
 
 " Ah, indeed ! how very sad ! " returned I, mechanically, 
 too intent upon my own train of thought 'to give much 
 heed or sympathy to the event. " Did you ever hear of 
 his having taken an orphan girl under his charge at La 
 Pizzo ! " 
 
 " Why, yes, of course. It was Pearl more's the 
 pity!" 
 
 " And she died soon after at Sondrip ? " 
 
 f * Died 1 good gracious, no ! She is very much alive - 
 vather too much so, all things considered ! '' 
 
 My surprise verged upon incredulity. " Dq I under- 
 stand you to say," I asked, with very distinct and deliber-
 
 372 SHILOH. 
 
 ate emphasis, " that the orphan girl of whom Mr. Chester 
 Danforth took charge at La Pizzo, in the year 18 , lived, 
 and is still alive ? " 
 
 " Exactly," replied she, nodding her head. " She is 
 called Pearl Danforth, and I have the inappreciable honor 
 to be her aunt by adoption. Chester failed in every attempt 
 to find out her relatives ; and was glad to fail, I suppose, 
 for he and his wife had become so attached to her in the 
 year and a half that they had her with them in Europe, 
 that it would have been like losing a second child to have 
 given her up. So, finally, they adopted her formally a 
 hazardous proceeding, I think, with a strange child, for you 
 cannot tell what sort of blood it may have in its veins, nor 
 in what unpleasant shape it may manifest itself. Pearl, 
 certainly, has some very queer drops in hers. She grew up 
 a strange, self-willed, erratic creature, as innocent to out- 
 ward appearance as a child, but in reality as cool and subtle 
 and slippery as quicksilver. Chester had hard Avork to 
 keep her in order, at the last ; and after he died, her moth- 
 er that is to say, Chester's wife could not control her at 
 all ; since then she has taken her own course pretty much. 
 She consorts chiefly with spirit-rappers, clairvoyants, 
 short-skirted Bloomerites, long-haired philanthropists, and 
 the like ; she even professes to be a remarkably good me- 
 dium (of the Old Nick, I grant !) herself, and can tip 
 tables and spell out unmeaning sentences by the slow half- 
 yard with the best of them, when she likes ; in short, she is 
 up to all manner of mischief, and keeps her poor mother in 
 constant dread of what she may do next." 
 " Can you tell where she may be found ? " 
 "Well, no, not precisely; nobody ever does know just 
 where Pearl is to be found the most unlikely spot you can 
 think of is apt to be the one. Nevertheless, there is no 
 difficulty in finding her when you want her ; she is the sort 
 of person easy to be traced. She always leaves a dozen or 
 two of dazed individuals along her track, staring after her,
 
 8HILOH. 373 
 
 open-mouthed and bewildered, and only too glad to get 
 a listener to all the strange things they have to tell of her. 
 But what, may I ask, do you know of her, or of Chester ? " 
 
 I hastily turned the matter over in my mind, and de- 
 cided that it was necessary to acquaint Mrs. Danforth with 
 the finding and the contents of Captain Hart's letter, 
 which I did as briefly as possible. She threw up her hands, 
 when I had done, with an odd, deprecatory gesture. 
 
 " So the little witch is to be an -heiress, and more inde- 
 pendent than ever !" exclaimed she. "Between you and 
 me, a fortune could scarcely have tumbled into a more pre- 
 posterous spot. Don't you think we should be justified in 
 suppressing the fact of . Pearl's identity with Cyrus 
 Thome's supposed-to-be-dead child, and leaving Rick and 
 Carrie in the enjoyment of the property ? I really believe 
 they have the best right to it." 
 
 I scarcely heard her. I was picturing Mrs. Thome's 
 disappointment, and striving to look a little way into the 
 dusk of her children's future. 
 
 " I see we are to do right, though the heavens fall," 
 laughed Mrs. Danforth, construing my silence into disap- 
 proval of her mock-earnest pi-oposition. " Well, then, it 
 becomes my duty to inform Pearl of this odd turn in her 
 affairs ; -and you, I siippose, will do as much for Mr?. 
 Thorne." 
 
 The suggestion was like the firm grasp of a policeman 
 upon an escaped convict's shoulder. It was a positive des- 
 pair to be thus forced back into a distasteful atmosphere, 
 just as I was congratulating myself upon breathing it no 
 more ; and into a new and inauspicious connection Avith an 
 affair that I had believed to be, so far as I was concerned, 
 happily concluded. And Mala did not scruple to question 
 the wisdom of the providence by which I was alternately 
 made to appear as the good and the evil genius of a per- 
 son with whom I should be best pleased to have nothing 
 to do.
 
 374 SHILOH. 
 
 " Let the matter alone," was her final advice, " and 
 leave Mrs. Thorne to be notified of Pearl's claim, in due 
 time, by Pearl's lawyer." 
 
 But Bona would not permit me to act upon it. She 
 averred that the blow would fall somewhat less crushingly 
 upon Mrs. Thorne, if dealt before she had time to settle 
 herself firmly into the belief that Rick's claim was beyond 
 all question. She reminded me that my antipathy to her, 
 and my tendency toward uncharitable judgment, in her re- 
 gard, should make me only the more solicitous to fail her 
 in no ordinary kindness ; in short, she made her quiet 
 voice so persistently heard through Mala's murmurs and 
 sarcasms, that I was forced to sit down to Mrs. Danforth's 
 desk, and scribble a hurried note to Mrs. Thorne, through 
 the house of " Venner & Co.," for I knew no other way 
 of reaching her. And I left it at the post-office on my way 
 to the station. 
 
 I arrived at the latter spot just as the up-train was 
 leaving. The little bustle occasioned by its departure was 
 all over w T hen I came out of the express oifice, and most 
 of the arrivals had been borne off by the various vehicles 
 in waiting. A single figure was pacing impatiently up and 
 down the platform. As it turned round, I found myself 
 face to face with Rick Thorne. 
 
 Our greeting was cordial and unembarrassed. In that 
 first moment, I think neither of us remembered precisely 
 how we had parted. 
 
 " I thought it most likely that you had gone to New 
 Orleans with your mother," said I. 
 
 " To New Orleans ! " he repeated in surprise. " Is 
 mother gone to New Orleans ? What on earth has taken 
 her there ? " 
 
 " Then you did not see her before she went ! " I ex- 
 claimed, amazed that Mrs. Thorne should have taken the 
 matter so completely into her own hands, as she appeared 
 to have done.
 
 SIIILOH. 
 
 375 
 
 " No. She came to Haventon, it is true, a clay or two 
 ago ; and I understand she made a regular fuss because I 
 was not there, and they couldn't tell her where I had gone. 
 I I" 
 
 Here his self-possession quite forsook him, and a flush 
 rose to his brow. It was only for a moment. 
 
 " What is the use of mincing matters ? " he went on, 
 with a quick return of his old, easy, engaging frankness ; 
 " I am married, Miss Frost." 
 
 No doubt I opened wide eyes of wonder at him. The 
 scene in " The Bower " came back upon me, now, vividly. 
 I was provoked at myself that it caused a momentary pang. 
 I had no mind to furnish a confirmation, in my own person, 
 of the sneering assertion that no woman likes to see a 
 man's affections transferred from herself to another, even 
 though they may have given her pain rather than pleasure ; 
 yet from whence came that swift throe, if not fi-om 
 wounded vanity ? Or, was its deeper root in the sudden, 
 flitting vision of my own lonely future which rose before 
 me, as he spoke ? Yet what right have I to assume that it 
 will be lonely ? God's spirit, working in and through my 
 prayerful efforts, is able to^rowd it with peace, joy, use- 
 fulness, blessedness. 
 
 " Allow me to be the first of your Shiloh friends to con- 
 gratulate you," said I to Rick, quickly recovering myself. 
 " Is your aunt expecting you ? " 
 
 " No, I believe not. The truth is, my wedding was a 
 very sudden affair ; the fruit of a hasty impulse-, but a 
 good one, I hope. I met her that is to say, my wife 
 only a month ago, when I was in a wretched, despondent, 
 gloomy state (I need not tell you the reason why), and she 
 contrived to diffuse some sunshine through it, in such a 
 miraculous way, that I was grateful, of course ; and grat i- 
 tude turns easily to love, you know. Then she was in un- 
 comfortable leading-strings, subject to the control of cer- 
 tain people who were not at all in sympathy with her, and
 
 376 SHILOH. 
 
 who were continually checking her bright, beautiful im- 
 pulses, and clipping the wings of her fancy ; and I saw her 
 so unhappy under it all, that I could not help marrying 
 her, just to set her free. I supposed mother would be 
 rather angry at first, but I knew I could coax her out of it. 
 And there was not time to write and consult her about it." 
 
 The frank, easy, kind-hearted, inconsiderate, infatuated 
 fellow ! I hoped his wife had brought somewhat more of 
 that uncommon commodity known as common sense into 
 the sudden partnership than he had done. 
 
 " And now," he concluded, " let me take you in and 
 introduce you to her." 
 
 I ceased to marvel at Rick's infatuation when a dainty 
 little creature, half-asleep in the dingy waiting-room, lifted 
 her picture-like head, with its great mass of golden curls 
 and its innocent, wondering blue eyes, and smiled up into 
 his face. But what a child ! What a pair of children ! 
 What would become of them ! Had Providence gracious- 
 ly gifted them with some sparrow-like instinct, by the help 
 of which to seek their food and build their nest, as an off- 
 set to their scanty stock of human reason ! And what 
 sort of mercy might this soft? dove expect at the angry 
 talons of Mrs. Thome ! Poor, bitter, disappointed, Mrs. 
 Thorne ! 
 
 Mrs. Rick received me w r ith the air of a childish prin- 
 cess, quiet, grave, slightly tinged with shyness, yet without 
 awkwardness or confusion. She replied to my congratu- 
 latory remarks appropriately enough, answered the ques- 
 tions I addressed to her, and left the rest of the conversa- 
 tion to Rick and myself. 
 
 A small boy, a rickety wagon, and a horse capable of 
 serving every purpose of a skeleton without taking the 
 trouble of dying, shortly appeared at the door, and termi- 
 nated the interview. With a laugh at the style of his 
 equipage, the only one he had been able to procure, dnd 
 a seriously expressed fear that the horse would be " off his
 
 SHILOH. 377 
 
 legs " before they could reach Bryer Farm, Rick tossed in 
 his trunk, handed in his bride, took his small driver on his 
 knees, and set forth through the sunshine toward Shiloh. 
 
 An hour afterward, having finished my shopping and 
 turned my face homeward, I came upon them midway be- 
 tween Clay Corner and Hope Plain, where the loneliness 
 of the road is not tempered, for more than a mile, by any 
 dwelling. The horse had been loosened from the wagon, 
 and was panting under a tree by the wayside ; Rick stood 
 looking at him with a serious face ; his wife sat in the 
 wagon, unruffled and observant ; and the small boy was 
 making much ado of crying, with his dirty fists in his eyes. 
 " What is the matter ? " I asked, drawing up beside the 
 party. 
 
 " The matter is that this miserable beast is completely 
 knocked up with old age, or starvation, or hard work, or a 
 mixture of the three ; it would be a kindness to knock him 
 in the head and put him out of his misery. I've a great 
 mind to do it. Be off, you young rascal, and tell his mas- 
 ter to come and look after him, if he's got a master. It's a 
 question whether he'll have a horse when he gets here, and 
 may he never have another ! " 
 
 There was a short consultation. It ended in Rick's 
 placing his bride in the empty seat of my buggy, to be 
 conveyed to Bryer Farm ; while he turned back on foot in 
 search of a team to bring on his trunk and himself. 
 
 My passenger sat silent, stealing occasional glances at 
 me from under her long eyelashes ; doubtless, she was em- 
 barrassed by the novelty of her position. To set her at 
 ease, by diverting her thoughts into a familiar channel, 
 I inquired what place she had been accustomed to call 
 home ? 
 
 " Philadelphia." 
 
 " Ah ? I have many acquaintances there. Do you know 
 the Maxwells or the Lightfoots ? " 
 
 " No. I know the Heavyheads very well."
 
 378 SHILOH. 
 
 I looked at her face. It was perfectly simple and seri- 
 ous, without a sign of having intended a witticism in it 
 anywhere. Repressing a smile at the odd, but, as it ap- 
 peared, fortuitous, conjunction of names, I said : 
 
 " Would it be an impertinence to ask what name you 
 have exchanged for that of Thorne ? I may know some 
 branch of your family." 
 
 " My name was Dorn Daisy Dorn." 
 
 " A dainty name for a dainty lady," I thought, but not 
 aloud. Truth to tell, I did not seem to " get on " with 
 Rick's wife. The child-like sweetness and simplicity of her 
 manner was slightly iced with a hauteur that seemed ab- 
 surdly out of place there. It occurred to me, finally, that 
 the congelation might be due to her knowledge of Rick's 
 former sentiment toward me, and I gave "Racer" a hint 
 to trot faster. 
 
 Not until I drove through the great gate of Brycr 
 Farm did I realize what an awkward mission had been forced 
 upon me to bring home Rick's unheralded, unlooked-for 
 bride; and Rick himself nobody knew where. I sent an 
 anxious glance down the long vista of the road, but he was 
 not in sight. 
 
 " Wiil you go in ? " I asked, hoping, and, indeed, fully 
 expecting, that the small creature beside me would beg to 
 remain in the carriage until he should appear ; but she 
 only put forth her fairy-foot, and alighted, as easily as a 
 bird might have done, on the porch. And Miss Bryer, 
 warned of my arrival by some domestic scout, was already 
 opening the door, with the pair of idiots at her back. Not 
 until she had ushered us into the parlor, and cast several 
 curious, questioning glances at my companion, did I ven- 
 ture upon an explanation. Taking Mrs. Rick's hand in 
 mine, in the belief that a friendly, sympathizing touch 
 would be helpful to her in her trying position, I said: 
 
 " Miss Bryer, I bring a new claimant for your love. 
 Rick expected to have had the pleasure of presenting her
 
 SIIILOH. 379 
 
 to you himself, but a provoking, though harmless, accident 
 has detained him on the way hither. He is quite well, and 
 will soon be here. Meantime, he sends you, by my hands, 
 his wife." 
 
 "Hands his wife! hands his wife!" echoed the half- 
 wits, rapturously. Miss Brycr seemed turned to stone. 
 
 " Who's there ? " suddenly called Dr. Bryer's harsh 
 voice from the farther door. And after a moment he add- 
 ed, impatiently, " Thunder and lightning ! why don't you 
 answer ? " 
 
 Thus adjured, Miss Bryer found tremulous voice. "I 
 don't know I believe Miss Frost says it's Rick's wife." 
 
 " Rick's knife," said the old man, sharply, " he's always 
 losing something. Did that young woman find it ? Oh ! 
 there's Miss Corse. How do you do, madam ? " 
 
 I threw a compassionate glance at the bride, whose 
 home-coming was so strange and so forlorn. Pier expi'es- 
 sion confounded me. Its innocent serenity was undis- 
 turbed : she stood looking on as at a spectacle in which 
 she had no concern. Yet, for one brief instant, I seemed 
 to catch a swift gleam of the eyes, a slight compression of 
 the lips, indicating that she was not so totally unmoved 
 as she appeared. I seemed to discover that the. glances 
 sped sidewise from under her long eyelashes, were cool, 
 keen, subtle, comprehensive ; noting every detail of the 
 scene, penetrating the thoughts and analyzing the charac- 
 ter of every actor therein. I seemed to see that she was 
 at once observant, amused, contemptuous, and guarded. 
 
 I say, seemed, for, the next moment, meeting her clear, 
 childlike eyes turned full upon me, I felt that I had been 
 under a delusion. 
 
 " I am sorry Carrie is not in," said Miss Bryer, address- 
 ing her new niece, in a trembling voice and with evident 
 effort ; " she would make it more pleasant for you. She 
 would not be so much overcome by " The quivering 
 voice broke down completely.
 
 380 SHILOH. 
 
 " Then Carrie did not go with her mother," said I, think- 
 ing that the conversation would flow more smoothly on the 
 level of the commonplace. 
 
 * " No : she is only gone to one of the neighbors. I ex- 
 pect her in, every minute." 
 
 The information settled a difficulty for me. Since meet- 
 ing with Rick Thorne, I had been disturbed by a suspicion 
 that it was my duty to make him acquainted with the cause 
 and object of Mrs. Thome's journey to New Orleans, and 
 the discovery of Cyrus Thome's daughter ; and so save 
 him from the trying alternations of elation and disappoint- 
 ment which had befallen his mother. But it was not a 
 pleasant task to tell a newly made bridegroom, in the 
 presence of his bride, that his expectations of future wealth 
 were cut off; neither was it a moment to ask for a private 
 interview. The thought of Carrie made my way clear be- 
 fore me : I determined to tell her the facts, and leave her to 
 communicate them to Rick. 
 
 It happened that the brother and sister met at the gate, 
 and walked up the lane together. His story _was told, 
 therefore, and her surprise partly over, before they joined us. 
 Their coming was a relief to us all. Rick was so easy, gay, 
 and unembarrassed, and Carrie so unaffectedly glad of a sis- 
 ter-in-law, that the atmosphere grew light and bright at once. 
 
 Very soon, I drew Carrie aside. She listened to my 
 statement with a gentle surprise. 
 
 "Mother did not tell me that she felt at all certain 
 about it," said she, simply. " She only said that there was 
 a little more hope of Rick's getting the property." 
 
 I was unfeignedly glad to hear it. I trusted that reflec- 
 tion had made Mrs. Thorne somewhat less sanguine, and 
 that the edge of her disappointment might be proportion- 
 ably blunted. 
 
 Charging Carrie to put Rick in possession of the whole 
 story, before he chanced to hear the first part of it only 
 from any other quarter, I took my leave.
 
 A VISIT TO THE CITY. 
 
 | HE next morning, I started for New York, tak- 
 ing Ruth Winnot with me. Thus it came 
 about. 
 
 Ruth's progress in music has more than justi- 
 fied my anticipations. Exercises and studies 
 that were Hills of Difficulty and Sloughs of 
 Despond to me, in the earlier stages of my musi- 
 cal pilgrimage, she cleared almost at a bound. 
 I was delighted, and told her so frankly, even enthusiastic- 
 ally. By and by, she grew careless. Content to read aL- 
 most by instinct and to execute easily, she neglected to 
 understand how and wherefore she did so. The faint 
 dawning of conceit showed itself, not directly manifested 
 to me, but by many subtile channels of look and tone. I 
 had praised her too much and made her way too easy. 
 
 Then, without preparation or warning, I threw her into 
 the thick of musical difficulties. I brought forth my old, 
 grand songs and interminable studies, sang some of them 
 to her, and gave her a lesson upon one or two others. She 
 began in confidence and ended in confusion. She blundered 
 and floundered through her hours of practice, and came to 
 her lesson with a most dissatisfied and anxious face. She 
 received plenty of criticism, and no word of praise. The 
 criticism was repeated, in nearly the same words, at every 
 succeeding lesson. At the fourth repetition, Ruth's head 
 went down upon the piano, and sobs brake forth. I in- 
 quired, composedly enough, what was the matter ?
 
 382 SIIILOII. 
 
 " I never can do that in the world ! It's of no use to 
 try ! " she sobbed out. " After all, I am no singer. I have 
 got to the end of my powers ; I cannot go a step further. 
 It is all dark to me ! And yet, only a little while ago, the 
 way was so easy and plain ! What does it mean ? " 
 
 " It means," answered I, drily, " that I am not like 
 Providence." 
 
 She lifted her head and looked at me w T onderingly. 
 
 " Because Providence, Ruth, rarely gives to us more 
 than just that moderate and judicious degree of encour- 
 agement which serves to keep us in the humble and indus- 
 trious exercise of our best powers, knowing that more would 
 tend to pride and carelessness, as less does to discourage- 
 ment and despair. Whereas I, having unwisely begun 
 by giving you too much, was forced to balance matters by 
 giving you none at all. Having made your way too easy, 
 at first, the only alternative was to make it too difficult, 
 at last, so as to teach, you that it was necessary to take 
 heed to your steps." 
 
 " I see," she returned, moiirnfully, " I was doing in earn- 
 est what I once prophesied that I should do, in jest, I was 
 getting conceited. I fancied that I had but little, if any- 
 thing, more to learn, and that I could learn it without effort. 
 Forgive me ! I will not be such an idiot again ! Sill," she 
 added, sighing, " I do not see, now, how I am ever to learn 
 that exercise ! " 
 
 " Neither do I, until you have been over some prepara- 
 tory ground. We will return to the point w r here your way 
 ceased to be easy, and work up to the exercise by degrees. 
 By that time, I suspect that most of its difficulties will 
 have disappeared." 
 
 " And all this time has been wasted ! " she exclaimed, 
 dolefully. 
 
 " Not so, Ruth, if it has taught painstaking and humil- 
 ity to genius. Without the latter, it can achieve but little ; 
 without the former, it can achieve .nothing worthily."
 
 SHILOH. 383 
 
 Thenceforth, her progress was sure as well as swift. 
 Every day seemed to add something to the compass or the 
 beauty of her wonderful voice. Its rare quality and rich 
 resources became continually more apparent. So much so 
 that I had a fit of humility, one day, and doubted if I were 
 really competent to train and develop so exquisite an organ. 
 To settle the doubt, as well as in the hope of getting 
 more light on the question of Ruth's future, which begins 
 to press upon me, I addressed a letter to my old teacher, 
 Signer Canto. It brought me an answer, highly compli- 
 mentary and encouraging, so far as concerned my qualifica- 
 tions for teaching, and closing as follows, in the Signer's 
 customary Italian-English : " When you can teach the 
 Signorina no more, bring her to me. If she be the prodigio 
 of genius that you believe, it shall please me much to help 
 her to perfect and make fruit of her talent. Voices supe- 
 riores are few; if you have found one, you have rare good 
 fortune, it must never be lost to the world for want of cul- 
 tivamento." 
 
 I showed the letter to Ruth. Her eyes sparkled at 
 first, then she grew thoughtful. After a moment, she 
 said, "It is very nice, only I am afraid he would expect 
 me to go upon the stage. I could never do that, you 
 know." And she made a silent gesture toward her feet. 
 
 " For other reasons, too, I hope, Ruth. The stage is no 
 place for a Christian woman, such as I trust you will be. 
 The* choir of the church, and, perhaps, the platform of the 
 concert-hall, will give ample scope for all your talent, and 
 not take you on dangerous ground." 
 
 She shook her head., " Not the latter, you forget " 
 And she gave another expressive downward look. 
 
 " No, I do not forget. Only, I do not recognise that as 
 an insuperable obstacle." 
 
 She gazed long and earnestly in my face. Suddenly, 
 she threw herself down at my side, hid her face on my 
 shoulder, and burst out with
 
 384: SIIILOII. 
 
 " Tell me, Miss Frost there is no one else that I dare 
 ask, it would be so hai'd for my mother to say ' no ' to me ! 
 tell me, is it not possible to have them straightened ? " 
 
 I was deeply moved ; there was so much pent-up suffer- 
 ing and desire in the tone. " I do not know, indeed, dar- 
 ling. Certainly, it would involve a fearful amount of 
 pain." 
 
 " I don't care for that ! I would bear anything every- 
 thing only to be made straight. Oh ! how often I dream 
 that I am so ! that Christ, passing by, turns his soft eye 
 on me, and says, ' Be healed ! ' And then to wake, and 
 find it only a dream, and that I am crooked still ! Ah ! 
 you don't know what that is, Miss Frost ! " 
 
 The result of this conversation was that Ruth and I 
 made a flying .visit to New York. First, I took her to the 
 distinguished surgeon, Dr. Heartwell, my father's life-long 
 friend. He gave her a rapid, but searching examination. 
 This was his decision : 
 
 " Your medical adviser, at home, was right. I have 
 reason, every day, to know that my brother practitioners 
 of the country are not so far behind us of the city as their 
 patients are apt to imagine. Although there is not a single 
 sign or symptom of disease about you, and you may live as 
 long, under favorable conditions, as the majority of the 
 human race, or even longer ; yet your constitution is too 
 delicate, your nerves too sensitive, to justify our undertak- 
 ing the operation. If done at all, it should have been 'done 
 earlier. Still not to leave you to the gnaAving tooth of a 
 miserable ' might-have-been ' I tell you frankly that I 
 question if it could ever have been done safely." 
 
 Then the kind old man, the practised Healer, learned in 
 medicaments for the soul as well as for the body, laid a 
 fatherly hand on Ruth's head. " After all, my child, it is 
 not so serious a matter. You have yotith, health, beauty, 
 and, as Winnie tells me, talent. Why seek for more ? Few 
 have so much. And all of us have some crookedness, of
 
 SHTLOH. 385 
 
 mind, or soul, or body, never to be quite straightened in 
 this life ; perhaps that we may the more ardently desii'e 
 the life in which all crooked things are to be made straight, 
 and all dark things plain. If your crookedness is "only of 
 the body, you have more reason to rejoice than to be sor- 
 rowful." 
 
 If Ruth was disappointed, she was also tranquilized. 
 Hope, suspense, and longing, were alike at an end. She 
 knew her ground. And the old man's reassuring words, 
 and benignant manner, were not without their effect. 
 
 Then I took her to Signor Canto. He listened to her. 
 with an ecstatic admiration that continually leaped over 
 the narrow limits of his slow English into enthusiastic 
 Italian. " Of course, she had much to learn, and he could 
 see that she was learning it," with a low bow to me, " but 
 her voice, it was magnified, sopra ogni cosa above every- 
 thing that he had imagined ! It was superba, maravigli- 
 osa, wonderful." 
 
 Then he said to me, in Italiap, " Something must be 
 done for her feet. She would make her fortune and yours 
 and mine, too on the operatic stage." 
 
 " It cannot be, signore" 
 
 " It must be. Take her to a surgeon." 
 
 " I have just done so. He does not advise it." 
 
 " Take her to another. Some one will be^ found to ad- 
 vise it." 
 
 " And kill her ! I beg to decline. Besides, neither Miss 
 "Winnot nor I like the idea of the stage." 
 
 He made a grimace. Then he besieged Ruth. Uncon- 
 sciously, the kind-hearted, enthusiastic little man played 
 the part of Satan in the wilderness, and played it well. He 
 held fame, wealth, admiration, power, before her dazzled 
 eyes. Paradoxical as the statement may seem, her crooked 
 feet enabled her to stand firm. For a moment, I was glad 
 she had them. With her rare, exquisite beauty, and her 
 marvellous voice, what temptations, what dangers, what 
 17
 
 386 SHILOH. 
 
 downfalls may they not have saved her from ! They were 
 God's visible protection around her the pillar of cloud 
 that was shade by day, and light by night. 
 
 At last, he gave up the vain attempt. " It is a thousand 
 pities," he said, dolefully. " Such a career as you could 
 have ! Still, we have the concert, the oratorio, the Church 
 service ; we must make ourselves content. When will I 
 have the honor to count you into my pupils, Miss "Win- 
 not?" 
 
 I remained in the city two or three days, in order to 
 give Ruth a glance at some of its lions ; Uncle John being 
 only too glad to have us impart even a transient home- 
 aspect to his great, empty house, and very fertile in ex- 
 pedients for keeping us there. The business-mist did not 
 once envelop him during our stay. He was greatly charmed 
 with Ruth ; and she was soon quite as much at ease with 
 him as his own children ; for him, she put on her brightest 
 face and sang her sweetest songs. 
 
 When " she returned i-o Shiloh, it was plain that the trip 
 had done her good. The city accustomed to all sad and 
 forlorn eights, and keenly appi'eciative of beauty had 
 scarcely noticed her feet, but had gazed admiringly in 
 her face. She had met many strangers and not one rebuff. 
 She had gained in confidence and in spirits.
 
 XXXVI. 
 
 THE TEUTH AT LAST. 
 
 N" the afternoon of the day of my return 
 from New York, I met Mrs. Danforth at 
 the Sewing Society. She soon took occasion to 
 lead me into a room apart. 
 
 " Well ! " she began, " I wrote to Pearl, or 
 rather, to her mother, and she wrote back that 
 Pearl was away visiting, and she had immedi- 
 ately forwarded the letter. Probably Pearl has 
 received it, by this time, and I shall soon hear how she takes 
 it. By the way, I hear that Rick Thorne is married, and 
 that you had the honor of carrying home the unexpected 
 bride. How does she look ? Is she pretty ? " 
 " Very pretty a perfect little fairy." 
 " Where does she hail from ? " 
 " Philadelphia." 
 
 " Indeed ! I have a large acquaintance there. What 
 is or what was her name ? " 
 "Daisy Dorn." 
 
 Mrs. Danforth gave me one look of unqualified amaze- 
 ment. Then, she dropped into the nearest chair, and burst 
 into a long, loud, ringing laugh, yet a laugh that I never 
 quite like to hear, because much too broad and noisy for a 
 woman. 
 
 "I do not see the joke," said I, rather severely. 
 " Don't you ? My good gracious ! it is too rich ! Daisy 
 Dorn is " and she went off into another peal.
 
 388 SIIILOH. 
 
 I waited in silent disapproval. 
 
 "Is is," she went on, catching her breath hysterically, 
 " goodness alive ! she is Pearl Danforth ! " 
 
 " Impossible ! " I exclaimed. " That child ! " 
 
 " Child ! " cried Mrs. Danforth, fairly screaming with 
 mirth. " Bless your simple soul ! she was of age two years 
 ago. And she has the brain of a Machiavelli under those 
 yellow curls of hers. I'll bet on her against Mrs. Thorne, 
 two to one." 
 
 " But her name Daisy Dorn." 
 
 " You persistent sceptic ! Her name is Margaret : of 
 course she is entitled to all its variations. Chester called 
 her Pearl, because, as he said, he had picked her up on the 
 seashore. She assumes the others as the fit takes her 
 Daisy, Madge, Greta, and I don't know what not. Lately, 
 too, she has taken a fancy to resume the name of Dorn, 
 the name her father bore in Italy, and the only one Chester 
 knew anything about ; no wonder he never found her 
 friends ! " 
 
 " And it is the German for Thorne ! " said I. 
 
 " Exactly. The affair grows clearer every moment, you 
 sec." 
 
 " And Rick will get the property after all ! " 
 
 " Umph ! that's as Pearl pleases ! She is of age, you 
 know. Perhaps he will get as much of it as is good for 
 him ; he certainly will not get any more. He will find that 
 his wife has a will of steel under her soft, cushiony exte- 
 rior. By the way, I wonder what possessed her to marry 
 him ! I always thought her on the look-out for a rich hus- 
 band, to be sure, she can afford to mai'ry whom she 
 pleases, now; but then, she did not know it when she did 
 the deed ! Can she really have fallen in love with his 
 handsome face, and married him with her eyes shut to 
 everything else, silly-girl fashion ? " 
 
 Remembering a look that she had given her husband, 
 as he entered the depot, and another in the Bryer's parlor, 
 I averred that I thought she had.
 
 SHILOII. 389 
 
 " Then," said Mrs. Danforth, " I should not wonder if 
 she macle him an excellent wife. She has brains enough 
 for both ; and artfulness enough to keep his simple head 
 from suspecting half the crooks and corners of hers. She 
 will manage him wholly, without his knowing that she does 
 it. She will seem as transparent as a meadow-brook, when 
 she is as deep as the sea. The more she loves him, the less 
 will she allow him to see her as she is, that is, until the 
 softening influence of wifehood and motherhood have made 
 her nearer to what she should be." 
 
 " And you call that an excellent wife ! Poor Rick ! " 
 
 Mrs. Danforth looked really abashed. " Miss Frost ! " 
 she exclaimed in a deprecating tone, " you surely know 
 that I was not speaking abstractly, but relatively, for the 
 present occasion. I do think that Frederick Thorne, with 
 his temperament and characteristics, might have done much 
 worse than to marry Pearl. For, after all, she is eccentric 
 and secretive, rather than wicked. She is such a consum- 
 mate actress, by nature, that she cannot help playing a 
 part ; and, loving her husband, she will play that of a good 
 wife to perfection. Besides, I meant to imply, in the con- 
 cluding clause of my unlucky speech, that I thought her 
 likely to change very much for the better, in due time. 
 But, my dear Miss Frost ! pray do not think that I have no 
 higher standard of womanhood than that ! none higher 
 than I had when I came to Shiloh, three months ago ! Is 
 it possible you do not see that I am trying to lead a little 
 higher life myself, even though I do still talk and perhaps 
 act carelessly, that being the 'natur of the critter,' as 
 the farmers say ? " 
 
 She ended " 'twixt a smile and a tear." My own eyes 
 grew dim. I had seen the change in her though far too 
 subtile a thing to define in words and rejoiced at it. I 
 told her so, earnestly. 
 
 " As the angels in heaven do over a sinner that repent- 
 eth ! " said she, with the same mixture of mirth and seri-
 
 390 SHILOH. 
 
 ousness; which, I have learned, she uses instinctively as a 
 mask to her deeper feelings. " Perhaps you'll never know, 
 till you get there, how much you have had to do with it. Sun- 
 day School teachings sometimes rebound from the children 
 and hit the parents. Seeing Gordon and Effie so earnestly 
 trotting and tumbling heavenward, under your guidance, 
 I could not well help asking myself whither my own 
 ways tended. You may be sure that it has taken some of 
 the conceit out of me, to find that what I did so unwil- 
 lingly, as a great favor to you and a wonderful condescen- 
 sion to the Sunday School cause in Shiloh, turns out to 
 have been, humanly speaking, the salvation of my children 
 and myself. To be sure, I was a Church member before, 
 and active enough in Church work, after my fashion ; 
 but I suspect I had as little of the Christian spirit as any 
 Hottentot." 
 
 I was dumb. Never did I feel so humbled. It was so 
 plain to me that it was not " I," weakly and wearily oscil- 
 lating between Bona and Mala, but the grace of God, that 
 had done it ! Mrs. Danforth had been very far from my 
 thoughts, in my Sunday School work. 
 
 She wiped her eyes, and recurred to the preceding topic. 
 
 " I suppose ! must go and call on Pearl," said she, 
 " though she doesn't deserve it. To think that the little 
 minx should have gone sti'aight past my door with you, 
 and not have stopped ! not even long enough for that 
 sorely tried husband of hers to come up. But it is just 
 like her ! I know she enjoyed her sudden, single-handed 
 descent upon those startled Bryers a great deal better than 
 any more commonplace introduction. She fairly luxuri- 
 ated in that absurd scene. Well ! I will go and see her 
 this evening, and tell her of her good fortune, if such it is 
 to be called." 
 
 The next morning, Mrs. Danforth knocked at the open 
 door of the out-room, where Ruth and I were seated at the 
 piano.
 
 SIIILOH. 391 
 
 " I thought I would just stop in and tell you that I 
 found only an empty nest," she said, as we shook hands. 
 " The bird is flown." 
 
 " What who ! " I asked, bewildered. 
 
 "Who? Pearl Daisy Mrs. Frederick Thorne. I 
 have just come from the Bryers ; I did not go up there 
 last night, I had a sick headache. Meanwhile, Carrie had 
 made Rick a statement of facts, as you requested her to do. 
 He imparted them to his wife. The name of Chester Dan- 
 forth made the whole thing clear to Pearl's very quick 
 comprehension. Finale: she and Rick started for New 
 Orleans at six o'clock this morning. Son voyage ! "
 
 XXXVII. 
 
 THE BUMMER'S WOKK. 
 
 | HE summer is* fast gliding by a summer of 
 some pleasure, of more labor, of multiply- 
 ing interests, of much that has left a rich 
 residuum of experience in the depths of my 
 heart. It has made life's purpose and signifi- 
 cance clearer to me. It has taught me that, as 
 our nature is constituted, and under its present 
 conditions, we are made more contented, as well 
 as wiser, by a due admixture of sorrow and disappointment 
 in our earthly cup. The life that is rightly lived, groAvs 
 richer by its losses and gladder through its tears. Not only 
 "knowledge," but joy, "by suffering entereth." So long 
 as we make earthly happiness an end, and seek it directly, 
 we are certain to miss it, and to be continually chilled and 
 soured and disappointed thereby ; but as soon as we make 
 up our minds to do without it, and put submission, useful- 
 ness, an earnest striving after holiness, in its place, we are 
 apt to find it quietly waiting upon them, as their humble 
 handmaiden. 
 
 So much of truth has the summer broiight to me in its 
 gliding by. Let us see what it has brought to others, for 
 it lias suffered none of the persons left behind by these 
 chronicles to stand quite still. 
 
 Alice Prescott took to the study of Italian as a bird to 
 the air. So far, the poet's dower is hers she has the gift 
 of tongues.
 
 SIIILOII. o;);j. 
 
 Moreover, the readings long ago inaugurated have been 
 quietly educating her taste, and deepening her thought. 
 For her sake, I have made frequent selections from the 
 poets, and accompanied the reading thereof with copious 
 commentary, analysis, and criticism. I left these to do 
 their silent work. That they did it I knew well, not only 
 by frequently surprising Alice with a pencil and a scrap 
 of paper in her hands, and the pleasant trouble of poetic 
 travail in her face; but by seeing the same scraps thrust 
 silently and despondently into the kitchen fire. It was 
 long ere I put forth a hand to save one of these frof- 
 doom. 
 
 " I hope I Jiave your permission to read this," said 1; 
 when I had done so. 
 
 " If it were worth reading, I would have brought it to 
 you unasked. Do not mortify me by looking at it ! " 
 
 " Is it lately written ? " 
 
 " Oh, no ; I wrote it more than a fortnight ago." 
 
 " Did it not seem worth reading to you, then ? " 
 
 " Ah ! yes, everything does, at first. But, in a few 
 days, all the flavor, all the life, have gone out of it. It is 
 wishy-washy, and sickens me ! It is cold and dead, and 
 chills me ! I hasten to put it out of my sight." 
 
 " That is to say that the inevitable moment of doubt, 
 discouragement, and disgust, which comes to every worker 
 for Art, be it painter, sculptor, or poet, comes also to you. 
 It may be that it is the moment wherein his late standard, 
 well-nigh reached, begins to mount higher ; it may be the 
 one which first reveals to him that the fairest, subtlest 
 graces of his spiritual ideal are not to be embodied in color, 
 marble, or rhythm. Still, that moment of disgust is not 
 the time to judge fairly of the work done. Leave the 
 decision to me whether this deserves the flames, or no." 
 
 " Not that," she exclaimed hurriedly ; " let ipe bring 
 you something I wrote this merning." 
 
 " Which has not yet lost its flavor ? No, thank you.
 
 394: SIIILOH. 
 
 My praise, if I have any to give, will seem fearfully cold 
 to that birth-warai effusion. While my criticism will not 
 hurt this one nearly so much." 
 
 Her reluctance continued, and seemed so disproportion- 
 ate to the occasion, that I was first puzzled, then half-vexed. 
 Seeing that, she yielded at once, and sat with a downcast 
 face and deeply-suffused cheeks, awaiting the result. 
 
 Of course, I expected to see " Lines to " something, 
 summer, autumn, a cat, a flower, on the death of a friend, 
 or some one of the hackneyed themes of youthful rhymers. 
 What I actually saw, therefore, astonished me not a little. 
 The verses had no title, and they ran thus : 
 
 " I have locked my heart, and I give you the key. 
 Throw it, I pray you, into the sea, 
 It's of no use to you, and still less to me. 
 
 " None shall come after you into that door, 
 None after you, and you enter no more ! 
 Let the dust gather on ceiling and floor. 
 
 " Let the dim ghost of our dead love all night 
 StaHc through the empty rooms, bare of delight, 
 Smell the brown roses that once were so white. 
 
 " Let it count over 'mid silence and dearth, 
 Hopes that once laughed in the glow on the hearth, 
 Snows that have chilled both the flame and the mirth. 
 
 " Then, when the dawn o'er the hilltops doth peep, 
 Back to its grave let it silently creep, 
 Grave that the slow years dig ever more deep ! " 
 
 The cause of Alice's reluctance was at once made clear 
 to me. For a moment, I felt a flush on my own cheek. 
 By means of that marvelous intuition of hers, she had ar- 
 rived at some conception of the sort of chill and torpor that 
 had fallen on my heart, and given it voice, in my stead. 
 Strange that the poet's insight can almost dispense with
 
 SHILOH. 395 
 
 experience ! That a slender New England girl, hid away 
 in the quietest corner of a quiet town, with no personal 
 knowledge of love, and quite innocent of its heartache, 
 should write such a sombre, hopeless, death-scented lyric as 
 this, was indeed a marvel ! 
 
 I read it twice or thrice, partly to get rid of my self- 
 consciousness, partly to qualify myself for judgment. 
 
 " Well, Alice," I said, at length, " you need not burn 
 this, and you may go on rhyming." 
 
 She looked at me with a slow, tremulous joy dawning in 
 her blue eyes. Yet the mute gaze seemed to ask for some- 
 thing more. To gratify it, I went on : 
 
 " Your verses are better than I expected. They are 
 simple and unpretending, and, therefore, do not greatly 
 challenge criticism. I .am glad to observe that you avoid 
 false rhymes and mixed metaphors, and that a distinct line 
 of thought is traceable throughout. This is something 
 much, in so young a poet." 
 
 Her face grew radiant, but her questioning look did not 
 change. What an unerring instinct the girl has ! 
 
 " If you really crave a little criticism," said I, smiling, 
 " here it is ! The last line is not quite smooth." 
 
 " Ah, yes ! I know it," she replied. " But how else am 
 I to get both the thought and the rhyme ? " 
 
 " There, I suspect, is the poet's woi-st difficulty," said 
 I. " To make sense and rhyme perfectly harmonious, so 
 that neither warps nor constrains the other ; to manage 
 both so artfully as to make it appear that the thought could 
 in no otherwise be so well and adequately expressed ; that 
 must give him his hardest labor. But I should really like 
 to know what is the poet's process, Alice." 
 
 " I do not know if I can tell you," she answered, slowly. 
 " With me, it seems like a remembering rather than a mak- 
 ing. My verses come to me precisely as you recall a half- 
 forgotten poem or song. Whole lines and stanzas start up 
 in my mind, without the least effort ; but here and there
 
 396 SHILOH. 
 
 are gaps which it is hard to fill. In vain I try to remember 
 what belongs in them; the missing line or phrase hovers 
 about the outer edge of my mind, but cannot be coaxed 
 within it. It is only after long trial that I can fill up these 
 gaps, at all ; and the interpolation always has the air of a 
 patch over a hole in a garment, at least, to me." 
 
 She then brought mo her morning's production. It 
 proved to be better than this, after all, more original, and 
 with a stronger, sweeter flow. It is too long to copy, .but 
 
 it can be found in the August NO. of the Magazine. 
 
 For, after Alice had copied it in her best hand (and it is not 
 the least of her literary qualifications that she writes one 
 which it is a pleasure and not a penance to read), I sent it 
 to the editor thereof, whom I happen to know slightly, 
 bespeaking for it a more prompt apd careful examination 
 than is usually vouchsafed to the production of an un- 
 known author. Two or three days brought back a letter, 
 saying that he would be " happy to hear from her again ; " 
 and enclosing a sum which filled Alice with shy, crimson 
 delight, and made Mrs. Prescott hold up her head as high 
 as if she had received the first instalment of an ample and 
 certain fortune. 
 
 But Alice's literary path was not always to run thus 
 smooth. Her second venture was " declined, with thanks ; " 
 it was "too grave for our columns," (which means simply 
 that it was devotional), would she " try again ? " She did 
 try again, and her article was accepted; but not without a 
 warning that it was below the mark of the first one, duly 
 emphasized by a much smaller enclosure. Her rejected 
 "Hymn" which was really the best of the three finally 
 found a place in the columns of a religious weekly ; at a rate 
 of compensation so low as to leave no question whatever 
 about the comparative values of religion and non-religion 
 in the literary market ; nor any shred of doubt in which 
 branch of the trade a neophyte's talent would be best re- 
 warded that is, so far as earthly remuneration is concerned.
 
 SIIILOII. 397 
 
 And this brings Alice's intellectual history up to the 
 present point. As for her emotional one, that lies, for the 
 most part, beyond my ken. Not that she is deliberately 
 secretive ; but she is naturally reserved and likes little to 
 talk about herself; easier for a deep, shadowy, enclosed 
 well to turn itself into a running and sparkling brook than 
 for Alice to assume the openness and communicativeness of 
 Ruth. Her natural channel of expression is her pen ; that 
 suffices her for interpreter and confidant. 
 
 Of course, this summer of constant association has knit- 
 ted Alice, Ruth, and myself very closely together. Any 
 picture of me, at this epoch, would be incomplete without 
 one or both of them at hand, looking up to me with an 
 affection that is half worship. I get even a little .too much 
 of their society, and am often oppressed by their reveren- 
 tial regard. It may be morally good for one, but it is none 
 the less wearisome to fallen human nature, to be compelled 
 to live always t the height of some loving, worshipping 
 friend's ideal. Often I feel an insane impulse to do some- 
 thing unredeemably weak or wicked, just to cast my image 
 down from that uncomfortable and insecure elevation, and 
 give it leave to stand, henceforth, upon the lower earth, 
 among its kind. I am withheld therefrom by no selfish 
 considerations of loss of power or prestige, but by an intu- 
 itive knowledge that both these simple, loving souls would 
 seem to see, in its downfall, the entire universe tumbling 
 backward into chaos. In life's earlier years, as I have sore 
 reason to know, it is a serious matter to lose one's ideals. 
 With them the fair structure of faith crumbles to dust. 
 The whole moral world falls, seemingly, into irretrievable 
 ruin. Its foundations heave and gape beneath our feet; its 
 sky crashes down upon our heads, w r ith fearful and start- 
 ling effect. All that was worthy of reverence has hopelessly 
 gone to rack, we think, as we struggle forth from the ruins, 
 stunned and bewildered. It may be years before we find 
 out the scarcely less bitter, if more wholesome, certainty
 
 398 SHILOH. 
 
 that it was only an unfounded, illusory fabric of our own 
 creation which fell, and that the fair temple of Truth, with 
 its immutable foundations in Goodness and Right, was in 
 nowise involved in the crash. 
 
 To be sure that crash must come to Ruth and Alice, 
 sooner or later, but woe to him by whom it cometh ! To 
 escape which malediction, I go on teaching, moralizing, sug- 
 gesting, encouraging, according to the established routine, 
 and striving to keep my interests and sympathies unflag- 
 gingly up to their work, in spite of the inevitable loss of 
 their first fresh impetus, till I can recover it by a temporary 
 withdrawal and rest, things indispensable, it would seem, 
 to the health of any friendship, however sweet and cordial, 
 wherein the sum of help, sympathy, and rest received does 
 not very closely approximate to the amount rendered. In 
 this effort Mala, as may be expected, gives me little assist- 
 ance. Not even under the guise of pride or self-respect is 
 she capable of lending a steady, lasting aid to any good 
 and unselfish work. But Bona, though often sore grieved, 
 and, doubtless, tempted to withdraw and leave me to 
 the unhelped and unhindered tendencies of my nature, doth 
 yet stand by me, and enable me to struggle on, if not to 
 the unmixed approval of my conscience, at least to the 
 apparent satisfaction of my duo of satellites. 
 
 Perhaps I ought to say trio, since the summer did what 
 it could to bring Carrie Thorne into the same category. 
 Still, no part of the foregoing paragraph applies to her. 
 The distance between the Divine and Bryer farms saved 
 me from her too close attendance, and she is of too gentle, 
 humble, and self-forgetting a nature ever to be felt as a 
 restraint or a burden. She is content to adore her idols 
 afar off, and accepts from them much or little with the same 
 sweet thankfulness. Whereas Ruth can be both jealous 
 and exacting, upon occasion, I find, or even without it ; and 
 Alice, though she is neither of these, has such an insatiate 
 hunger for thought, feeling, emotion, knowledge, and all
 
 SIIILOH. 399 
 
 sorts of mental pabulum things by which her genius is to 
 live and grow, in truth a vital necessity of its existence 
 that she becomes in constant association (not to use the 
 simile harshly, and divesting it of every heartless and repul- 
 sive idea), a* kind of human leech. The one wearies by 
 excessive stimulation, the other by continual absorption. 
 Carrie presented the reposeful side of the picture. She 
 neither excited nor drained. She simply soothed. 
 
 But the summer did something better for Carfic 
 Thorn e than to give her an assured place in my interests 
 and affections. It brought her into closer contact with the 
 life that beats around her, and so warmed her own into 
 expansion and usefulness. She became an efficient teacher 
 in the Sunday School, quiet, painstaking, and obedient, 
 and she was one of the most regular attendants and faith- 
 ful workers of the Sewing Society. 
 
 I say, was, because these last summer days have swept 
 Carrie away from me, into an atmosphere of trouble and 
 anxiety. Poor Mrs. Thorne was stricken with paralysis, 
 on the receipt of Rick's sudden announcement of his hasty 
 marriage. Following close upon my notice of the discovery 
 of Cyrus Thome's missing child, it seemed the deathblow 
 to all her schemes, hopes, and ambitions. Rick's arrival, 
 and the discovery that the bride and the heiress were 
 one and the same, could not undo the bodily mischief, 
 though they may have brought some comfort to her mind. 
 Carrie was immediately sent for. A letter just received 
 from her, reports Mrs. Thorne in a very dangerous situa- 
 tion. 
 
 There have been no new developments with regard to 
 the artist. Though we meet often, and upon terms which 
 time and a better knowledge of each other render more and 
 more friendly, it is always in the presence of others, and 
 the subject of his incognito has never again been broached. 
 
 He has nearly finished my picture of Ruth. The like- 
 ness is perfect ; yet he has not failed to add, or take away,
 
 400 MHLOII. 
 
 that indefinable, inestimable something which makes all the 
 difference between a mere portrait and a work of art. 
 
 The " Dream ; Reverie ; Reflection," is also in progress. 
 At my earnest solicitation, the artist has substituted Alice's 
 face therein for mine ; as furnishing a stronger contrast to 
 Ruth's, and more perfectly embodying the idea reverie 
 being Alice's normal expression. Both she and Ruth give 
 him a sitting, when desired ; yet I cannot report satisfac- 
 tory progress in the little romance heretofore hinted at. 
 His artist-eye lights np at sight of Ruth's face ; yet his 
 enjoyment of Alice's silent, intuitive sympathy with all his 
 thoughts and moods is scarcely less evident. Certainly, he 
 is beguiled, by its subtile charm, to talk to her more freely 
 than to any one else of whatever he has done in the world, 
 or dreams of doing. Nevertheless, he may forget her even 
 while he talks to her most unreservedly, being moved solely 
 by the natural impulse of thought to flow into the first 
 sympathetic ear that comes in its way. 
 
 Yet the themes which chiefly engage his mind and con- 
 versation, the history, scope, and mission of Art, the suc- 
 cesses, discouragements, and self-consecration of her work- 
 ers, these, and kindred topics, discussed in a lofty, gener- 
 ous spirit, and with a rare flow of language and imagery, 
 are not without a noticeable effect in quickening and 
 Enlarging the minds both of Alice and Ruth. With every 
 visit to the studio, their faces are informed with a deeper 
 thought ; the girlishness is fast departing thence, and some 
 new charm of womanhood blossoms there daily. 
 
 As for Essie Volger, though Shiloh would seem to lose 
 half its sunshine without her, and parish-work would 
 greatly miss her helping hand, yet any detailed record of 
 her fresh, active, joyous life, free and bright as a meadow- 
 brook, and as innocent of care and turmoil, would but serve 
 to illustrate the French proverb, " Heureux le peuple dont 
 rhistoire ennuie"
 
 XXXVIII. 
 
 IK ST. JTJDE'S. 
 
 St. Jude's the summer has wrought some 
 greatly needed improvements. The fund 
 for repairs prospered to such a degree, under 
 Mrs. Prescott's fostering care, that a self-consti- 
 tuted committee, composed of that active lady, 
 Mrs. Taylor, Mrs. Danforth, Essie Volger, and 
 your indefatigable reporter, aided and abetted 
 by the artist, whose surplus fancy and energy 
 like to bubble over in gratuitous church architecture and 
 decoration, ventured to turn a half-dozen carpenters and 
 painters into the sacred edifice, and to set them at work 
 there. It was irregular, we knew; but then, Church 
 work had to "be done irregularly in Shiloh ! To call a 
 parish meeting, and pass a vote, was to quash every for- 
 ward proceeding. Fortunately the opposition wouH be as 
 irregular as the advance. It would never organize, and 
 therefore would be ineffective, save in producing uncom- 
 fortableness. - 
 
 The aspiring gallery, which actually seemed to. climb 
 higher every time I mounted it, was first brought low. 
 ISTot alone to the confusion and wrath of the wasps that had 
 tenanted it undisturbed all the week, and waged fierce war 
 upon' intruders on Sundays ; nor of the urchins that had 
 whispered and tittered and contorted in its recondite nooks 
 during service, wholly out of eye-shot either of minister or 
 congregation ; but to the dire dismay of all .the representa-
 
 402 SHILOH. 
 
 tive stagnancy and ossification of the parish. Major Bur- 
 cham came to inspect the work, one day ; and I heard him 
 saying to Mr. Taylor, in his most pompous and overbearing 
 tones, 
 
 " You little sus imagine what you are doing, sir ! The 
 gallery is the main support of the church, sir, the main sup- 
 port of the church. It keeps the walls in place, and when 
 it is taken away they will turn collapse, sir, and leave 
 nothing but a heap of ruins a heap of ruins ! I wash my 
 hands of the whole business, sir, of the whole business ! " 
 
 Which supererogatory ablution the Major immediately 
 performed, by rubbing his large hands together, sprinkling 
 the air with imaginary water, and turning his broad, impos- 
 ing back, typical of universal disapprobation, upon us and 
 our proceedings. Whereat Mr. Taylor looked a little 
 scared ; but the feminine wing remained undaunted ; and 
 the artist, emerging from the shadowy corner where he had 
 listened to Major Burcham's comments with what struck 
 me as a very odd and inexplicable expression of counte- 
 nance, laughed and poohed and insisted ; so the work went 
 on. The huge heap of gallery timber was quickly trans- 
 formed into a small organ loft, at a moderate elevation, 
 with not an inch of lounging or play-room in it ; also a 
 vestry at the rear of the chancel, to supersede a narrow 
 cuddy in the vestibule, wherein Mr. Taylor had hitherto 
 groaned himself into his surplice, and then walked, in state, 
 up the aisle to the desk. Finally, two of the obnoxious win- 
 dows were suppressed, the others were darkened with 
 blinds, . the chancel was refurnished, the artist gave an 
 effective touch here and there, and St. Jude's was success- 
 fully remodelled. Its walls, in spite of the loss of their 
 " main support," preserved their equilibrium, and the ob- 
 jectors recovered theirs. 
 
 However, by the inevitable fatality attending all such 
 work, the repairs outran the fund. Hereupon, Mrs. Dan- 
 forth's fair came magnanimously to the rescue. It was
 
 sniLoir. 403 
 
 held in Mrs. Divine's house, not that it was more roomy, 
 central, or adaptable, than many, of its neighbors, but be- 
 cause its mistress's heart was larger, warmer, and less easily 
 irritated by domestic turmoil and upset, than any similar 
 organ within a radius of many miles. It was good to see 
 how cordially she entered into it, how readily she sacrificed 
 domestic routine and comfort to it, how she aided, satirized, 
 and enjoyed it. 
 
 Being an exotic, it required all Mrs. Danforth's tact, 
 fluency, and skill, to save it from languishing in Shiloh's 
 ungcnial air. To use her own felicitous phrase, she "gal- 
 vanized the thing through," forcing a kind of spasmodic 
 life from the very joints and muscles of death. The re- 
 freshment tables were tolerably well patronized, an appe- 
 tite being the one thing to be counted upon with certainty 
 in all gatherings. But the native population " fought shy" 
 of the fancy-work table stocked with all sorts of frail and 
 fanciful money-traps (under other names!), knitted or cro- 
 cheted by Mrs. Danforth, or donated by her idly-busy city 
 friends. Great, brown farmers touched them with the tips 
 of their horny fingers as if they suspected them to be dan- 
 gerous combinations of the brittleness of glass with the 
 flimsiness of cobweb, asked what they were for, bestowed 
 upon them a certain amount of half-bewildered, half-con- 
 temptuous admiration, and went their way without open- 
 ing their purses. 
 
 But for the timely presence of a waif from the city, who 
 bought whatever he was requested to buy without looking 
 at it ; and a small army of Essie Volger's admirers, anxious 
 to impress her with their generosity ; these elegant nothings 
 would have been left upon our hands. The quilts, how- 
 ever, sold readily enough, by " chances," as the softening 
 phrase goes. Taken as a whole, the fair was a success, 
 but a success resembling certain victories in the battle-field, 
 which not even the conquering general himself would care 
 to repeat.
 
 404 SHILOH. 
 
 The summer has done much for the Sunday School ; it 
 is now in a most flourishing condition. Though it 'has a 
 duly appointed superintendent, Mr. Taylor never fails to 
 give it the strength and inspiration of his pi'esence ; and 
 makes it a point to shake the hand of every teacher and 
 scholar, at each session, with, at least, a cordial " How do 
 you do ? " When the lessons in class are over, he devotes 
 a quarter of an hour to catechising the scholai-s, in person ; 
 a time to which they look forward with real pleasure. For 
 he has the rare faculty of talking to children in a manner 
 that is at once simple, entertaining, and instructive ; neither 
 wrecking himself* upon the Scylla of silliness nor the 
 Charybdis of obscurity. 
 
 As for my own class, in which you take so kind an in- 
 terest, it has bettered my anticipations. Being a work in 
 an untried field, and undertaken very much on my own 
 responsibility, my pride as well as better feelings was 
 deeply concerned in its success ; and I spared no pains in 
 its behoof. I prepared myself for the recitations with the 
 utmost care ; looking out or inventing stories, and hunting 
 up pictures and curiosities whatever could be made to 
 serve the purposes of illustration. An old herbarium, con- 
 taining dried specimens of fig-leaves, palms,' pomegranate, 
 and other plants mentioned in the Bible, helped me out ; so 
 did the artist's collection of antiquities and portfolios of 
 sketches. I took care never to be without something of 
 the sort, to awaken and interest the childrens' minds, and 
 give shape and point to their very vague ideas of Bible ac- 
 cessories (to borrow a term from the language of Art). 
 Also, I made it a rule to visit, at the earliest moment pos- 
 sible, every child that was not in its place, on Sunday ; and 
 the mother's certainty that every such absence would be 
 followed by my appearance beside her wash-tubs, on Mon- 
 day morning, may have had its share in bringing about a 
 gratifying regularity of attendance. The class now num- 
 bers thirteen ; it has greatly improved in appearance and
 
 SIIILOII. 4:05 
 
 behavior ; clean faces and clean garments, quietude, and 
 good lessons, are no longer the exception, but the rule. 
 Yet its best fruits appear in the fact that some few 
 of its members are really setting their young faces heaven? 
 ward ; though not, of course, without much blundering 
 and tripping by the way ; the truest evidence of their sin- 
 cerity being that they pick themselves up after every fall, 
 and, while yet sore and smarting, set forth again. Libby, 
 sweet and patient by nature, and early trained by circum- 
 stance to a sense of duty and responsibility, is most for- 
 ward of them all ; I am sometimes oppressed by a vague 
 fear of I know not what, when I observe how very near to 
 the kingdom she is. Next to her so far as is patent to 
 human vision, for I do not count my judgment infallible, 
 in this matter comes Gordon Danforth. That boy has in 
 him the making of another Bayard ! His manner toward his 
 smaller, weaker, poorer classmates, is redolent of the pur- 
 est essence of chivalry. 
 
 But the class has also borne good fruit, in an indirect 
 way. Very soon after its commencement, such members of 
 the congregation as ai-e wont to spend the short intermis- 
 sion between morning and afternoon service at the church, 
 began to gather in its neighborhood, listening attentively 
 to its recitations, and begging a reversionary look at the 
 pictures, maps, etc., used in illustration of the lesson. 
 Doubtless, some of them read their Bibles more understand- 
 ingly thereafter. Certainly, the audience increased even 
 faster than the class. One day, I was surprised to discover 
 Mrs. Danforth's diamonds flashing in the midst of it. 
 
 " Gordon and Effie make such a -fuss about you and 
 your teaching," whispered she, " that I am devoured with 
 curiosity to see what it all means. You have fairly be- 
 witched them, and I would like to make sure that you use 
 no unlawful magic." 
 
 When the recitation was over, she came to me with a 
 piquant air, but an unusually thoughtful face.
 
 406 SHILOH. 
 
 " Well ! I must say I never saw you lay yourself out 
 for anybody as you do for those children ! No wonder 
 they are fascinated ! But do you really like it ? Does it 
 pay?" 
 
 " I do like it, Mrs. Danforth, better, I think, than any 
 work that I do. And if any of them are made better and 
 wiser for this life, even, to say nothing of the future one, 
 does it not ' pay ' well ? Think of the amount of moral 
 usury to be gained, by my small principal, from the hearts 
 and lives of thirteen children ; some of whom are certain 
 to become centres of influence to families, neighborhoods, 
 friends ! " 
 
 She looked down thoughtfully. " Miss Frost," she ex- 
 claimed, suddenly, " I am afraid I shall have to cut your 
 acquaintance ! " 
 
 " Indeed ! May I ask wherefore ? " 
 
 " Because I never meet you without being made to feel 
 I do not say it is your fault that I am not, and never 
 have been, of much use in the world. And I shall be 
 driven either to renounce- you or run in opposition ! Good 
 bye ! " 
 
 Two days after, she stopped me in the road. " Have 
 you ever been ragamuffin-picking down in m^ district ? " 
 she asked. 
 
 " Not yet," I began, after a moment's consideration 
 had shown me the drift of the inquiry. 
 
 " Not yet ! " she interrupted, " then, don't you dare to 
 do it ! .1 will not stand any trespassing on my gi'ound ! " 
 
 And, shaking her finger at me, with a humorous de- 
 fiance, she went her. way. 
 
 On the following Sunday, such persons as happened to 
 be standing in or about the porch of St. Jude's to wit, 
 the majority of the males and a considerable number of 
 the females of the congregation saw an amazing sight. 
 Mrs. Danforth's carriage drew up to the door, packed to 
 bursting with small, tanned, freckled, oddly-clothed, and
 
 SHILOH. 407 
 
 restless figures ; and not far in the rear appeared its owner, 
 on foot, leading her two children by the hand. Her eyes 
 sparkled even brighter than her diamonds, as we encount- 
 ered each other at the corner. 
 
 " You see that I've decided on running an opposition ! " 
 said she, laughing. " Look out for your laurels, my 
 dear!" 
 
 " They certainly are in danger," I answered, " if you in- 
 tend to make a practice of sending a carriage after your 
 scholars. But, Mrs. Danforth, you surely do not intend to 
 walk home ? " 
 
 " No ; I told them fair play was a jewel, and we would 
 each ride one way. To make sure of them, I gave them 
 the first chance. Aren't they a nice-looking set, though ? 
 I expect to have a gorgeous time with them ! " 
 
 She stowed them into her seat, and managed to keep 
 them tolerably still during service ; then, she took them 
 into a vacant corner and there began the work of teaching 
 them. Her success has been quite equal to mine ; and she 
 has even more adult listeners. She is none- the less indus- 
 trious in hunting up illustrative matter ; while she has 
 greatly the advantage of me in vivacity of manner and ex- 
 pression ; and especially in her wonderful spontaneity and 
 fitness of gesture, by the help of which she tells a story or 
 describes a scene in such manner as to seem to set its 
 actors and images bodily before the listenei*'s eyes. 
 
 The Sewing Society has made its payments to the rec- 
 tor's salary promptly, far more so, I regret to say, than 
 the pewholders, and its later meetings have been charac- 
 terized by unusual harmony and energy. 
 
 Yet, notwithstanding so much good work done, done, 
 I realize more fully now that I see it on paper, than when 
 under the influence of the delays, vexations, and discour- 
 agements attending it, Mr. Taylor has been much de- 
 pressed of late. He began his work in Shiloh with a 
 generous enthusiasm that gave a kind of personal warmth
 
 408 siiiLon. 
 
 to everything he said and did. He continued it with an en- 
 ergy, indefatigability and engrossment, worthy of all praise. 
 But the era of enthusiastic impulse and impetus is soon over j. 
 and when that of patient, plodding labor, looking rather to 
 the Master's smile at the end than the day's gain, was be- 
 gun, he found it, doubtless, comparatively slow, wearisome 
 and disappointing. Likely enough the inevitable discrep- 
 ancy between the amount of time and strength lavished 
 and the immediate results, forced itself upon him, and sad- 
 dened him. He came to me one morning with a face and 
 voice full of the flaccidity of discouragement. He spoke 
 drearily of indifference that had chilled, calumny that had 
 stung, opposition that had bruised him ; finally, he uttered 
 the sombre suspicion that he had mistaken his calling. 
 
 " See how little I have accomplished ! " he went on, bit- 
 terly. " The bishop comes soon for confirmation, and I 
 know not that I have .three candidates to present to him. 
 And yet, when I began my ministerial work, I thought 
 that nothing could long resist such zeal, faith and love, as 
 I brought to it. I fancied that the world was getting sick 
 and tired of the old, broad, bad way, and only waited for 
 my hand to lead it into the narrow, new one. I believed 
 that I saw the harbingers of a new and triumphant era for 
 the Church, in the sky ; and that I should live to see it 
 begun gloriously, and to feel that I had done what I could 
 to help it along." 
 
 " As to your personal work," said I, " may you never 
 have better cause to decry it ! As to the main point of the 
 Church's ultimate triumph over the world, may we never 
 live to doubt it ! You were chiefly mistaken, I apprehend, 
 in thinking that in this age, more than another, is the 
 Church's march toward millenial glory to gather speed 
 and volume, or that of the world toward ruin to be 
 arrested and turned back. God's plans arc worked out 
 not less slowly than surely. He, being eternal, can afford 
 to wait."
 
 SHLLOII. 409 
 
 " And I, being mortal, cannot afford to see that my life, 
 so far, is a failure." 
 
 " What right have you to pronounce it a failure ? " 
 " It has wrought so little for God's cause." 
 " That remains to be seen. Neither you nor I can esti- 
 mate the increase of the seed you have sown. Men die, and 
 count their labor vain, yet the cause prospers. Results ap- 
 pear, now and then ; possibly some present worker takes 
 the credit of them, and forgets to add his predecessor's la- 
 bors to the long account. What matter? The drop which 
 overflows the bucket, and gains the applause of men, is not, 
 therefore, larger, nor of greater value, in God's sight. Be- 
 sides, we may all solemnly comfort ourselves with the cer- 
 tainty that, after all, it is of little moment to His cause 
 whether we work for it, or no. It will not fail nor flag, for 
 want of our poor, weak instrumentality. Innumerable 
 agencies are at His command. He can call them forth 
 from the mire, and fashion them out of the stubble. Fire 
 and flood, battle and storm, and the unruly wills of sinful 
 men, alik serve him." 
 
 " You preach strange doctrine," said he, looking at me 
 intently. "So it does not matter whether we work for 
 God's cause ? " 
 
 " Ah ! I did not say that ! It is of vast moment to us ! 
 For our own sakes, we ought not to let our hands rest, for 
 one moment, out of His work. For we know that, if we 
 build not according to His will, we build in opposition to 
 it ; and all such work is vain, and will be overthrown. We 
 are working out our ruin, if we are not working out our 
 salvation. That- last is the work which we are chiefly set 
 to do, and for which alone we are wholly responsible. To 
 save us from selfishness, God has so arranged that we cannot 
 accomplish it without doing our utmost for the salvation 
 of others. Every stroke deliberately withheld from theirs, 
 is so much withheld from ours. Still, our own is the main 
 thing." 
 
 18
 
 410 SHILOII. 
 
 Mr. Taylor looked at me meditatively, and as if not 
 quite satisfied. 
 
 " Else, how dark the providence," I went on, " when a 
 good man is cut off in the midst of his days and his use- 
 fulness ! But if we understand that, his own calling and 
 election being made sure, his earthly work was finished, we 
 see light. God could do just as well without him, on earth ; 
 and he was fitted, so far as he was ever likely to be, for 
 heaven. What need to keep him longer in a state of pro- 
 bation and trial ? 
 
 " Work on in faith and hope, Mr. Taylor, and look in 
 your own heart for results. If you find them there, be 
 content ; for even St. Paul contemplated the possibility of 
 being a castaway, while preaching to others. Leave out- 
 side results to God." 
 
 " Ah ! " said he, with a smile that was tinged with sad- 
 ness, " you should have been the preacher, and I the lay- 
 worker, Miss Frost." 
 
 " Not so," I answered. " It would be strange indeed, if 
 I were not furnished with material for one short sermon 
 to you, since you have preached me so many ! I give you 
 back the slow distillation of your own wisdom." 
 
 " It is better than I thought it was," he rejoined, cheer- 
 
 iiy. 
 
 The event proved that Mr. Taylor's work was more 
 fruitful in results than he had known. Yesterday he pre- 
 sented eleven candidates to the Bishop for confirmation. 
 Among them were Carrie, Ruth, and Alice fruits, I hum- 
 bly dared to think, not alone of his faithful sowing, but of 
 my own quiet watering. The sweet thought bowed my 
 head so low, while it lifted my heart to the skies, that I 
 quite forgot that my voice was to take the place of Ruth's, 
 in the hymn to be sung while the candidates were gather- 
 ing at the chancel-rail. Essie sounded the preliminary 
 and opening chords, but I was deaf to the call. There was 
 a momentary flutter of embarrassment and perplexity in
 
 SIIILOII. 411 
 
 the choii 1 . Then Ruth, standing just before the altar, half- 
 turned, and took up the lagging strain. The sweet, clear, 
 thrilling voice swept round the church, drawing a few trem- 
 ulous voices after it, as it went ; and then soared alpft, like 
 the very spirit of sacred song. The choir followed after 
 as soon as it could recover itself with a kind of breathless 
 swoop, and the church was filled with harmony. Still, that 
 swelling voice from the chancel-rail led all the rest, domi- 
 nating all, etherializing all, infusing through all its own sub- 
 tile sweetness and intensity of feeling. How wondrously, 
 and yet with what entire unconsciousness, the inspired girl 
 sang, putting her whole soul into her voice, and slightly 
 bending her head, as if listening -to some celestial accom- 
 paniment, inaudible to us: 
 
 " Witness, ye men and angels ! now 
 
 Before the Lord we speak : 
 To Him we make our solemn vow 
 A vow we dare not break ! " 
 
 I drew a long, breath when it was all over. For, I need 
 not say that, not Alice, with her budding genius ; nor Car- 
 rie, with her softness ; nor even Essie, with her bright 
 good-nature, and the healthful play of her fresh, full life ; 
 but Ruth, with her varying moods, her sore cross of in- 
 firmity, and her entrancing voice ; lies nearest my heart. 
 
 Aunt Vin met us in the vestibule. " I know 'twould be 
 a work of superderogation to tell you that you sing like a 
 sheriff, Ruth," she said, benignantly ; " you've had the 
 opinion of better cynosures than I am. But I hearjl Essie 
 Volger saying, the other day, that you could sing the 
 rheumatic scale to refection ; and I'm coming up, some day, 
 on purpose to hear it. I haven't the least idea what sort 
 of a piece it is ; but if there's any music to be distracted 
 from the rheumatiz, I'm the person to depreciate it. I have 
 it awful, sometimes."
 
 XXXIX. 
 
 A BE-FLOW OF TROUBLE. 
 
 " artist of wonderful power has appeared in 
 Shiloh, and is painting the quiet little ham- 
 let with a gorgeousness of color, a boldness 
 of treatment, a breadth of effect, and a brillian- 
 cy of tone, beyond all that Ruskin could con- 
 ceive, or Turner dare to paint. She charges 
 the forests with great masses of glowing 
 reds, shading, at the edges, into orange. She 
 makes a tree on the hillside otherwise green to hold out 
 one bough burning as with flame, and another reddened as 
 with blood. She paints the oaks in rich raiment of purple 
 and crimson, blotched with golden brown. She dips her 
 pencil in bright scarlet for the sumach, and pale yellow for 
 the beeches. Here and there, in the meadows, an isolated 
 maple becomes a fixed, earthly embodiment of the sunset's 
 celestial and evanescent glories. At last, having emptied 
 her palette of all its most brilliant colors, she tones down 
 the dazzling effect by drawing over the picture, soft, gauzy 
 veils of azure and amethystine haze. Needless to say that 
 her name is Autumn ! 
 
 Yes, Francesca, the feet of October ai'e bright on the 
 hilltops, and still I am in Shiloh ! Two weeks ago Uncle 
 John wrote to ask if it was not time for the " rose crop " to 
 be in, and Flora ended a resume of her winter's plans with 
 a threat to come and see for herself what mischief I was 
 about, if I did not at once return to help in their execu-
 
 SHILOH. 4:13 
 
 tion. Even Aunt Belle added a gracious postscript to the 
 effect that a kindly welcome home was ready for me when- 
 ever I chose to claim it ; to characters so radically disso- 
 nant as hers and mine, an occasional separation is a wonder- 
 ful promoter of harmony. We shall tolerate each other all 
 the more cordially through the winter for the summer's 
 escape from the necessity of toleration. 
 
 First, I was kept in Shiloh by the autumn pictures, to 
 which every day added some new effect that I could not 
 bear to miss ; then, by a new wave of trouble, or rather, the 
 reflow of an old one. In the fair, still, sunny days of late 
 September, the fever, so long held in abeyance, broke out 
 again. My child-woman, Libby, was one of the first to 
 sicken. She was so unmistakably a child of God that, when 
 Bob burst into my room crying out "Libby's got the 
 fever ! " I felt how fit it was that she should be called to 
 enjoy her heavenly inheritance, and knew that I had not a 
 thread to hang an earthly hope upon. A few days later 
 her mortal part went to swell the immortal harvest to be 
 finally reaped from Shiloh burial ground. 
 
 From the clods and the flowers laid gently upon her 
 small grave, I went to Mrs. Burcham's bedside. She had 
 been stricken down by the fever, about a week previous. 
 Soon after, Major Burcham had sought Aunt Yin and 
 begged her, with tears in his eyes, to take charge of the 
 sick-room ; his wife had no relatives within easy distance, 
 none of them could reach her under some days ; meanwhile, 
 she would be left to such care, willing but unskilful, as he 
 could give her, and the various assistance of the neighbors. 
 The appeal was not made in vain. For five days the faith- 
 ful old nurse had been at her post : for the past three days 
 and nights she had scarcely slept. That morning, I had 
 looked in upon her, on my way to Libby's corpse, and 
 found her looking nearly as haggard as her patient. 
 
 " You are killing yourself," I remonstrated. " Surely, 
 you can have watchers at night."
 
 414 SHILOH. 
 
 " Don't you be troubled ! I'm made of tougher imma- 
 terial than you think. As to the watchers, there's plenty 
 of 'em to be had for the askin' good, bad, and diiferent. 
 But the truth is, that every time I've left her, she's run 
 down unrecountably, pulse all gone to most nothin', and 
 it's took all my wits to bring her up again. So I've made 
 up my mind that it's easier to stick by her as long as she's 
 in such a carious situation ; or, at least, till you have done 
 your last good deed for poor little Libby, and can come 
 and stay with Mis' Burcham while I refute myself with a 
 nap. I ain't afraid to trust her with you, but there ain't 
 another person in all Shiloh that I'm willin' to leave her 
 with, though it does sound a little like self-gloriousness ! " 
 
 So Mr. Divine drove me directly from the graveyard to 
 the house of Major Burcham. That gentleman was stand- 
 ing by the gate, and assisted me to alight. I saw him look 
 at Leo (who was with us, as usual) in a way that I could 
 not understand ; I saw Leo look at him grimly, fiercely, 
 giving utterance to a low growl. 
 
 " Leo ! " said Mr. Divine, sharply, yet with no intona- 
 tion of surprise. 
 
 It was plain that the dog had an antipathy to Major 
 Burcham, and that Mr. Divine understood it well. 
 
 Mrs. Divine began to make kind inquiries after Mrs. 
 Burcham. Before they came to an end, I discovered that 
 the soft, warm slippers, in which I had expected to be 
 " shod with silence " and with comfort, during the night- 
 watch, had been left behind ; and I begged Mrs. Divine to 
 send them to me, by Leo, sometime in the course of the 
 evening. 
 
 " He has seen me alight here," said I, in conclusion, 
 " and will know where to find me." 
 
 " Ye-es," returned she, hesitatingly. Then, seeing that 
 Mr. Divine had engaged the Major's attention, she leaned 
 over, and whispered ; " Leo'll bring them, I guess, seeing 
 it's you ; but you had better keep a little lookout for him,
 
 SHILOH. 415 
 
 for I doubt if he'll come inside the gate, that is, unless he 
 sees you somewhere round. I'll send him about eight 
 o'clock." 
 
 The wagon rolled away ; Leo, after a long, wistful look 
 at me, as he saw me turn toward the house with Major 
 Burcham, bounded after it ; and I went in, wondering what 
 possible cause of feud could exist between the faithful, mild- 
 tempered dog and the pompous man at my side, 
 
 " Mr. Divine told me that he had bought Leo of Major 
 Burcham's Irishman," said I to myself. " Ah ! yes, I see, 
 the Irishman's dog, treated with contempt, possibly Avith 
 cruelty, by the Irishman's master. Leo remembers and 
 resents it." 
 
 Aunt Vin met me at the door of the sick-room. Wben 
 she had made me fully acquainted with its routine, I said 
 to her ; 
 
 " Xow, go straight to bed, and leave every care 
 behind." 
 
 " I'm agoin'," replied she, with a long yawn, "I don't 
 need but one such conjunction. I didn't know I teas so 
 sleepy till you come in ; the very sight of you was omniv- 
 orous ! Be sure and call me at nine o'clock ; then, it'll be 
 time to shift her on to t'other bed." And Aunt Vin took 
 herself oif. 
 
 Mrs. Burcham appeared not to notice the change of 
 nurses. She lay with her eyes closed, in a half stupor, 
 from which (I had been warned) she roused completely 
 only at intervals. Sometimes she slept, a troubled, un- 
 easy sleep, wherefrom it was necessary to waken her 
 partially, at least every few moments. 
 
 Two hours crept slowly away ; twilight began to gather. 
 With it, heavy clouds rolled up from the east ; a peal of 
 thunder sounded from afar. Mrs. Burcham woke from a 
 brief slumber with a start and a moan, and the sorrowful 
 lament of David fell brokenly from her lips ; 
 
 " My son ! my son ! oh, my son ! "
 
 41G SHILOH. 
 
 I heard it with alarm. Delirium was always a dreaded 
 symptom, in the fever. And no question but she was de- 
 lirious, for, if she had ever had a son, he must have been 
 dead years ago ; I had never heard of him. Indeed, I be- 
 lieved her to have been childless. I laid my hand upon her 
 head, felt her pulse, listened anxiously to her breathing, but 
 could detect no sign of increasing fever or weakness ; and I 
 sat down again, a little reassured, just as another rumble of 
 thunder filled the air. It helped to rouse her completely. 
 She opened her eyes and looked at me, intelligently enough. 
 There was no sign of the delirium I had feared. 
 
 "It is Miss Frost," said she, feebly. "You are very, 
 kind. Is Aunt Vin resting ? " 
 
 % " Yes ; for a little while. She needed rest ; and she 
 said she was not at all afraid to leave you with me," re- 
 plied I, fearing lest she might be disturbed at finding her- 
 self in other hands than those of her accustomed and ex- 
 perienced nurse. 
 
 " I am very glad that she is resting, I mean. I hope 
 you are making yourself comfortable. There is wine in the 
 closet ; it will help to keep up your strength. And there 
 is an easier chair in the parlor, tell Bridget to bring it in 
 for you." 
 
 " Do not trouble yourself about me, I am quite comfort- 
 able," I answered, much marveling at the change that a 
 few days of sickness had wrought in Mrs. Burcham's man- 
 ner. Gratitude for kindness and consideration for others 
 were not its most prominent chai'acteristics, formerly. 
 
 She insisted, and, to satisfy her, the chair was brought. 
 Then, she closed her eyes, and sank again into stupor. 
 
 An hour went by. Darkness was fully come. The 
 storm, which had seemed to retreat, for a time, now drew 
 near again ; heavy drops of rain fell ; flashes of lightning 
 came and went, followed by the loud roll of thunder. 
 
 Glancing at my watch, I saw that it was about time for 
 Leo to arrive ; and began to wonder how I was to manage
 
 SHILOH. 41 7 
 
 that " lookout " which Mrs. Divine had advised. The bed- 
 room, was at the back of the house; one window opened 
 upon a dense orchard, the other, into a small recess or al- 
 cove, enclosed on three sides only, and termed in Shiloh a 
 "shed." While I was yet considering the difficulty, I 
 heard a sound in this shed ; which, after listening a moment, 
 I knew to be made by my canine friend, shaking the rain 
 from his shaggy coat. Immediately, his huge head and 
 chest appeared framed in the open window, his fore-paws 
 resting on the sill, and, in his mouth a small package 
 carefully wrapped in oiled-skin, to protect it from, the 
 rain. Instead of scratching at the main entrance, as is 
 his wont, in his character of messenger, it would seem 
 that the sagacious animal had quietly reconnoitered the 
 premises, until, discovering me sitting alone in the sick- 
 room, he had ventured to make his appearance at the 
 window. 
 
 I rose, intending to relieve him of his burden, give him 
 a pat on the head, and silently motion him to depart, when 
 a fearful peal of thunder shook the house, startling Mrs. 
 Burcham into sudden consciousness. Her eyes opened full 
 upon Leo's dark figure. 
 
 " Who is that ? " she asked, in alarm. 
 
 " It is only Leo Mr. Divine's dog," I hastened to say, 
 soothingly, "he has brought me some slippers that I for- 
 got to bring myself." 
 
 The look of fright passed quickly from her eyes, and a 
 soft, mournful expression came there instead. To my utter 
 surprise, she said, in low, faint tones, but distinct enough, 
 doubtless, to the dog's quick ears, 
 
 " Leo ! come here ! " 
 
 He leaped through the window, came to the bedside, 
 and looked down upon her with a benignant, yet an inquisi. 
 tive, face. She feebly lifted her wasted hand and laid it on 
 his great, rough head. 
 
 " Oh, Leo ! Leo ! " she exclaimed, mournfully, " where 
 18* '
 
 4:18 SIIILOH. 
 
 is your master ? " Two large tears gathered in her eyes, 
 and rolled down on the pillow. 
 
 I was amazed and alarmed. The scene was utterly in- 
 comprehensible ; but I saw that it involved excitement and 
 emotion which could not be otherwise than hurtful to my 
 patient, and I hastened to put an end to it. 
 
 " Leo ! " I began, somewhat sternly, " it is time for you 
 to go home, sir." 
 
 " Oh ! no, no," exclaimed Mrs. Burcham, pleadingly, 
 " do not send him away yet ! It is so pleasant to have him 
 here once more ! Besides, he never likes to go out in a 
 thunderstorm, you know." 
 
 It was true. Leo has a very human dislike, amounting 
 to a species of nervous terror, of a thunderstorm. He will 
 face one at the call of duty ; but he would much prefer to 
 have duty choose a fairer occasion. Yet I was astonished 
 at Mrs. Burcham's intimate knowledge of his idiosyncrasy. 
 
 However, it was no time to question nor argue. I 
 pointed to a dim corner and bade Leo lie down, which he 
 did at once. Then, seeing that it was nearly time for the 
 patient's anodyne, I ventured to anticipate it a little, and 
 to increase the dose by two or three drops, to balance the 
 unexpected excitements of the moment. As she swallowed 
 it, there came another heavy clap of thunder. 
 
 "It is a fearful storm!" said she, with a slight shiver. 
 " It was in just such a storm that " 
 
 She checked the words, or they faltered on her tongue, 
 I could not tell which. A spasm of pain crossed her face ; 
 then, she closed her eyes and lay quite still, but neither in 
 stupor nor in sleep, I saw plainly. I sat watching her, 
 praying that the anodyne might quickly take effect. My 
 anxiety was too great to allow me to wonder much at the 
 scene which I had just witnessed. I only felt dimly, that 
 here were memories and sorrows at work to which I had no 
 clue ; curiously connected with Leo, too ; and not in the 
 least explained by that hypothesis of the Irishman's dog
 
 6HILOH. 419 
 
 and the Irishman's master which had BO satisfactorily ac- 
 counted for whatever was strange in the joint behavior of 
 Major Burcham and that dumb, black animal coiled up in 
 yonder corner : whom, by the way, I was resolved to send 
 quietly home as soon as I could do so without attracting the 
 sick woman's attention. I deeply regretted that he had 
 ever been sent hither on errand of mine. 
 
 Little did I imagine that it was God's errand, and not 
 mine, which which had brought Leo there, that night ! 
 
 Some silent moments passed by, and I trusted that Mrs. 
 Burcham's over-burdened heart was slowly sinking into the 
 soft depths of slumber, when her eyes opened once more. 
 There was no sleep, no forgetfulness in them, only thought, 
 trouble, wistfulncss. 
 
 " Miss Frost," said she, quite calmly, " how long do you 
 think I have to live ? " 
 
 " My dear Mrs. Burcham ! " I exclaimed, almost in des- 
 pair, " pray do not agitate yourself any further, at present ! 
 Try to leave all your cares your life also in the hands 
 of God, who cai'eth for you, who pitieth you as a father 
 pitieth his own children. Lay yourself in His mercy as in 
 a bed, and there sleep all your cares and fears away ! " 
 
 " As a father pitieth his own children," she repeated, 
 slowly, as if thinking aloud, and paying no heed to the rest 
 of my words, " yes, that is it that is what I must say to 
 him. Miss Frost, please tell my husband I want to see 
 him." 
 
 " Would it not be better to wait till morning ? " I en- 
 treated. " You have had too much excitement already ; I 
 really ought to forbid any more. Do try to forget all that 
 troubles you, and go to sleep ! " 
 
 " I have tried," she answered, " and I cannot. Besides, 
 I may not live till morning, ' the night cometh, in which 
 no man can work.' And I have something to do before I 
 die, Leo has come here on purpose to remind me of it, 
 to rouse me up to it, to help me through it. Let me do it
 
 420 SfllLOH. 
 
 while I have strength and reason. Please call my hus- 
 band ! " 
 
 I saw that it was necessary to do her bidding. Feeling 
 her pulse, I found it strong and regular, though quick : 
 something love, duty, hope was strengthening her for 
 the work she had to do. Dimly I began to discern the 
 finger of Providence, of Guidance, in the strange, and, at 
 first sight, casual incidents of the evening : whither it 
 pointed, I would go ! 
 
 As Major Burcham entered the room, I cast an anxious 
 glance at Leo. He lifted his head, and his eyes looked 
 gloomy and sullen, but he made no \mfriendly demonstra- 
 tion ; plainly, he respected the sanctities of the sick-cham- 
 ber, or he deferred to the rights of the master of the house, 
 or his fierceness was held in check by awe of the thunder- 
 storm. I went out, and left the husband and wife to- 
 gether. 
 
 I had been in the sitting-room but a few moments, when 
 Aunt Vin joined me. 
 
 " It thundered so hard I couldn't sleep," said she, yawn- 
 ing, " so I insided I might as well come down. What time 
 is it?" 
 
 " It is near nine o'clock." 
 
 She looked thoughtfully at the closed door of the bed- 
 room, through which came indistinctly the faint, beseeching 
 tones of Mrs. Burcham's voice, and the heavier, yet sub- 
 dued and broken, accents of her husband. 
 
 " I don't quite like that" said she, significantly, " though 
 I've been participating it, this three days." 
 
 It was plain that the mystery was no mystery to her ! 
 
 Before I could answer, Major Burcham threw wide open 
 the door. If that was Major Burcham ! All his pomposity 
 and self-sufficiency gone as completely as foliage from a 
 forest where fire hath been, teai*s in his eyes, a broken, 
 shaken, grief-stricken man, whose very aspect smote me 
 with compassion.
 
 siiiLoir. 421 
 
 " Aunt Vin Miss Frost " he began, in faltering tones, 
 " my wife wants me to call you to witness that I promise 
 her to to forgive our son Henry fully and freely, from this 
 day forth ; and to take immediate steps to find out what 
 has become of him ; and to rreceive him, whenever he re- 
 turns, as as a loving father, whether " 
 
 His voice failed ; a great sob heaved his broad chest. 
 
 " Whether I am dead or alive," prompted Mrs. Burcham, 
 slowly and distinctly. 
 
 " Whether she is dead or alive, so help me God ! " 
 faltered the Major, in trembling, yet earnest and solemn 
 tones. 
 
 Mrs. Burcham's face, while these sentences were in pro- 
 gress, was a sight to see ! the eager, hungry look with 
 which she waited, at every break, for the next words, seem- 
 ing to draw them foi'th by the very force of her expectation, 
 the perfect satisfaction and peace that settled upon her 
 features as the Major ended, transfiguring them into a soft 
 and beautiful unearthliness. 
 
 " I can die happy now ! " she murmured, reaching up 
 her arms to her husband, the dew of a new birth of wifely 
 love shining in her eyes. 
 
 Aunt Vin softly closed the door upon them. "I'll 
 give 'em jest two minutes, by the clock," said she, almost 
 fiercely ; " then, I shall gravitate that man out of that room 
 so quick, he'll think he's an extant race ! " 
 
 Getting no answer, she turned and saw my face of mute 
 perplexity. 
 
 " Goodness ! child ! " she exclaimed, " didn't you ever 
 hear about Henry Burcham ? " 
 
 " Never." 
 
 " Then I s'pose I must give you an exclamation. Well ! 
 he was Major and Mis' Burcham's only child, and as bright 
 and handsome and good-hearted a boy as ever you see, 
 high-sperited, too, as you might demise, seein' what stock 
 he come from, but a boy that everybody liked and made
 
 422 8IIILOH. 
 
 much of, in Shiloh. Well, his father was sot on makin' 
 him a lawyer, but Henry wanted to be a painter, he took 
 to brush and pellet jest as nateral as a duck takes to 
 water; couldn't help makin' picturs no more than he could 
 help breathin', poor fellow ! His father forbid it, in ex- 
 tinct terms, over and over again, but his mother derived at 
 it, in secret, I guess, anyhow, Henry had his canvas-backs 
 and his boxes of brushes and collars up in his own room, 
 and painted all the time he could get. Well, the upshop 
 of it all was that Major Burcham found it out, one day, 
 and flew into a tearin' passion, and told Henry that if he 
 was bent on disgracin' his name by being a poor miserable 
 painter, he wished he'd clear out and never show him his face 
 agin. The boy took him at his word, it was an awful, 
 stormy night jest like this ; and in the morning, they found 
 his room empty, and him miners ; and he's never been heerd 
 on since. That's most eight year ago. It's strange you 
 never happened to hear on't, and you a-stayin' at the Di- 
 vines, too ! Why, if you say, ' Henry Burcham ! ' to that 
 great dog of theirs, now to this day, he'll, whine and take 
 on like mad." 
 
 " Leo ! " I exclaimed, " what has he to do with it ? " 
 " Why, Leo was Henry Burcham's dog, first. Some- 
 body made him a present of him, when he was a pup, and 
 they were uncommonly detached to each other. You nev- 
 er saw one without t'other ; Mr. Dragner used to call 'em 
 ' Tamon and Pathos.' When Henry went off, he give the 
 dog to Mike, his father's Irishman, to keep for him ; but 
 the Major never could bear the sight of him, I guess he 
 was an onpleasant momentum of his son ! and he kicked 
 him, one day ; and the dog spi'ang at his throat, and like 
 to choke him to death afore they could pull him off; and 
 so the Irishman had to sell him to Mr. Divine." 
 
 For some moments, I sat silent, slowly digesting these 
 various items of information. Then, I took out my tablets 
 and began writing rapidly.
 
 SHILOH. 423 
 
 " What are you doin' ? " asked Aunt Vin, with sur- 
 prise, " takin' notes ? " 
 
 " No ; I am writing these words ; ' Your mother is 
 dangerously ill, and longs to see you. Come immediately? 
 I sign it with my name, and I am going to send it, by Leo, 
 to Henry Burcham alias, Harry Archum alias, Mr. 
 Cambur ! " 
 
 " Good land ! " exclaimed she, settling into the nearest 
 chair, and jerking her head in her grimmest fashion, " if 
 that don't beat all ! And to think that I never once in- 
 spected him ! Yet I've told him, a dozen times, that he 
 dissembled somebody I'd seen afore ! " 
 
 " And now," said I, wrapping my tablets in a part of 
 the oiled-skin so seasonably provided, " if you think you 
 cati venture to open that door, I will call Leo out, and 
 send him on his errand." 
 
 " Bless us ! " ejaculated Aunt Yin, recalled to the recol- 
 lection of her patient's situation, " I ought to have done it 
 afore ! " 
 
 I led Leo quietly into the porch, and closed the door 
 behind us. 
 
 " Take this," said I, slowly and distinctly, and strongly 
 emphasizing the underscored words, " take this, quickly, 
 to Henry Burcham. He may be at the studio, or at Mrs. 
 DanfortNs, or at the' depot. FIND HIM ! " 
 
 The last words, I knew, Leo understood perfectly. 
 How far he comprehended the rest of my directions, I 
 ccruld not be sure : but, as he had often surprised me by 
 showing that he knew the names of many persons, places, 
 and things, which no one had taken any special pains to 
 bring to his notice ; and as he had visited all these spots 
 with me, on several occasions ; I felt tolerably at ease, even 
 on this point. The more, that he took the tablets be- 
 tween his teeth, and, without the least hesitation, dashed 
 out into the storm. The thunder was dying away in the 
 distance, but the rain fell more heavily than ever, and an
 
 424: SHILOH. 
 
 angry wind drove it in sheets against the windows and 
 shook it -from the groaning trees. It was a wild night, 
 dark to utter obscurity ; no man would have liked to lace 
 it ; my messenger, I felt, was the fittest, swiftest, surest, 
 that could have been provided. In that faith, I went back 
 to the sick-room. 
 
 Before taking you thither, however, I will give you the 
 explanation of my instructions to Leo. A few days previous 
 to Mrs. Burcham's seizure, the artist had gone to the city, on 
 business. He had told me that he should positively return 
 on this (Saturday) evening. The train would be late, I 
 knew ; it would not reach the depot till aftej the storm 
 had begun. He might wait there for it to cease ; he 
 might set forth, and be glad to take shelter with Mrs. Dan- 
 forth ; or he might persevere till he reached the studio. 
 In one or the other of these places, I felt certain, he would 
 be found. 
 
 Mrs. Burcham was quietly falling asleep. The anodyne 
 which I had administered, aided by the relief of mind and 
 heart afforded by Major Burcham's promise, was at last 
 taking effect. 
 
 I stole softly to Aunt Vin's side and asked, in a whisper, 
 if the mother ought not to be informed that her son was 
 nearer than she had believed, and that she might hope to 
 see him soon ? 
 
 " Not till she's slept," answered Aunt Vin, decidedly. 
 " That's her great consideratum, now. Time enough to 
 break his revival to her, when he gets here.- But you'd 
 better tell Major Burcham." 
 
 He listened to the communication almost without a 
 word. He looked even more pained than surprised to find 
 that his son had been in Shiloh so long without making 
 himself known ; nor did the shadow wholly dissipate as I 
 talked of his rising fame as an artist. He exhibited some 
 fear lest my message might not reach its destination, and 
 talked of setting forth himself ; but, being made to consider
 
 SHILOH. 425 
 
 the fury of the storm, and Leo's excellent qualifications for 
 the task entrusted to him, he went sadly and wearily back 
 to the silence and solitude of his chamber. The argument 
 which really prevailed with him, however, was probably 
 shadowed forth in a few words spoken as he went ; 
 
 " After all, Mrs. Burcham might want me, before I 
 could get back again." 
 
 Together, Aunt Vin and I kept the watch in the sick- 
 room. Neither of us could sleep, now, till this matter was 
 brought to some conclusion. We sat and listened through 
 the subsidences of the wind and rain. 
 
 Very slowly the hours wore away. Ten eleven 
 struck ; midnight drew near. It was three hours since 
 Leo's departure. Anxiety took possession of me ; per- 
 haps he had misunderstood my directions perhaps he had 
 failed in his quest possibly the artist had not arrived, a 
 hundred ii's and perad ventures, the gray, teasing progeny 
 of suspense and expectation, thronged my mind and tor- 
 mented me with their pertinacious, yet changeful, shapes. 
 It exasperated me to see Aunt Vin's calm patience ; it 
 sickened me to think what long experience of just such 
 vigils, such expectation, such delay and such anxiety, it 
 argiied ! 
 
 Was there a sound outside ? I held my breath to listen, 
 with my eyes involuntarily resting on the outer door of the 
 sitting-room. I saw the latch noiselessly lifted ; the door 
 swung open; two dripping figures, a man and a dog, 
 entered. Between them and me rushed Major Burcham, 
 more upon the alert than I, to throw his arms around his 
 son, and murmur some incoherent words. 
 
 It was all the work of an instant. Before Aunt Vin 
 could turn round to see what was going on, before I could 
 reach and close the bedroom door, Mrs. Burcham opened 
 her eyes, saw the tableau, and read its meaning. 
 
 " My son ! " she cried, in tones that thrilled every 
 heart, " it is my son ! "
 
 XL. 
 
 THROUGH SHADOW TO LIGHT. 
 
 is said that joy never kills ; neither does it 
 always cure. 
 
 Sunday morning dawned fair and still. Its 
 early rays showed Mrs. Burcham's face lit up 
 with such peaceful brightness, the soft reflection 
 of a mind and heart at rest, that I thought her 
 better; but Aunt Vin, quicker to detect the 
 signs betraying the waste and progress of dis- 
 ease, quietly shook her head. 
 
 At seven o'clock, the hour which the nurse's experi- 
 ence declared to be the one wherein her patients were 
 strongest, the long weariness of the night being over, and 
 that of the day scarce begun, Mr. Taylor came, according 
 to previous arrangement, to administer the Holy Commun- 
 ion to the sick woman. 
 
 " You will join us ? " he said to Harry, as he was pre- 
 paring for the feast. 
 
 " Yes, as my mother wishes it so much. That is, if 
 you do not think I am unfit." 
 " You have been confirmed ? " 
 
 " Oh, yes, and I .have communicated, before I left 
 home; but " 
 
 " But what ? Have you lost your religious faith and 
 hope ? " 
 
 " No, I think not. I believe firmly in religion, and I 
 have tried to live it, of late, at least, according to my
 
 SHILOH. 427 
 
 light ; but I do not that is, I did not, two months age 
 believe in Churches." 
 
 Mr. Taylor laid his hand on his friend's shoulder, with 
 a grave smile. "An artist," said he, " and cannot see the 
 beauty and the fitness of organization ! As well say that 
 you believe in boughs and roots, but not in trees ; in flesh 
 and bones, but not in bodies ! All God's higher works are 
 organized bodies, not loose elements nor disjointed mem- 
 bers floating about without connection or concert, then 
 why not the highest work of all, His Church ? by which, 
 as says St. Paul, His manifold wisdom is made known unto 
 the principalities and powers in heavenly places, a won- 
 derful proof, certainly, of its excellency and importance." 
 
 The artist returned the smile with one as grave, and 
 more thoughtful. " I see that I must take this matter into 
 deeper consideration than I have yet done," said he. 
 " Meanwhile " 
 
 " Meanwhile, if anything in your heart responds to the 
 Church's broad, yet solemn, invitation, ' ye who do truly 
 and earnestly repent you of your sins, and are in love and 
 charity with your neighbors, and intend to lead a new 
 life ' , I think you may venture to draw near with faith 
 and take this holy Sacrament to your help and instruction 
 and comfort." 
 
 It was a holy and a beautiful hour, that early Sunday 
 morning Communion of the reconciled, reunited family, in 
 the sick-room's hush; the world seemingly, so far, the 
 Redeemer and the Comforter so near ! And, seeing Mrs. 
 Burcham's face so radiant with serenest joy, I said to 
 myself once more, " She is certainly better." 
 
 Three hours afterward, she died in her son's arms ! 
 
 Standing by her grave, and remembering how gentle 
 and patient she had been in her sickness, how anxious to 
 avoid giving trouble, how grateful for Mr. Taylor's con- 
 stant visitations, and how desirous of making amends to 
 everybody whom she had wronged, I thought remorsefully
 
 428 SHILOH. 
 
 of the many severe and sarcastic things I have written 
 about her, and wished that they might be wiped out of re- 
 membrance. It would be well if wo could always, or 
 even in general, speak of others as we do over their newly- 
 turfed graves ; recognizing their good, and silently leaving 
 their evil to the Blotter-out of transgressions. For what 
 * have any of us to do with judgment, when our one, con- 
 stant prayer is for mercy ! 
 
 After the funeral, I had a long talk with Harry 
 Burcham, as he must now be called ; which cleared up 
 some points that had puzzled me-, among them his two 
 aliases. 
 
 Stung to the quick by his father's angry, ill-considered 
 words, he had left home resolved nevermore to be -known 
 by his patronymic till that father himself should acknowl- 
 edge that he honored rather than disgraced it. So, with a 
 natural desire to feel that he had some small right to the 
 name he was henceforth to bear, he had made it into an an- 
 agram ; writing himself, in Rome, as " H. B. Archum ; " 
 and winning, under that title, whatever measure of reputa- 
 tion, as an artist, he now enjoyed. 
 
 For seven years, in America and in Italy, he had led 
 his lonely, struggling artist-life ; absorbed, almost forget- 
 ful ; content to feel that he was slowly climbing toward 
 those heights whereon his soul ever gazed with aspiration 
 and longing. But, during the last summer, a strange 
 homesickness had stolen over him. For the first time, he 
 felt something of the exile's pain. Standing by the turbid 
 Tiber, he saw only the clear, blue river of his boyhood's 
 love. In the Campagna, he dreamed of New England 
 hills and rocks. The churches, palaces, ruins, and sepul- 
 chres of the Eternal City, were continually fading from his 
 ^ sight, and quiet New England homesteads, embowered in 
 lilacs and apple-blossoms, rose in their stead. 
 
 So it had come to pass that, when the time drew near 
 for Rome's foreign population to flee from the atmospheric
 
 SHILOH. 429 
 
 terrors which overhang it, like a pall, in the summer-time, 
 the artist said to himself, 
 
 " Why not spend my summer in my native land ? 
 Why not revisit the scenes of my childhood, secure in 
 the changes that time and foreign habits have wrought in 
 me, and judge for myself if my father's heart has soft- 
 ened ? I know my mother yearns for her son ! " 
 
 But he had reason to suppose that his father might 
 now be cognizant of his whereabouts and change of 
 name ; a mutual friend, residing in New York, having met 
 and recognized him, in Rome, three years previous. So 
 he twisted his name into a second anagram, H. H. Cam- 
 bur, while a slight acquaintance with Mrs. Danforth, 
 formed abroad, and a more intimate one with an artist 
 friend of hers, had Opened the way for his introduction 
 to Shiloh, in a manner to ensure him courtesy and confi- 
 dence. He had given Mrs. Danforth such outlines of his 
 history as were necessary to account for his change of 
 name from Archum to Cambur, but had not confided to 
 her the real facts of his birthplace and parentage. She 
 supposed him to be living near, not absolutely in, his na- 
 tive town. 
 
 Many things had tended to prolong his stay in Shiloh. 
 He had found a curious charm in residing among the scenes 
 and companions of his boyhood, as a stranger ; sometimes . 
 listening to his own story, and the varied commentary it 
 provoked. He had not been able to decide whether his 
 father really wished for his return, while he had been 
 pained to discover "that his mother was not the mother of 
 his memories and his dreams. All the sweet bloom and foli- 
 age of her character seemed to have .been blighted and 
 stripped oft* by some sharp frost-touch, leaving but a hard, 
 bare, gray, and unattractive outline. Nor did he at once 
 understand that this was the result of his own sudden 
 flight and the long anguish, anxiety and suspense follow- 
 ing it ; aggravated by Major Burcham's stern interdiction
 
 430 SHILOII. 
 
 of any future mention of his name, which had compelled 
 her to shut all her sorrow and care within the depths 
 of her own heart. But, beginning dimly to discern this, 
 at last, he had determined to make himself known to 
 her on his return from the city ; and try whether joy 
 and assurance would not soften and heal where grief and 
 suspense had hardened and irritated. Sickness a surer 
 softener, a better reconciler, than either had anticipated 
 him ! 
 
 Now, too, the history of Leo's night-search for Harry 
 Burcham was made known by the mouth of four witnesses. 
 
 Mrs. Baird (with whom the artist boarded) stated that 
 Leo scratched at her door at nine o'clock, on that Satur- 
 day evening ; that she admitted him ; that lie rushed 
 straightway up to the studio, and there scratched and 
 whined until she opened that door to him, also, and satis- 
 fied him that the room was empty ; whereupon, he rushed 
 out again, and was seen no more. 
 
 Mrs. Danforth's statement ran thus: 
 
 " I was in the sitting-room with the children, when Leo 
 marched in, all dripping, through the long window that 
 opens on the veranda. Seeing a roll of something in his 
 mouth, and knowing that you are in the habit of using 
 him as a telegraph, a mail-carrier, an express-wagon, and 
 every sort of go-all, fetch-all, and carry-all, I took it for 
 granted that his errand was to me. But he would not suf- 
 fer me to touch the roll ; when I insisted, he growled, 
 not a musical nor a reassuring sound, by any means ! So 
 I suffered him to take his own course. He raced around 
 the room, smelt the chairs and the carpet, looked disgusted, 
 put his head on one side, seemed to ask himself, ' What shall 
 I do next ?' and departed just as he had come." 
 
 The depot-master testified that " Mr. Divine's big New- 
 foundland came into the depot, that night, just as I was 
 beginning to shut up ; smelt round a little, and went out 
 at the back door, about ten or fifteen minutes after Mr.
 
 SHILOH. 431 
 
 Cambur I mean, Mr. Burcham went out the same way, 
 with Squire Delbyn. I noticed that he went with his nose 
 to the ground, as if he was following a trail." 
 
 Harry furnished the sequel, in telling his own story, as 
 follows : 
 
 "The cars were late; we arrived in the midst of the 
 thunder-storm. There were no teams at the depot, nothing 
 but a drenched horse and buggy belonging to Mr. Delbyn, 
 who was a fellow-passenger on the train. We waited until it 
 was plain that the storm was settling into a steady, heavy 
 rain, likely to last through the night ; then, Mr. Delbyn said 
 to me, ' You won't get any chance to ride to Shiloh, to-night, 
 and you certainly won't foot it over, in this storm ; besides, 
 it is so dark you can't see your hand before your face. Get 
 into my buggy and go home with me ; in the morning I'll 
 take or send you over to Shiloh, with pleasure.' The offer 
 was too seasonable a one to be refused. We started ; but 
 ran into a tree in tvirning the first corner I never saw so 
 dark a night ! Mr. Delbyn got- out, to extricate the wheel, 
 and feel his way back to the road, for he could not see it. 
 At the same moment a heavy body plunged into the buggy, 
 and Leo thrust his nose and your tablets into my hand ! I 
 suspected some calamity at once. Mr. Delbyn, being a 
 smoker, was provided with matches ; I lighted one under 
 my hat, and made out to read what you had written. He 
 now insisted upon taking me over to Shiloh ; so we turned 
 about, and took a fresh start in that direction, creeping 
 along at a snail's pace, and almost literally feeling the road. 
 Just beyond Clay Corner, we ran into the fence. Here, I 
 made up my mind that, under the circumstances, pedes- 
 trianism was to be preferred to wheeling. So I got out, 
 thanked my kind friend, turned his horse's head in the 
 direction of his home, bade him good-night, and plodded 
 on with Leo. At first, I was continually getting out of the 
 road, into th- ditch, or among the bushes and stones ; the 
 dog was wholly invisible, his blackness blended indistin-
 
 4C2 8HLLOH. 
 
 guishably with the pitchy darkness of the night. Finally, 
 I bethought myself to fasten my handkerchief into his collar, 
 and the dim white spot guided me surely, and even swiftly, 
 to my fathei*'s door." 
 
 " But how," said I, " could Leo have divined that you 
 were in Mr. Delbyn's wagon ? " 
 
 " Probably he heard the sound of the wheels, in the dis- 
 tance, and reasoned that it was worth while to follow them, 
 not knowing what else to do. Or he may have caught the 
 sound of our voices ; his ears ai - e quick, and that corner 
 where we first came to grief, is not far from the depot. 
 Faithful, sagacious fellow ! I wonder if Mr. Divine would 
 let me have him, now ! I would give him anything he 
 chooses to ask." 
 
 " I think not. You know Leo once saved Mr. Divine's 
 life. He would sell half his farm before he would consent 
 to part with him." 
 
 " I am afraid so," returned Harry, with a sigh. " But 
 you have not yet told me how you found me out ! " 
 
 " Leo is, responsible for that, too. Do you remember 
 the day he caught you sketching us, in the glen ? I was 
 then perfectly well satisfied that you and he were old ac- 
 quaintances, although you chose to ignore it. And wnen I 
 learned that Major Burcham had a runaway son, an artist, 
 - and Leo's first master, the chain of evidence was complete, 
 and the point whither it tended, manifest." 
 
 "I wonder, sometimes," said the artist, thoughtfully, 
 "whether my life would not have been better, happier, 
 nobler, even, if I had 'stayed at home, done my father's 
 will, and made my mother happy ! Might I not look back 
 upon it with more satisfaction ? " 
 
 " You surely do not regret giving your life to Art?" 
 
 " No, only the manner of doing it. I seem to see that it , 
 would have been better to wait for God, who gave the 
 talent, to open a lawful road to its exercise. Besides, Art 
 does not mean, to me, all that it did once. I thought it
 
 8HILOH. 433 
 
 the regenerator, I find it is but the refiner and polisher, of 
 mankind. And a great deal of outward fineness and finish 
 may co-exist with inward foulness and turpitude. Those 
 Avonderful, mutilated fragments of Greek sculpture, which 
 no modern art can rival, were wrought in days of such 
 social depravity as is almost unmentionable, in our times. 
 I have long since been convinced of the utter futility of 
 that gospel of beauty, which so many preach, at the pres- 
 ent day, and upon which so many others rest their hopes 
 for the regeneration of mankind ! Art, alone, is impotent 
 to that end! Only the Gospel of Christ can purify the 
 heart and ennoble the character. But, as soon as we admit 
 that, a new standard of life rises before us. We see that it 
 is not so much its outward form and object, as its spirit, 
 which makes it beautiful and noble. I seem to catch, 
 dimly, glimpses of a life of obedience, patience, humility, 
 self-sacrifice, of outward narrowness, even, lived here in 
 Shiloh ; which, in its spirit and aim, would be loftier and 
 lovelier than any artist's life in Rome. Ah ! if I had only 
 been strong enough, and patient enough, and noble enough, 
 to have lived it ! " 
 
 " Go back to your studio," said I, " and paint the "Wise 
 Virgin ! I am sure you can do it, now ! And so painted, 
 it will serve to show that if Art, of herself, cannot purify 
 the heart nor ennoble the life, she may be one of God's 
 blessed instruments for doing both." 
 
 " Do you think so ? " he exclaimed, his face lighting up 
 with all an artist's fire and fervor " do you really think 
 so?" 
 
 19
 
 XLI. 
 
 THE EMPTY CHAIE. 
 
 LL this time, the fever spread. It was creat- 
 ing something like a panic, in Shiloh. 
 Many persons avoided the houses where 
 it had entered. "Watchers were hard to find. 
 Aunt Vin's good offices were in constant 
 demand, either for the sick or the dead. She 
 gave them freely ; yet she was looking much 
 Avorn. Alice, Ruth, and I, constituted our- 
 selves her corps of assistants, and helped her as we could. 
 But there was work enough for all, it grew continually 
 on our hands. 
 
 Coming home after a morning spent with one of the 
 sick ones, I noticed Uncle True at the woodpile, leaning his 
 head on his hand, in an attitude of weariness unusual to 
 him. 
 
 " "Wall, I don't feel reel smart," said he, in answer to 
 my hurried inquiry if anything was amiss. "There's a 
 singin' in my head that ain't birds ; and once in a while the 
 woodpile trots round me like a horse round a cider-press. 
 I hope it's agrindin' out suthin' that's worth while ! Some 
 on us takes lots o' grin din' before the reel good juice gits 
 squoze out, ready to be cleared by the blood o' Christ and 
 stored in the kingdom o' God. They used to clear wine 
 with blood, sometimes, ye know. I guess it had a meanin', 
 most things do have, if you only know how to find it." 
 
 I took his hand. The quick pulse, the dry, hot touch, 
 I was getting to understand these symptoms only too well !
 
 SHILOH. 435 
 
 "Is't the fever?" he asked, simply. 
 
 No need to deceive the good old man, with his guile- 
 less, trustful face, so childlike through all its wrinkles ! 
 " I am afraid it is," I answered, gravely. 
 
 " I kinder thought so. You see that holler in Hart's 
 rock, thar, 's run dry this two days. And though I ain't 
 superstitious, I know the Lord made the rock, and takes 
 count o' the water, and He might mean it marcifully as a 
 hint to me that my spring o' life's arunnin' dry, too, with- 
 out goin' out o' His way, partic'larly, to do it. I've allers 
 found His ways and works full o' signs for my good or my 
 comfort, when I looked arter 'em. This woodpile, now, it's 
 pooty considerable of a world itself. It's got crooked sticks 
 and straight uns, little uns and big uns, green uns and dry 
 uns, sound uns and holler uns, hard uns and soft uns. And 
 they all have to take their turn in the fire of affliction. 
 But see how different they act thar ! Some on 'em begin 
 to give out light and heat right off; it does you good to 
 see 'em burn, they take it so cheerful like, as if they meant 
 to find out the good in it; but there's others that does 
 nothin' but fizzle an' sizzle, an' sug an' smoke, an' try not 
 to stay put, you may poke 'em an' stir 'em an' turn 'em 
 over, jest as much as you like, but you can't coax a good 
 blaze an' a revivin' wannth out on 'em, an' do yer best ! 
 Howsomever, they all go to ashes, at the last." 
 
 " Is not that rather a sad conclusion ? " I asked. 
 
 " Not a mite of it. We don't throw away our ashes, 
 you know; they're good for manure, or -lye, or suthin'. 
 And the Lord don't throw away His'n, no more, I guess. 
 They're safe enough in His hands." Then he took up the 
 axe, and drew his finger lightly along its edge. " I'm glad 
 I give it a good grindin' up yisterday," said he. " I allers 
 like to leave my tools in good order. It's tryin' to human 
 natur to have to stop and sharpen up tools that somebody 
 else has dulled, before you can go to work yourself. Many
 
 4:36 8HILOH. 
 
 a good mind for work's been sp'iled that way. Wall, 
 p'raps I'd better be agittin' into the house, while I can." 
 
 At the gate, he paused and looked round on the familial- 
 landscape, rich with its autumnal glory. 
 
 " It's a pooty world," said he, " and a good world, for 
 the Lord made it. And, seems to me, it never looked 
 pootier than it does now. But I guess 'taint the best He 
 can turn out. And His will be done ! " 
 
 And thus Uncle True quitted the scene of his active 
 labors. 
 
 The fever wrought very gently with him. He was not 
 tortured with thirst nor pain ; much of the time he slept 
 quietly, or lay in a kind of misty stupor that had the 
 appearance of sleep. Six days of care and watching, on 
 our part ; six days of patient waiting upon the Lord, on 
 his ; and the watching and the waiting were both over. / 
 
 The morning before he died, he said to me, while his 
 eyes rested lovingly on his old arm-chair, the faithful com- 
 panion of so many years, now standing empty by his bed, 
 " You wouldn't think it, would ye, now, Miss Frost ? but 
 that old chair thar's been the greatest blessin' the Lord 
 ever give me. I had suthin' of a wild turn in my young 
 days, and if He hadn't fust thrown me out of a wagon, 
 and then sot me down in that chair for the rest o' my life, 
 thar's no tellin' how swift to do evil my feet might have 
 got to be ! That chair's been the Hand o' Providence res- . 
 trainin' me, and the Everlastin' Arms round me, all my 
 days, though I- never see it quite so clear afore. If you've 
 got any cross to bear and sometimes I've kinder suspected 
 you had, though you've allers done your best to show 
 a bright face and not shadder other folks with your 
 troubles ; but if you've got any, take my word for't, the 
 time'll come when you'll thank the Lord more for that 
 cross than for all the pleasant things that ever He poured 
 into your bosom." 
 
 Shortly after, he turned his face to the wall. " I feel as
 
 SHILOH. 437 
 
 if I could sleep a little," said he. " Sleep's about as good a 
 thing as the Lord gives us, I reckon ; it comes reel refreshin' 
 at the end of a hard day's work, or onto a bed of sickness. 
 Some think it's a type o' death. I shouldn't wonder if 
 'twas, one ain't to be dreaded no more'n tother, I reckon, 
 by them that love the Lord." 
 
 None of us could tell when the type became the reality. 
 We only knew that the waking was beyond our sight, past 
 the shadow wherein man walketh and disquieteth himself 
 in vain, in the sunshine of the eternal shore. 
 
 For the sake of convenience, on the morning of the fun- 
 eral, Uncle True's chair was restored to its wonted, out-of- 
 the-way corner of the kitchen fireplace, and there it stands 
 still. Through the day it tells its quiet story of a humble 
 life well lived, a humble cross cheerfully borne, a humble 
 spirit divinely nurtured into rare beauty of holiness and 
 dignity of faith ; and at evening time, seen through the 
 dancing firelight, by eyes dim with a slow-gathering mois- 
 ture (that seldom falls in a tear), it becomes a dazzling, 
 iridescent throne, fit to stand by the Crystal River, under 
 the boughs of the Tree of Life. Over it Bona, Mala, and 
 I, have many subdued talks. Of the latest of these, being 
 yet fresh in my memory, I give a brief report. 
 
 I had been thinking not only of Uncle True's sweet, 
 mellow, genial character, and of the wisdom unto salvation 
 whereof he had gathered such rich store ; but of the seem- 
 ingly infertile soil of infirmity and bachelorhood but of 
 which these had bloomed. So far as I could learn, Uncle 
 True had never known love human love, par excellence^ 
 that is neither in its joy, nor in its sorrow. Yet who, 
 looking at the first and highest end of our earthly existence, 
 namely, the developing and training of the germ of im- 
 mortal life within us until it is fit for transplantation into 
 the King's Garden, which end being gained, all other 
 losses may count for nothing, and which being lost, all 
 other successes are worse than failures ; who, looking at
 
 438 SHILOH. 
 
 these things, would dare to call Uncle True's life incom- 
 plete ? And so I began the talk by asking myself: 
 
 " Have the poets all been wrong, then, in singing human 
 love as the sweetest, the richest, and the most ennobling 
 thing in human life ? " 
 
 MALA. Assuredly not. Look at the great and glorious 
 deeds whereof it has been the inspiration ! at the courage, 
 the patience, the fortitude, the self-sacrifice, the constancy, 
 the heroism which it has brought forth ! What grand na- 
 tures it has helped to enlarge and enrich ! what lovely ones 
 to beautify and refine ! 
 
 BONA. A fair picture, and not without a certain truth. 
 But it has black shadows, be mine the painful task to 
 point them out ! Look at the sinful and shameful acts of 
 which Love is often the motive, the deceit, treachery, vice, 
 degradation, misery, remorse, and despair, of which it is the 
 too prolific parent. What gifted minds it has helped to 
 drag down to the dust ! what gentle hearts it has soured, 
 withered, or hardened ! No, no ! Human Love, though it 
 may sweeten human life more than anything else, if its 
 course do but run tolerably smooth, does not necessarily 
 ennoble, nor unqualifiedly enrich, it. If it is entire, absorb- 
 ing, satisfying, it tends to narrowness of aims and sympa- 
 thies, and so to poverty of life and experience ; if it is not, 
 it provokes doubt, jealousy, anger, and discontent, on the 
 one hand, and on the other, leaves the way open for trifling, 
 falsehood, duplicity, and a gradual searing of heart and 
 conscience, likely to end in actual crime. Crossed or dis- 
 appointed, its only natural fruit is sorrow. In its unhal- 
 lowed, illicit form, no need to say how surely it tends to 
 infamy and ruin ! 
 
 MALA. Do you pretend to deny that Love has arrested 
 many a youth's depraved and downward course, and lifted 
 it up to purer air ? 
 
 BONA. Not at all ; no more than you will deny that it 
 has hindered, 6r turned aside and befouled, many another
 
 8HILOH. 439 
 
 that was struggling up toward righteousness. But let us 
 not forget that, in both these cases, Love was less a con- 
 trolling power than a mighty lever, either in the hands of 
 the Spirit of Evil or the Spirit of Good. Satan tries all in- 
 struments to work out his evil purposes ; God blesses many 
 means to His wise ends. Often He gives us Divine help 
 through human hands. Graciously He orders or permits 
 that an earthly love shall illume or direct the first step or 
 two in the heavenward path, while the heart is still far 
 from Him and the ear deaf to His call ; but if the pilgrim 
 do not soon learn to look to a purer and more steadfast 
 light, and to depend upon a higher and safer guidance, he 
 will never get far on the heavenly road. Left to the nat- 
 ural impulses of the natural heart, Love becomes but a 
 blind leader of the blind, and it is by God's mercy alone 
 that both do not fall into the ditch. 
 
 I. The drift of all which appears to be that Love par- 
 takes of the nature of the soil from whence it springs : 
 from a pure heart, a pure sentiment ; from a vicious heart, 
 a vile one. 
 
 BONA. And a pure heart is from whence ? 
 
 I. From the grace of God, duly sought in prayer, and 
 faithfully applied in thought and act. 
 
 BONA. It follows, then, you see, that God's grace is the 
 true inspiration, the original cause, of whatever, is really 
 noble, pure, lovely, and of good report, in human love ! 
 
 MALA (insidiously). Do you not see that she wholly 
 ignores all the good, great, generous, beneficent deeds 
 done in the name and service of Love by men who never 
 thought, nor cared, to seek God's grace ? 
 
 BOKA. Take care that your eyes are not dazzled by 
 worldly glory, neither suffer yourself to confound worldly 
 honor with the Divine blessing. No deed can rightly be 
 called good, except it spring from an earnest desire to do 
 God's will and a loving regard for the honor of His 
 name, no matter how wisely and well He may overrule
 
 440 SHILOH. 
 
 its 'results to the good of mankind and His own glory. 
 Nor must we forget how strong an indirect influence re- 
 ligion exerts upon unrenewed hearts. Little does a man of 
 the world realize that what he proudly calls his " honor," 
 is but the shadow of the fairer form of Christian virtue ; 
 and that his integrity, benevolence, temperance, and what- 
 ever is comprehended under the head .of morality, have their 
 deep root in the Divine law that thundered from Sinai, and 
 draw their unseen nourishment from the gentle precepts 
 that dropped from the lips of Christ ! And even so, human 
 love continually perhaps unconsciously touches the hem 
 of her divine sister's robe, and is insensibly penetrated and 
 purified by her virtue. Without this involuntary borrow- 
 ing, this unacknowledged help, how inevitably would she 
 go astray, how often would she perish ! 
 
 I (rather sadly). And so Art and Song and Poetry have 
 all gone wrong, in their long apotheosis of human Love ! 
 In lavishing upon it their brightest colors, tenderest mel- 
 odies, and sweetest numbers, they have insensibly led to 
 an undue magnifying of its importance and an over esti- 
 mate of its power ! 
 
 BONA. "Would it hurt you much if I were to say, yes ? 
 Alas ! Art, Poetry, and Song, are too much of the earth, 
 earthy ; their immortal spirit is hampered by a mortal 
 body, or misread by mortal interpreters. Servants of 
 earthly Beauty, and lovers of earthly Love, artists and 
 poets and musicians forget that no heart was ever regener- 
 ated by the one, no soul ever saved by the other ! They 
 forget, too, that all of their work which cannot be made 
 to subserve these vital ends, is worthless, and must utterly 
 perish ! 
 
 I looked grave, perhaps sorrowful. For a moment, I 
 was in doubt how many of the sweet creations of genius 
 would stand this test. But, after a swift, timid glance 
 sent round the world of imagination, I took courage. Few 
 of the characters which one would really sorrow to miss
 
 SHILOH. 441 
 
 from that fair land, but shine with some soft reflection of 
 heavenly virtue, or walk in the strength and serenity of a 
 divine faith. Even that genius, which, in its life and creed, 
 violates every principle of religion sets at naught its pre- 
 cepts and denies its power is forced, in its works, to pay 
 reluctant homage to the beauty of holiness, and to irradi- 
 ate its creations with the light of Divine truth. 
 
 Seeing this point established in my mind beyond her 
 power to shake it, Mala suddenly recurred to that at which 
 the talk began. " Still," said she, " we must admit the 
 experience of the whole world goes to prove it that nothing 
 develops the higher nature like Love, that it as essential 
 to life's completeness, as it unquestionably is to its hap- 
 piness." 
 
 BOXA. We must admit nothing that arraigns God's 
 providence, nothing that questions His wisdom or His 
 goodness. There are lives into which love never enters (in 
 the shape under consideration), yet we may safely believe 
 that God withholds from no soul anything essential to its 
 preparation for a future state of being. If you find Love 
 in your path, either its sunshine or its gloom, you may 
 fairly infer that it is 'meant to you for good, that it is 
 a part of that mysterious process, by which time educates 
 for eternity, an instrument which, if used aright, will do 
 you good service in shaping your course for heaven. But 
 if you find it not, you may rest assured that to you it 
 would have been a hindrance and a snare, and you can 
 work out your salvation more surely and safely without it. 
 Be not deceived by that plausible word, " completeness." 
 Human life, being what it is, a means, a seedtime, a pro- 
 bation, looking to a future state for its end, its harvest, its 
 entering into possession, is, and must be, from its very 
 nature, incomplete. No estimate of it, that takes not 
 eternity into the account, is worth anything. But with that 
 important addition, how quickly the balances change ! 
 What seems most incomplete here, may there round out 
 10*
 
 442 SHILOH. 
 
 into the fulness of orbed perfection. The life that was 
 lived without love technically so called may be found to 
 have been fullest of that divine Charity, who holds both the 
 life that now is and that which is to come in her sof^ em- 
 brace, greatest of " these three," in their abiding upon 
 earth, and sole survivor of them in the ages of endless 
 fruition and perfect knowing ! The point which I wish to 
 impress upon you being, that all material which God gives 
 us, not love, nor talents, nor influence, nor successes 
 alone, but all things, losses, failures, hindrances, disap- 
 pointments, impoverishments, may be so wrought into our 
 life-temple by patient labor and fervent faith, that the com- 
 pleted structure shall show no deficiency, no incongruity, 
 no want of fair proportion and costly adornment ; but every 
 stone shall seem chosen and fitted for its place ; and all 
 shall be polished into the similitude of that diviner temple 
 " eternal in the heavens." Human love may be one of its 
 carved and gilded capitals ; or a lofty, illuminated arch ; or 
 a great, rich glory of an altar-window, many hued, and 
 crowded with luminous blazonry of sacred symbolism ; or 
 only a blood-incrusted, ebony cross ; or its absence may 
 make room for a more minute and delicate finish of all the 
 parts, a softer, chaster, more mellow and harmonious diffu- 
 sion and exquisiteness of beauty ! 
 
 And yet there is a certain sense in which Love is an ef- 
 ficient element of moral training ; everywhere felt, but 
 dimly discerned, and therefore vaguely expressed. But 
 that efficiency grows out of its infirmity, its faithlessness, its 
 earthliness, the very qualities, you observe, which most 
 surely detract from the sum of human happiness, and 
 which each one most earnestly deprecates, in his own 
 experience. Yet, like our Lord, we must needs be made 
 perfect through suffering. And to most hearts no suf- 
 fering like that which comes from the affections ! none 
 penetrates so deep, nor rankles so long, nor is so little sus- 
 ceptible of earthly consolation. But, in the black depths.
 
 SHILOH. 443 
 
 of that bitterest of sorrows, the soul often finds the pearl 
 of divine love, and struggles up with it to the fair shore of 
 Peace. Out of the loneliness of bereavement or desertion 
 is first born that deep, tender, spiritual yearning for the 
 visible presence of its Lord " My soul thirsteth for Thee, 
 my flesh also longeth after Thee, in a barren and dry land, 
 where no water is ! " And thus we reap a richer harvest 
 from Love's losses than ever we could have gathered in 
 from its increase. Out of its barrenness, or its ashes, its 
 divine sister rises winged, and we are alone no more 
 forever ! 
 
 All this and much more said Bong, softly to me over 
 Uncle True's empty chair, from which Mala had flown dis- 
 comfited. A wonderful touchstone is it by which to try 
 earthly experiences and possessions. Worldly balances un- 
 dergo strange transformations in its light ; debt and credit, 
 profit and loss, change places. And daily it recalls and 
 points the good old man's last comfortable assurance, 
 " Take my word for't, Miss Frost, the time'll come when 
 you'll thank the Lord more for that cross than for all the 
 pleasant things that ever He poured into your bosom." 
 
 And sometimes, Francesca, it seems to me that that 
 tune, if not yet come, is swiftly coming is near at hand. 
 
 So near, at least, that I can now bear to set down how 
 the cross came and of what material it was wrought, Now, 
 you shall know all the strange, sad story of the two months 
 that intervened between that joy-cry sent you from the 
 fulness of a happy heart, " Paul has told me that he loves 
 me ; count us one forevermore ! " and that brief, bitter sen- 
 tence, wrung from the depths of a crushed, exhausted spirit, 
 " Paul and I are two ; never mention his name to me 
 again ! "
 
 XLII. 
 
 THE TREACHEROUS FLOWER. 
 
 |EYER till now, Francesca, could I have borne 
 to rake out and sift these ashes of my heart ; 
 thank you for awaiting the process so patient- 
 ly. It is not every friend that knows how to be 
 at once sympathetic and silent, tender without 
 exaction, and interested without inquisitiveness. 
 But first, how the love was told ; for that is 
 essential to a clear understanding of the rest. 
 It so happened that we were all in the drawing-room, 
 on that March morning Flora; Sylvia Gay, a friend of hers ; 
 Marcia Bodley, a friend of mine ; Winnie Frost, a friend of 
 yours when Paul was shown in. It chanced, too, that I 
 was sitting near the door, so I heard him say to the servant 
 in the hall, with marked emphasis, "Miss Winnie Frost, 
 mind ; " saw the slight start of surprise and brief expres- 
 sion of chagrin with which he caught sight of our party ; 
 and felt my cheek flush with a sudden, shy consciousness 
 of what these things might bode. Recovering his equa- 
 nimity immediately, however, he drew a chair into our cir- 
 cle ; and Sylvia, with her wonted, free, dashing manner 
 toward gentlemen, made him acquainted with the subject 
 in hand. 
 
 " You are just in time, Mr. Venner. I am taking counsel, 
 and ' in a multitude,' and so forth, there is wisdom. The 
 uncomfortable truth is, that I cannot afford a new dress for 
 Mrs. Bizarre's grand reception to-night, and there must be
 
 SHILOH. 445 
 
 a rentree of some one of the stock in hand. I am halting 
 between two opinions supposing one opinion to represent 
 my white moire, and the other, my pink tarlatan. You 
 have seen me in both which are you longing to behold 
 me in again ? " 
 
 "Miss Gay looks so well in both, as to leave me no 
 ground for a choice," he returned, bowing somewhat list- 
 lessly. " Nor is it likely that I shall have the pleasure of 
 seeing her in either to-night. I am suddenly called to New 
 Orleans, on important business. I must take the three 
 o'clock train in the morning, and I have scant time, for all 
 that must be done beforehand ; it was with difficulty that I 
 could find a moment to come and bid you good-bye." His 
 gesture comprehended the party, but his eyes rested full 
 on me. 
 
 There was a chorus of regrets and deprecations from the 
 three girls. Sylvia's Avere loudest and longest. " Prepos- 
 terous !" she exclaimed, " why, this is to be the affair of the 
 season. Besides, you cannot do any business this evening." 
 
 " There is to be a consultation of the firm at my uncle's, 
 and I must be present." 
 
 "And your uncle's is on the same block as the Bi- 
 zarre' s. You can certainly look in when the consultation 
 is over." 
 
 He sat looking at her absently, meditatively. 
 
 " Don't stare at me in that Mrs. Jellyby fashion," she 
 went on, saucily. " Come back from the left bank of the 
 Nile, and tell me you will look in at the Bizarre's to-night, 
 and see how brilliant we all are." 
 
 " Well, possibly I may." 
 
 " Good ! " she returned, in excellent humor at the con- 
 cession. " And now for your vote on the dress question, 
 don't think to escape with a compliment. Which shall it 
 be, pink or white ? " 
 
 There was the faintest possible curl of the lip, I thought, 
 accompanying the reply. " If I might presume to recom-
 
 446 SHILOH. 
 
 mend either, it would be the white moire, because it is 
 going to be a chilly night." 
 
 " How absurd ! " laughed Sylvia. " As if it mattered 
 in the least what temperature is outside of a crowded recep- 
 tion ! You see the kind of criticism your tulle is to en- 
 counter, Flora." . 
 
 To my unspeakable amazement, Paul suddenly roused 
 to an appearance of interest in the subject. Looking at 
 Marcia, he said : 
 
 " And in what, may I ask, is Miss Bodley to be beauti- 
 ful to-night ?" 
 
 "In pink silk and white roses," she replied, with mock 
 seriousness. " I hope they meet your approval." 
 
 " Entirely," with a grave bow. " And Miss Winnie 
 how am I to find her in the crowd ? " 
 
 " By your lack of any toilet-data to guide you," answer- 
 ed I, quietly, for the tone of the conversation had jarred 
 upon me a little. 
 
 " How disobliging ! " exclaimed Sylvia. " I will tell 
 you, Mr. Venner ; she is to wear blue silk and dignity ! 
 Which becoming trimming will be visible and unmistak- 
 able at any distance ! " 
 
 " Thank you," replied Paul, gravely ; " I have now all the 
 information I require." And very soon he took his leave. 
 
 At dusk, a box and a letter were left at the door for me. 
 In the box, rich, creamy, odorous, saflrona rosebuds ; in the 
 letter, a man's love, strong, tender, true at least, I thought 
 so then ! 
 
 " If there is any feeling in your heart which answers to 
 mine," the letter concluded, " wear these rosebuds to-night. 
 Seeing them in your hair, on your bosom, I shall under- 
 stand what it would be very sweet to hear you say ! See- 
 ing them not, I shall understand, not less plainly what it 
 will be very hard to bear ! " 
 
 Ah ! Francesca, how exquisitely, girlishly, exuberantly 
 happy I was! Impossible to shut it all within my own
 
 SHILOH. 4:47 
 
 heart, and hence that joyous postscript to you! Before 
 the night was over, how gladly would I have recalled it ! 
 
 My toilet for the evening was completed, all but the 
 rosebuds; they should wait till the last moment, that their 
 beauty and freshness might be unimpaired. Meanwhile, I 
 heard little Bella crying in the nursery; the child was 
 timid and forlorn in her new nurse's hands, and sorrowful 
 for the old one, lately discharged. I opened the door, and 
 she held out her little arms to me with a piteous wail and a 
 look of entreaty, not to be resisted. My heart was so full 
 of happiness that it was most fit the little one should profit 
 by the overflow, I thought there was enough for both of 
 us, and to spare ; so I took her into my room, and gave her 
 a blissful half-hour of stories and caresses. 
 
 Then Aunt Belle's maid knocked at the door, " Would 
 you please step to Miss Flora's room a moment ? she wants 
 your advice about her hair." 
 
 I opened the door into the nursery, called hurriedly, 
 " Elise, come and see to Bella ! " and went. Twenty min- 
 utes Flora kept me, commenting, altering, discussing, till 
 her coronal was arranged to her liking. " Thank you," said 
 she, at length, " it is quite right now. Go and finish your- 
 self ; it is nearly time for the carriage." 
 
 I entered my room, humming an air. It was the last 
 of my singing for many days. On the floor sat Bella, by 
 her side an upturned box, all around a litter of creamy 
 petals and green leaves. She held up the last fragment of 
 a rosebud to me, with a smile. At the same time the nurse 
 entered. 
 
 "Why did you not come when I called?" I asked, 
 faintly. 
 
 " Did you call ? " returned the woman. " I did not hear 
 you. I just ran down stairs a moment. Shall I take Miss 
 Bella out?" 
 
 The child cried, and ran from her. Captured at last, she 
 was carried out, wailing. I sat quite still, cold, and silent.
 
 448 SHILOH. 
 
 The maid reappeared. " The carriage is waiting, Miss. 
 Mrs. Frost begs you will hurry." She put a shawl round 
 me, and I descended mechanically. 
 
 In the carriage I gathered courage. Paul would misin- 
 terpret at first, of course ; but it would be easy to unde- 
 ceive him as soon as we spoke together ; some way for ex- 
 planation must open. I could not admit any other conclu- 
 sion. 
 
 The reception you know what those things are like 
 a crush of silk, tulle, and broadcloth ; snatches of talk, 
 snatches of music, snatches of supper I need not describe 
 it. I moved through it all like one in a dream, a single 
 thought in my heart. 
 
 Midnight drew near. Standing by the mantel, I heard 
 the French clock strike the sombre hour in the midst of the 
 gay scene. Some quick intuition made me look up. In the 
 doorway opposite, between two smiling faces, I saw an- 
 other, so pale, so gloomy, so stern, that I scarcely knew it 
 for Paul's. One moment, its sad reproachful gaze met 
 mine, and it was gone ! 
 
 Unconsciously, I took a step or two toward the vacant 
 place. The crowd surged heavily between, and threw me 
 back. 
 
 Half an hour after, Flora found me, sitting stonily in a 
 corner. " Why, how pale you are ! " she said, in alarm, 
 " and you shiver like an aspen leaf. What's the matter ? 
 Are you ill ? " And she went for Aunt Belle, whose stiff 
 satin soon rustled by my side. She ordered Uncle John 
 and the carriage, and sent me home with a charitable hope 
 that I was " not going to be sick." 
 
 I was not sick. The next morning, to be sure, I rose 
 with a dull pain in head and heart ; but I went about 
 much as usual, and not particularly wretched. Paul would 
 return in due time, I thought ; we should meet ; all would 
 be made right. In that conviction, I lived and breathed. 
 
 Two months went slowly by. About the middle of
 
 SHILOH. 449 
 
 May, Marcia Bodley called. " Have you heard the news ? " 
 she asked. " Paul Venner is to be married to a young lady 
 in New Orleans." 
 
 " Impossible ! " burst from my lips. 
 
 " Indeed, it is not. Here is a letter I received yester- 
 day from cousin Hallie. Seeing is believing; read that 
 paragraph." 
 
 I read accordingly: "Tell me what is pretty for a 
 bridesmaid to wear ; I am to stand with Adele Roche. She 
 will be married in June to Mr. Paul Venner, recently made 
 a partner in the house of ' Venner & Co.' you must know 
 the New York branch. He is a splendid fellow, and she is 
 as good as she is pretty, which is saying much," etc., etc. 
 
 I crept up to my room, after she had gone, and felt as if 
 the foundations of the earth were shaking under my feet ! 
 
 I grew pale ; I grew thin ; I lost my appetite ; I forgot 
 how to smile. The doctor gave me a course of "iron," 
 unnecessary trouble, so much had already entered into my 
 soul ! Finally, at his wit's end, he prescribed country air, 
 change of scene, etc. And so I came to Shiloh, seeking a 
 " Place of Rest " rest from the bitterness of Paul Venner's 
 memory. I have found it, too, in " Shiloh ; " but I think 
 not now of the quiet little hamlet, so fair under the dreamy 
 autumn haze, so restful, even to sluggishness, in its aspect, 
 oh, Francesca, how could I have missed so long that 
 deeper, sweeter meaning of the word which lends such 
 music to Israel's blessing of Judah ! " Until Shiloh come " 
 into the heart, and until the gathering of 'its hopes and 
 affections be " unto Him ; " there is no place of rest for it 
 in the universe ! But, with Him, entereth the fulness of 
 rest unutterable, the soft ripple of peace " that floweth as a 
 river ! " 
 
 And now si taccia delpassato. Here hath it its decent 
 burial, its sufficient epitaph. It hath done God's work ; . 
 driving me out of myself because introversion was so intol- 
 erable, forcing me to live in the present and in eternity, 
 19
 
 4-50 SHILOH. 
 
 "because earth's future was so blank, it hath brought me 
 to see wherein life's real value lies ; to taste the sweetness 
 that comes, not of the work done, but of the doing it unto 
 the Lord. So, let it rest in peace ! 
 
 In finishing this letter, I seem also to have gotten to the 
 end of all my energies. A strange languor, that is half 
 weariness and half delicious peace, has hung about me all 
 day, and grown with every word I have written. Good 
 night !
 
 XLIII. 
 
 THE FINDING OF THE CLUE. 
 
 [Francesco, to her Husband in Europe J\ 
 
 TRUCE to domestic historiography in this 
 letter. Content yourself in knowing that 
 the home- world revolves smoothly, by sun- 
 shine and starshine. My mind is too full of 
 Winnie and her affairs for possibility of other 
 chronicle. Besides I want to make confes- 
 sion, and get absolution yours, the only 
 mortal remission I care for ! 
 I have been meddling. I am a would-be Providence, 
 with a rankling fear of turning out an evil geniiis. Need- 
 less to say (to you !) that I have been yielding to a head- 
 strong impulse, and now begin to question its right to 
 obedience. Write tout de suite, and pronounce that I have 
 done well, or that I have not done ill, and deliver me from 
 this bond of fear, this gall of uncertainty. 
 
 To afford you the necessary standpoint for your judg- 
 ment, I enclose Winnie's last letter. Stop, precisely here, 
 and read it. 
 
 Have you done so ? Now recall the fact that, next to 
 you, she is the dearest thing I have on earth. Ere your 
 love lapped me in incalculable opulence, I counted myself 
 rich in hers. Remember how she stood by me, in my trial 
 "as by fire." Reflect what a woman she is, strong of 
 mind, lofty of soul, tender of heart. Then, knowing me as
 
 452 SHILOH. 
 
 you do, to the innermost, you will be able to picture my 
 reading of it. How I fumed and glowered ! How I shook 
 the child Bella, in imagination, till she could not tell rose- 
 buds from falling stars ! What vindictive fists I doubled 
 up in Paul Venner's face ! "What fierce sarcasms I hurled 
 at the whole race of male mankind, and how energetically 
 I told my toilet-table that* I was glad Providence had gra- 
 ciously interposed to prevent Winnie from throwing her- 
 self away upon any one of them ! How, finally, when my 
 fury had burnt itself out, I wrapped her in my faithful 
 love, and wept over her tears of regret and pity and 
 despair. 
 
 For I had never credited the rumor of Paul Venner's 
 marriage. My mind refused to take iu the possibility that 
 a man, manly, who had once found entrance into Winnie's 
 great heart and mind, could thereafter endure a narrower 
 abiding place! I believed that the estrangement, however 
 it had grown up, belonged to the order of things remedi- 
 able.* He of the scythe and hour-glass would cut it up, 
 root and branch, in the fulness of time ; its thorny work 
 being done, its bitter-sweet fruit borne. I would lend him 
 a helping hand myself, so soon as home duties should let 
 me out of their grip long enough to look Winnie up, get a 
 succinct account of the affair, and find out where such hand 
 would be in order. Meantime, seeing how her character 
 was getting its crowning grace of humility through it all, 
 I managed to possess my soul in a fuming patience. 
 
 This letter gave a death-blow to my hopes and plans. 
 Paul Venner being married, what remained to be done ? 
 Clearly, nothing but to wish him joy, and Winnie, forget- 
 fulness. Lucky for him that the "joy" did not depend on 
 the sincerity of my good wishes. 
 
 As for Winnie, she declared herself "at peace." The 
 past was not only dead, but buried. Neither ghost nor 
 vision haunted her memory, to disturb or to appal. The 
 stream of her love, dammed up from its late channel, had
 
 8HILOH. 453 
 
 spread into a broad lake, for the mirroring of heaven and 
 the refreshment of the people. 
 
 Stuff and nonsense ! I exclaimed, contemptuously. 
 Docs she think to make me believe that love Tier love 
 can die so easily ? Does she fancy I forget how that vio- 
 loncello voice of hers used to roll its molten richness along 
 the last verse of Parthenia's song, 
 
 " And tell me how love cometh ? " 
 
 " It comes unsought unsent." 
 " And tell me how love goeth ? " 
 
 " That was not love which went ! " 
 
 while I held on to my chair to keep myself in the world of 
 sense ; to know, by touch, that I was somewhere, and not 
 floating out on that purple stream of melody to nowhither ! 
 
 Then I knocked myself down with a suddenly-grasped 
 conviction. Winnie was not the sort of person to consume 
 herself with love and longing for another woman's husband. 
 She would tear such an affection out of her heart, by the 
 roots ; no matter how much bleeding flesh and fibre came 
 with it. And I ! I was Spartan enough, thank Heaven ! to 
 stand by and encourage her in the doing it, though every 
 wrench and every pang had its double in my own ! 
 
 /Sans doute, she had done this. Without human encour- 
 agement; without other cry for help than toward the Cross 
 on Mount Calvary ; without visible shrinking of spirit, or 
 quivering of flesh. Silently, in the strength of God. 
 
 Now, the bloody work was accomplished, the sharp 
 agony over. She was healed, and " at peace." 
 
 Why could I not be more thankful ? Why did I so 
 rebel against the hard necessity ? Because, knowing the 
 sweetness and the rest of happy wedded love, as I do, the 
 comfortableness of being cherished and taken care of, I 
 longed to have Winnie know it also. I did not want her 
 to braid St. Catharine's tresses, though she grew ten times 
 a saint in the process. I wanted her life to have bloom as
 
 454: SHILOH. 
 
 well as fruit. Sweet verdure of earth as well as illimitable 
 blue of heaven. 
 
 But what was to be done about it ? Nothing. Only to 
 write her a comfortful letter, deep rather than broad (we 
 are not the sort of women to bedear and bedarling one 
 another much), tell her I love and honor her above all 
 other women ; and then let her go forth alone into her 
 starlit dusk. That was all ! 
 
 ' Lame and impotent conclusion! It made me frantic 
 with helplessness. It oppressed me as with an insufficiency 
 of air to breathe. I longed for space, freedom, motion. A 
 breezy walk on the Common would, perhaps, give me bet- 
 ter heart to write. I bonneted, shawled, and set forth. 
 
 I walked till I was tired, yet found no rest. A seeming 
 paradox, but a simple truth. You will understand. 
 
 Coming back through Main Street, it occurred to me to 
 step into Mr. Watling's office, and ask for news of Bessie. 
 The business card of " Venner & Co., New Orleans," side 
 by side with another of " Venner & Co., New York," was 
 nearly the first thing that smote my gaze. Glad that my 
 talk might have an excuse for hovering around the engross- 
 ing subject of my thought, however remotely, I inquired if 
 he knew the Venners, personally ? 
 
 "Certainly, all of them, more or less," said he. "I 
 know Mr. Amos Venner, head of the New Orleans house, 
 tolerably well. And Hugh Venner, late head of the New 
 York firm, was my most intimate friend. In truth, we 
 were like brothers. I sorrowed for him as David for 
 Jonathan." 
 
 " Then you know Paul Venner, of course ? " said I. . 
 
 " Which Paul Venner ? " he returned. " Though, to be 
 sure, I know them both." 
 
 How I pricked up my ears and my hopes! There 
 were two Paul Venners, then? Here might be another 
 comedy no, tragedy of errors ! 
 
 Holding up the possibility to look at it, I saw a flaw.
 
 SHILOH. 455 
 
 Doubtless, the twain were uncle and nephew. And it was 
 the junior, unquestionably, that was reported to be a 
 candidate for matrimony. My ears dropped; my hopes 
 likewise. 
 
 " I mean the young man," said I ; "do you know if he 
 is married ? " 
 
 " They are both young men," he answered. " But the 
 question of marriage settles the identity. Paul Venner, of 
 New Orleans, was married last summer. Do you know 
 him?" 
 
 " I have heard him spoken of," I answered, dryly, thrust- 
 ing down by the strong hand an inclination to " speak of " 
 him myself, nippingly as frost. 
 
 Mr. Watling looked at me sharply. " You have heard 
 nothing to his disadvantage, I am sure ; at least you ought 
 not to have done. He is a fine young man, as young 
 men go, which, after all, is saying too little for him, 
 most young men go to the bad in these days. But his 
 cousin, Paul Venner, of New York, is a finer young man 
 still, as young men do not go, brave as a lion, gentle as a 
 lamb, pure as a vestal, wise as a sage, another Bayard, 
 'without fear and without reproach.' I should feel con- 
 siderably easier about our country's future than I do, if I 
 were sure that Uncle Sam could put his finger on fifty more 
 like him, at need. To be candid, I love him like my own 
 son. And it cuts me to the heart that he should be going 
 out of business just now, when the commercial world needs 
 men like him so much, firm, calm, candid, upright men, 
 with stamina and conscience enough to resist the speculat- 
 ing, defaulting, stock-gambling, gold-worshipping tenden- 
 cies of the times." 
 
 I pricked up my ears again. This sounded like Win- 
 nie's first mention of her Paul ! She, too, had quoted the 
 French knight, sans peur et sans reproche. Was there 
 some miserable mistake, after all ? If so, it was my duty 
 to ferret it out.
 
 456 SHILOH. 
 
 " And why," said I, " does he quit business, then ? " 
 Mr. Watling sighed and shook his head. " I suspect 
 it is the old story a woman who ' would, and would not.' 
 Paul owned as much to me when I saw him last. ' His old 
 future was slain to him,' he said. ' He must build a new 
 one out of other and better material.' In short, he had de- 
 termined to study for the ministry. It had been the dream 
 and desire of his youth, but he had given it up at his 
 father's request ; he wanted his son beside him in his count- 
 ing house. He was not sorry that he had yielded ; his 
 commercial training would not come altogether amiss in 
 the ministry; and it was an inexpressible gladness to re- 
 member that he had been by his father's side in dark days 
 of commercial quake and distress, and had been a stay and 
 a comfort to him. But it had pleased God, now, to remove 
 every obstruction from his onward path ; his father needed 
 his help and companionship no more ; he had left him a for- 
 tune ampler than his wishes or his needs ; he saw his way 
 quite clear before him, stripped of everything to hinder his 
 progress or divide his strength.' I grumbled out that he 
 would only spoil a good business-man to make a poor min- 
 ister. ' I think not,' he answered, quietly ; ' I have lived in 
 and of the world, and I know what it is like. I have been 
 down to the gates of death, and I know how it looks from 
 thence. I know what it is to ' lose all, yet find all,' and I 
 can ' teach men so.' And you would be the last man on 
 earth, Mr. Watling, to counsel me to resist my convictions 
 of duty.' So I could only wring his hand and let him go. 
 But I have not done mourning about it yet." 
 
 He must mourn alone, then ! My call was, clearly, to 
 rejoice. For them who knew not yet what cause of re- 
 joicing was coming to them. Coming ever since the 
 world came out of the murk of chaos. " Prepared " before 
 chaos "was." The thought took my breath away. It 
 pitched me down, headlong, from the mount of joy into 
 the valley of humiliation. For, all this time, I had been
 
 SIIILOH. 457 
 
 crying out against God's ways, in my heart ! You know 
 I never distrusted Him, for myself. But, for my friend, I 
 could have done better, I thought ! 
 
 So it was not a " miserable mistake." A wholesome 
 one, instead, of the Father's own making. His machinery 
 for cutting and polishing a pair of human souls into fit- 
 ness for His day of making up His jewels. His veil drawn 
 between, while He was beautifying them each for the 
 other, and both for Himself. His sign and seal upon His 
 " elect," elected, first, to the purification by fire ; next to 
 the sweetness and the hardships of His service ; finally, to 
 the fulness of the glory to be revealed ! 
 
 This was what I felt. What I said when I could say 
 anything was too far away of - kin for kinship to be 
 traceable. 
 
 " How strange that two cousins-german should bear ex- 
 actly the same name ! It must give rise to endless confu- 
 sion and mistake." 
 
 " It happened naturally enough," said Mr. Watling. 
 " Twenty-five or thirty years ago, Amos Venner was a cot- 
 ton planter in Texas, and Hugh the American Consul at 
 Naples. Sons were born to them, within a fortnight, or 
 thereabouts, of each other. Letters traveled slowly in 
 those days. Both the children were christened Paul, in 
 honor of their paternal grandfather, before either brother 
 knew of the other's good fortune. But I don't think it 
 ever caused any trouble. They have lived too far apart ; 
 one at the South, the other in Europe or New York." 
 
 I denied myself the pleasure of dispelling the illusion. 
 I was in a white heat of impatience to get home and write 
 to Winnie, " Paul is not married.. He has never so much 
 as dreamed of the thing. He is going to be a minister. 
 He has buried you in his heart, and mourns the living 
 dead. Over that grave, God writes ' Resurgam.' For He 
 is gracious, and His mercy endureth." This would I 
 write. 
 
 20
 
 458 SIIILOH. 
 
 But there must be something more, of where and when 
 and why. 
 
 " Do you know where Paul Yenner is now ? " I asked. 
 
 " In New Orleans ; or, it may be, on his way home. 
 Most likely the latter." 
 
 " Has he been in New Orleans all summer ? " 
 
 'Now, Mr. Watling looked at me suspiciously. This 
 persistent questioning about a stranger began to strike him 
 as odd, to say the least of it. I answered his look. " I 
 ask from a deeper motive than curiosity. I take an inter- 
 est in Paul Venner, which shall have a future explanation. 
 Meantime, it will do no harm, and may do good, f6r me to 
 know what have been his outward movements since last 
 spring." 
 
 " First," replied Mr. Watling, " his father despatched 
 him to New Orleans, on important business for the firm. 
 There, it was decided that he must proceed forthwith to 
 California. He returned in August, to find his father look- 
 ing ill and woi'n ; ' waiting,' he said, ' for Paul to come 
 back and take his place, so that he might give up, and be 
 sick a little while.' The giving up was final ; he died a 
 month afterward. For a time, Paul seemed quite stunned 
 by the blow. Then he came to the decision I told you of. 
 He is closing up the business. The two houses having 
 always been connected, he was obliged to visit New Or- 
 leans again, two or three weeks ago, for consultation with 
 his uncle. It is about time for him to return." 
 
 Now, I had got all I wanted. I bade Mr. Watling good- 
 bye, hurriedly. I set out for home at a great pace. 
 
 On the way, it slackened. Thoughts came to me ; 
 thoughts and a question. I could write to Winnie, but 
 she would she write to Paul Venner ? 
 
 I tried to tell myself, Yes ; and could only get out an 
 unwilling, No ! Womanly pride, womanly delicacy, fine- 
 spun as cobwebs, yet strong as steel, these would hold 
 her back.
 
 SHILOH. 459 
 
 I sputtered furiously against the folly, the sin, of sacri- 
 ficing the happiness of two lives to a figment, a scruple, a 
 mere conventionalism. It would be setting up an image of 
 straw, and not daring to knock it down. Blenching at a 
 moment's pain, and going out deliberately into a long ag- 
 ony of years. Sickening at a little drop of bittersweet, 
 and drinking slowly a great, bottomless cup of gall. In 
 vain. Over all my resentful metaphors strode that relent- 
 less, " No." It set its foot on my neck, and held me at its 
 mercy. 
 
 With clearest soul-sight, I saw what she would write 
 back. " Providence, having brought me so much, will 
 surely bring me the rest, in His good time. I can wait." 
 
 And what then ? A dull pain of suspense, a slow fever 
 of expectation, a growing weight of patience. Across 
 that peace whereof she had told me, " flowing as a river," 
 I should have thrown a long, wavering shadow of unrest, 
 a haunting " if," a slow-dripping " when." A joy with an 
 ache in it. A gift with a sting in it. No, a thousand 
 times, no ! whatever I did, I w r ould not do that ! 
 
 I walked slowly enough now, and pondered. Cleai-ly, 
 here was a case where Providence needed an instrument. 
 None more ready and glad than I. That, sans dire. There- 
 fore this clue had been put into my hands. What was I 
 to do with it ? The answer flashed back, as along an elec- 
 tric wire. Give it to Paul Venner. But how ? I did not 
 know him. Write. An anonymous letter 
 
 I stopped short. Anonymous letters are instruments of 
 Satan. Slimy, as with the trail of a serpent on them. 
 Smutched, as by pitchy hands. Of evil reputation, be- 
 cause found in bad company. 
 
 Besides, Paul Venner might suspect Winnie of having. 
 Avritten it. I flushed all over at the bare thought. Nor 
 did it help me much to pronounce that such suspicion 
 would prove him unworthy ever to have stood at the white 
 portal of her heart.
 
 460 S1IILOH. 
 
 "What I did, then, should be done openly. I took my 
 pen, and dashed off this : 
 
 " He that could trust his happiness to so fragile a thing 
 as a flower, deserved the swift retribution that overtook 
 him. But the spring will bring again saiFrona buds as 
 sweet as those that perished with their mission but half 
 fulfilled ; and for hopes which we mourn as dead, there 
 may also be a springtime and a reblooming. So (speaking 
 as the spirit only moveth her) saith 
 
 " FEANCESCA GOLDEN." 
 
 Reading it over, I thought I might have signed it "Py- 
 thia," with fitness ; it sounded oracular enough. But its 
 meaning would not be dark to Paul Venner. And I sealed 
 and sent it forthwith. 
 
 Then I began to be dubious. I discerned that none 
 can go back to the precise place in life, he has left behind. 
 Circumstances have dug it up, or built a Avail around it, or 
 greened it over, or blighted it with barrenness. Or he has 
 grown, or dwindled, and no longer fits into it. 
 
 Besides, there is no such thing as a perfect reparation 
 on earth. When a man would restore the fair image of 
 Right to the place from whence he stole it, the old niche is 
 filled up or vanished. He must take up with the one 
 which nearest resembles it ; or go on with his burden, vow- 
 ing to steal no more. 
 
 Perhaps Winnie and Paul have lived so far past that 
 old point of divergence, as to make it impossible to return ! 
 Perhaps it is too late for the old mistake ever to be set 
 right. Perhaps Winnie's love is dead, as she thinks; and 
 not in a trance, as I have taken for granted ! Perhaps 
 Paul, in " finding all," counts nothing lost ! Perhaps 
 
 I am in a state of mortal bewilderment with all these 
 perhapses! Write quickly, and settle me into a certainty 
 of having done well, or ill ; either would be preferable to 
 these doubts. Thine, FEANCESCA.
 
 XLIV. 
 
 A :NTOTE OF WAKNTVG. 
 [Alice Prescott to Francesco,.] 
 
 'EAR Mrs. Golden : I am sorry to have to 
 tell you that Miss Frost is very ill with 
 that dreadful fever which has already 
 caused us so much sorrow. Will you come 
 to her at once, and also send word to her 
 uncle in New York ? We could not find his 
 address among her papers, and none of us 
 happen to know it. We found yours, how- 
 ever, and therefore I write to you ; indeed, I should have 
 done so in any case, for I feel certain that she would send 
 for you, first of all, if she could. At present she is uncon- 
 scious, and recognizes no one. 
 
 I think her illness began early last week : I remember 
 she said to me that she had been writing you a long letter, 
 and that it had been difficult to finish it satisfactorily ; 
 " My mind seemed all afloat, I could not anchor it any- 
 where," was her expression. All through the week she 
 was not quite her usual active, cheery self ; but she declared 
 positively that she was " not sick, only tired and languid," 
 and as Uncle True's death had left us all in an exhausted 
 and dispirited state, it did not occur to us to be uneasy 
 about her until day before yesterday. Then grandma 
 announced that it was " high time to take her in hand," and 
 did so, administering medicine and forbidding her to leave
 
 462 SHILOH. 
 
 ner room. Yesterday she was so much better as to dissi- 
 pate all our anxiety. This morning, on entering her room, 
 I was terror-stricken to find her delirious ; she called me 
 "Annita," and began talking to me in Italian. I could just 
 make out that she fancied herself in Italy. We sent for 
 the doctor. He looked very grave, and told us " it was 
 always safest to prepare for the worst, while hoping for the 
 best." 
 
 We shall send to the depot at every train, after to-mor- 
 row morning. Meanwhile, be quite sure that she will 
 have every care and comfort. Aunt Vin came up as soon 
 as she heard of her sickness, took off her bonnet, and pro- 
 claimed that she had " come to stay, wanted or not." She 
 immediately took charge of the sick-room, and she is a 
 most experienced nurse. As for Ruth and I, either of us 
 would give our lives for Miss Frost, and we shall not leave 
 her a moment. Besides, we have almost too many offers of 
 help, watchers, etc. ; there has been a continual stream of 
 people coming and going, to inquire after her or to tender 
 assistance, ever since the evil tidings went out. I tell you 
 all this, that you may know that there are plenty of loving 
 hearts and willing hands about her, that will not let her 
 miss anything they have to give. Still, we should be glad 
 to have some of her own friends here, to share the respon- 
 sibility ; and we thought Mr. Frost might wish to bring a 
 physician from the city. 
 
 Yours truly, 
 
 ALICE PEESCOTT.
 
 THE SPIRIT OF HEAVINESS. 
 
 \Francesca to her Husband.] 
 
 is little more than a week sintfe I wrote 
 you. It is years since I wrote you. The one be- 
 ing the literal fact ; the other the felt truth. Such 
 days as those through which I have just lived 
 are not to be measured by clock-strokes. They 
 stagger under a weight of event, emotion, pos- 
 sibility, which sets the night afar off from the 
 morning, and the morning at a weary year's jour- 
 ney from the night. 
 
 Alice Prescott's letter, herein enclosed, will tell you all 
 it told me. Before I had well finished it, I was thrusting 
 indispensables into a travelling-bag. On my way to the 
 depot, I telegraphed " Uncle John." In half an hour I was 
 on board the express, dashing southward. Two changes 
 of cars and eight hours of travel brought me to Shiloh 
 station at dusk. 
 
 A tall, erect, broad-shouldered, gray-headed man ; keen 
 of eye, benignant of face ; with an enormous black dog at 
 his side; stood on the platform, expectantly. Straightway 
 I went to him. " Mr. Divine, how is Winnie ? " 
 
 The answer came through quivering lips, ending with a 
 sound akin to a sob : 
 " Sinking fast." 
 Recovering himself, the fanner asked, "Are you. the
 
 464 SHILOH. 
 
 only one ? " And he looked behind me as if I should have 
 been leader of a troop. 
 
 " The only one. I am Francesca Golden. Is not Mr. 
 Frost arrived ? " 
 
 He shook his head. 
 
 " I telegraphed him at once," said I. " He should have 
 been here first. He .had not half the distance to come." 
 
 " The worst of it is that this is the last train, and he 
 cannot get here now till morning," said he. "And I'm 
 afraid" 
 
 But the fear, whatever it was, would not " out." No 
 need. 
 
 I got into the wagon without another word. The sta- 
 tion was on a hill, lit pallidly by the latest gleam of the 
 west. From it the road sank swiftly toward the shadow of 
 the valley below ; hiding itself, as it went, under the gloom 
 of trees. We sank with it, drearily. " Sinking fast," rever- 
 berated dismally through my heart. Everything was sink- 
 ing with her, into the dusk of grief, the blackness of des- 
 pair, the night of death ! 
 
 Clay Corner, with its clustering lights, its hum of busi- 
 ness, its murmur of falling water, its red glow of a black- 
 smith's foi'ge, was quickly reached, and left behind. In the 
 darkness beyond, the fai'mer found voice, and even a degree 
 of eloquence. Winnie's goodness, Winnie's talents, Win- 
 nie's genuineness, these were the heads upon which he en- 
 larged, as if enamored of the subject. Especially did he 
 dilate upon her unlikeness to " city folks," as he had known 
 them. 
 
 "I own I didn't use to take to 'em much," said he. 
 " There was more ' fine feather ' than ' fine bird ' about 'em, 
 I reckoned. They came and went among us like comets 
 in the sky ; no great shakes for light, and no account at all 
 to steer by. They sickened us with their condescension, or 
 riled us with their superciliousness. They left their religion 
 at home, mostly, in their five-hundred-dollar pews with
 
 SHILOH. 465 
 
 their gilt-edged Prayer Books. They had plenty of bank- 
 bills for pleasure, dogs, horses, boats, excursions, and 
 what -not, but only the smallest kind o' change for our 
 contribution box ; and they seemed to think we was well 
 paid for giving 'em up our best seats by the honor they did 
 us in sitting in 'em once a day, in fine weather. They were 
 bothered within an inch of their lives to find ways to kill 
 time, but they never thought of giving an hour to our Sun- 
 day School, or our poor, or our Sewing Society ; or, like 
 Mrs. Danforth, they'd make a great show of work, and do 
 a little something just as long as they could have their own 
 way, and no longer (at least, that's the way s/ie used to be, 
 but I really think she's improving, too, and I reckon Miss 
 Frost's at the bottom of it !). As for trying to find out 
 our talents and helping us to make the most of 'em, they'd 
 sooner their own would rust out for want of using ! They 
 lived among us as if they wasn't of us, and didn't mean to 
 be. And they never left behind 'em any idea of a life any 
 higher and deeper than our own ; only one with a little 
 more surface and glitter. 
 
 " Now, Miss Frost wasn't none' of that sort. She's what 
 I call a lady, through and thi'ough. She didn't leave her 
 fine breeding nor her religion behind, when she came into 
 the country. She was just as polite and respectful to Uncle 
 True's gray hairs and mine, as if they'd grown on mayors 
 of New York. She was never a mite stuck up, to anybody. 
 She spent all her time and strength in our service ; and she 
 carried her talents and her edication in her hand, ready for 
 anybody that wanted 'em most. She went right into our 
 kitchens and bedrooms, and watched by our sick and dying, 
 just as if she had been one of ourselves ; only with twice as 
 much gentleness, and delicacy, and handiness. And there's 
 no end to the good she's done, when you come to reckon it 
 up ; though its all come along so easily and naturally, that 
 you wouldn't know what to lay it to, if you didn't keep 
 your eyes open. She's made another creature out of Ruth 
 20*
 
 466 SHILOH. 
 
 Winnot. She's done everything for Alice. She's softened 
 down Mr. "Warren from a regular bear to something border- 
 ing on hiiman. She's won all Jack's heart ; and if- she'd 
 only been spared long enough, she'd have made room in it 
 for something else. She's managed the Lord knows how ! 
 to keep peace in the Sewing Society, though some of the 
 folks in it go together like fii-e and gunpowder. But, bless 
 me, I couldn't begin to tell you all she's done, directly and 
 indirectly, if I talked from now till morning ! 
 
 " But perhaps the best of it all was the way she's be- 
 haved to Mr. Taylor. She's always treated him with as 
 much respect and consideration as if he'd been a Bishop ; 
 and she paid as good attention to his sermons as if he was 
 the most learned man on earth, though everybody knows 
 she's got more edication than ever he thought of. And she 
 has always supported him right straight through, even 
 when she didn't quite fall in with his way of thinking. I 
 remember when the Sunday School was reorganized, she 
 talked over a plan with Priscilla that she thought was just 
 about right ; and so did Priscilla. But when Mr. Taylor 
 come, he'd got his mind set on something quite different ; 
 and Priscilla wasn't going to give in, ' she couldn't recon- 
 cile it to her conscience to give up a good plan for a poor 
 one,' she said. But Miss Frost told her that the question 
 between the poor plan and the good one, and the responsi- 
 bility, too, was Mr. Taylor's ; the only question for them 
 was whether they'd submit themselves to their spiritual 
 pastor, and gladden his heart by their goodwill, and 
 strengthen his hands by their example and influence; or 
 whether they'd set themselves up in opposition to him, and 
 give rise to a dissension in the parish, and hinder his work, 
 and weaken his power to do good ; and so Priscilla had to 
 come round. And there's no telling the good of such an ex- 
 ample, from such a person, in a community that ain't over- 
 weighted with reverence for anything or anybody, and 
 that would* just as soon pick a quarrel with their minister
 
 SHILOH. 467 
 
 as eat their victuals. The fact is she's done us good, some- 
 how, every day of her life since she come here. There ain't 
 many city folks, I guess, that have made such a record of 
 a summer in the country as the recording angel has written 
 down of hers ! " 
 
 This long speech did not run its course without interrup- 
 tion. Thrice a shadowy horse, wagon, and driver had come 
 out of the dusk before us, and halted ; a voice, nasal per- 
 haps, but certainly kind and interested, had propounded 
 the query, " How is Miss Frost ? " Without drawing rein, 
 Mr. Divine had responded, " Sinking fast ; " and the vision 
 had disappeared in the gloom behind. My heart ached 
 anew with each repetition of that answer sank lower as 
 with a fresh burden of despair. 
 
 The road now began to climb. Reaching a level, Mr. 
 Divine announced that we were on " Hope Plain," and 
 pointed out the homes of* Mrs. Danforth and Essie Volger. 
 Up two or three more hills, and the " Gwynne Place " rose 
 duskily into the darkening sky. I shuddered to come thus 
 upon places made so vivid to my imagination through Win- 
 nie's graphic picturings; and to find them dim, sombre 
 shapes, wavering of outline and vague of tint, eluding my 
 straining gaze and vanishing into gloom. The world she 
 had evoked seemed fading dying with her ! 
 
 More hills to climb ; more jolting ; a denser shadow of 
 trees ! Then a little white church reared itself lonelily 
 upon the sky before us. Now, I knew my ground. Swiftly 
 we turned the corner, gently we trotted up to the gate. 
 The large, sloping-roofed, venerable, kindly homestead of 
 Winnie's story and my dreams rose before me. 
 
 A comfortable vision after that long, dark, heavy-heart- 
 ed ride ! Bursting with light, every door and window 
 contributing its cheery quota. Through one wide portal, 
 the ruddy glow and flame of the kitchen fire. Between its 
 gleam and our dusk, a short, brisk figure, with straight- 
 down skirts and flying cap-borders, hurrying out to meet
 
 468 SHILOH. 
 
 me. Hearty, homely words of welcome, of sympathy, of an 
 unconquerable springiness of hope, upon its lips. 
 
 Can you guess what I did next ! Up to this moment I 
 had shed no tear. Now, the kind tone, the motherly man- 
 ner, overcame me. My "windows of heaven" were opened. 
 For one minute there was a swift downpour. 
 
 " Come right into the kitchen," said Mrs. Divine, "there's 
 nobody there. The rest of the house is pretty much filled 
 up with people waiting to see how the- fever turns with Miss 
 Frost. I told 'em they might go where they liked, if they'd 
 keep out of her room, and leave the kitchen clear for Fris- 
 cilla and me and the kitchen- work ; that needs to go on all 
 the more regularly when there's sickness in the house. And 
 I've got a cup of tea and a bite all ready for you." 
 
 I tried to decline the refreshment ; I desired to go to 
 Winnie at once. But there was no resisting Mrs. Pivine's 
 mingled kindness, peremptoriness, and good sense. 
 
 "You're not fit to go just yet; and there's no hurry 
 she won't know you. Take your tea and get up your 
 strength ; you want to be able to stay when you do go. 
 We try to keep her room as free from coming and going 
 and confusion, as possible. Aunt Vin says that noise and 
 excitement tells on the nerves of sick people, even when 
 they don't seem to take any notice. And I guess she's 
 right." 
 
 The kitchen was exquisite in neatness ; redolent of Mrs. 
 Prescott's spirit, tempered by the blither one of her 
 mother. Mrs. Prescott herself took my bonnet and 
 placed my chair. She was quieter, gentler than my ex- 
 pectation ; but I remembered that sickness and death had 
 but lately visited the house, and that one perhaps both ! 
 had crossed its threshold again. Wonderful softeners 
 they! 
 
 As I sat at table, a slight, graceful, thoughtful-looking 
 girl stole quietly to my side, and kissed me silently, with 
 quivering lips. I needed no telling that I beheld Alice
 
 SHILOH. 409 
 
 Prcscott. A few moments after, Essie Volger appeared, 
 a fine, open, intelligent face, a frank, easy, cordial manner, 
 both a little shadowed now by grief and anxiety. With 
 her, came Mr. Taylor to wring my hand and utter a sym- 
 pathizing, comforting word. All these, I felt, took me di- 
 rectly into their hearts, for Winnie's sake, and made com- 
 mon cause with me. My sorrow was theirs. " One prayer 
 was in all our hearts " Spare her, good Lord ! " 
 
 Alice led me up stairs. Leo followed us, with grave 
 and dignified aspect. 
 
 In the little entry above, on a large chest, in a position 
 to command the interior of the sick-room beyond, a boy 
 sat motionless, sombre, mute, watchful. 
 
 " It is Jack Warren," whispered Alice. " He will stay 
 here." 
 
 Stirred to the depths, I passed on. 
 
 A large, wainscoted room, with the bed drawn near the 
 middle, for greater convenience and freer air. On one side, 
 a tall, gaunt woman, her finger on the patient's pulse, her 
 head shaking fatefully Auntr \ 7 in. Flung down at the 
 foot, in an attitude of complete dejection, a girl with au- 
 burn hair. "On the pillow, a wan, wasted face, veiled with 
 stupor. These things I took in at a glance. 
 
 The girl rose, and turned round. Xo lovelier counte- 
 nance ever lit the interior regions of a painter's imagination. 
 With a sob, she threw herself into my arms, sweet, lov- 
 ing, impulsive Ruth Winnot, gifted and stricken by Provi- 
 dence as at one blow. 
 
 " We're amasin' glad to see you," said Aunt Yin. 
 " We've been in a state of expectoration all day, and we'd 
 about giv' up." 
 
 Alice noiselessly placed me a chair on the farther side 
 of the bed. I sat down and looked at Winnie through my 
 tears. So changed oh ! so changed ! 
 
 " Speak to her," said Aunt Vin, " and see if she reck- 
 onizes you."
 
 470 SHILOH. 
 
 Once twice thrice, I called her name. Into it I con- 
 densed an agony of supplication and, tenderness that should 
 have brought her back from the very portal of the grave, 
 I thought. At the third repetition she half-opened her 
 eyes, murmured something in Italian, of which I caught 
 only the sombre word " notte," and relapsed into coma. 
 
 " Oh ! this is too much ! " I groaned. " Not to knoAV 
 me, not to speak to me, not to hear what I would say to 
 her ! I cannot bear it ! Oh ! will she not wake will she 
 not understand just for one moment, before she dies ? " 
 
 " Couldn't conjuncture," said Aunt Yin, gravely. " The 
 fever'll turn about midnight, I guess. What'll follow, I 
 couldn't intend to say ; not if I'd swallowed the pharma- 
 copious and was physician in ordinal to the Queen. "We 
 must do our best and wait upon the Lord." 
 
 The evening wore slowly on. Intense quiet in the sick- 
 room, broken only by the rattle of spoons and phials, an 
 occasional remark or direction from Aunt Vin, and faint 
 sounds from below indicating the coming and going of anx- 
 ious and sympathizing friends. 
 
 At ten o'clock, Mr. Taylor stole quietly in, knelt by the 
 bed, and said a prayer or two from the order for the Visita- 
 tion of the Sick, in low, solemn tones that only seemed to 
 add to the chamber's hush. They were folloAved by an 
 " Amen ! " so loud and deep that it startled me. Looking 
 up, I saw a new comer in the entry, by Jack's side. The 
 form was hidden in shadow, but the rough, leonine 
 head, the deepset, glittering eyes, could only belong to Mr. 
 Warren ! 
 
 Then the sounds from below ceased, the house grew 
 still, the long, fateful night-watch began !
 
 THE CRY IX THE NIGHT. 
 
 [Francesca to her JETusband.] 
 
 HILE I live, that night-watch will live, too, 
 in my memory. I wish I could set it be- 
 fore you, reasonably true of outline and col- 
 oring! 
 
 The large, low, quaintly-furnished room, 
 dimly lit by the swealing candle. Two open_ 
 windows one merely a square of blackness, 
 dense shadow laid against it, like a thing to 
 be felt ; in the other, the dusky foliage of a lilac, here, 
 catching the light from within, there, vanishing into gloom. 
 Without, a dark, clouded sky ; an atmosphere still and 
 warm, even to sultriness ; the soft murmur of the brook 
 flowing in the meadow. 
 
 On the bed, the sufferer's motionless form and pallid 
 face ; low moans, as of pain, breaking at intervals from 
 her parched lips. Ruth fanning her, with a tireless, mo- 
 notonous motion. Alice gliding to and fro, noiseless as a 
 shadow ; bringing water from the well, ice from the cellar, 
 broths and decoctions from the kitchen, obedient to a sign 
 or a word from Aunt Tin. The latter personage by the 
 bedside ; cool, vigilant, cautious, and prompt, as a sentinel 
 at his post or a general in the field. 
 
 In one corner, Leo, observant, alert; with an expression 
 almost human in its anxiety, its mournfulness, and its in- 
 telligence, upon his face.
 
 472 SHILOH. 
 
 Just outside the door, the dark, watchful gleam of Jack 
 "Warren's eyes. Behind, him, indistinct in the shadow, his 
 father's saturnine features. In the room beyond, Essie 
 Volger, seated by a table, shading her eyes from the light 
 thereon. Near her, a sheen of silk, a sparkle of diamonds, 
 a rapid, dramatic gestui-e, speaking for Mrs. Danforth. 
 
 Below, Mrs. Divine, keeping up the kitchen fire ; can. 
 die-stand by her side, Bible in her hand. Opposite to her, 
 Uncle True's empty chair ! 
 
 These are the bald details of the picture. By the 
 power of your sympathy, you will endow them with truth- 
 ful light, shadow, tint, tone. The candle will be less an 
 illumination than a revealer of gloom. The faces will 
 darken with anxiety and whiten with dread. The atmos- 
 phere will be full of the breathlessness of approaching 
 crisis. 
 
 As the night wore on, Winnie's moans ceased. Her 
 breath grew faint, her chest scarcely moved. Her pulse 
 was like the slow lapping of a retreating tide. Growing 
 lethargy, scarcely distinguishable . from death, held her 
 more closely locked in its embrace. 
 
 Suddenly a harsh sound smote the night. It came 
 nearer : it resolved itself into a trampling of horses, a 
 lashing of a whip, a rattling of swift-revolving wheels. It 
 swept past the window, and was quenched in a moment, at 
 the gate. 
 
 Silence, for a brief space. Then a slight bustle, a sound 
 of voices, from below. Presently, a rustling on the stair- 
 case; a group of new-comers in the doorway. 
 
 I recognized Mr. and Mrs. Frost, Flora, Dr. Heartwell. 
 "We greeted each other gravely, briefly, as people do greet 
 by deathbeds. 
 
 Uncle John whispered an explanation. " Did not get 
 your telegram till this afternoon some confounded remiss- 
 ness at the office. Came to Pontport in last train hunted 
 up a carriage and driver told him to drive like Jehu, for 
 life and death."
 
 BHILOH. 473 
 
 The last word choked him. He had just caught sight 
 of Winnie's corpse-like figure. He stood for a moment si- 
 lently regarding her. Then he turned away, .drawing his 
 hand across his eyes. 
 
 Dr. Heart well wasted no time in courtesies. He went 
 straight to the bedside, gave the patient a rapid, compre- 
 hensive glance, tasted the contents of the phials on the 
 stand, asked Aunt Vin a question or two, and vanished. 
 In a moment he reappeared with a flask ; Alice brought 
 him a spoon ; he administered a dose to the patient with 
 his own professional hands. Then he sat down, expectant. 
 
 Now, first, I discovered, with a start, that still another 
 spectator had been added to the scene. By the window, 
 out of everybody's way, yet where he could command a 
 full view of Winnie, a young man had quietly planted him- 
 self. Dark hair ; a square brow ; a calm, clear face ; an 
 attitude iv udy, resolved, and patient: these traits struck 
 me at a glance. 
 
 Who could it be, I wondered. A son of Mr. Frost's ? 
 No, he had none grown up. A friend of the family, 
 perhaps. 
 
 Suddenly, my mind swooped upon the truth, Paul 
 Venner. 
 
 I went to him and held out my hand. " You received 
 my letter ? " 
 
 " Yes. I know not how to thank you. It confirmed 
 what I had begun to suspect. For I met Frederick Thome 
 in New Orleans. He told me much that was suggestive. 
 I found your letter awaiting me in New York. I went im- 
 mediately to Mr. Frost's, to learn if Winnie had returned. 
 I met your telegram there. I am here." 
 
 The look said, " Here, because it is my right ; here, be- 
 cause she is mine, as I am hers. Here, to save her if I 
 may ; to yield her into God's hands, if I must." 
 
 Another hour went by. Slowly, as if stretching its 
 elastic length across an age. Time is the tent of Peri-
 
 474 SHILOIT. 
 
 Benou, in the Arabian tale. Capable of compression into 
 a nutshell, or of expansion to cover a kingdom. 
 
 Dead silence, now. Even Dr. Heartwell and Aunt Vin 
 spoke no more. They understood well enough without 
 words. A look, a gesture, a nod, these sufficed for con- 
 cert of aim and action. 
 
 As Winnie's strength declined, their vigilance and activ- 
 ity increased. There was something awful, thrilling, sub- 
 lime, in that struggle with death, in w r hich they were 
 plainly engaged. No inch of ground was to be yielded 
 without a fight, no point left unguarded, no resource un- 
 tried. Again and again they rallied Life's forces to the 
 battle. 
 
 Of the two, Aunt Vin seemed most persistent, most in- 
 defatigable. Holding fast by the hem of Hope's garment, 
 she would not once turn her eyes toward the Medusa-head 
 of Despair. Woman's patience, woman's intuition, woman's 
 trust, in the long run, often come out ahead of manly 
 strength, reason, independence. 
 
 Nevertheless, the battle was going against them. I read 
 that truth in their set lips, their anxious faces. Read it with 
 alternate fever of revolt and chill of despair. In my heart, 
 continual beginnings of fervent prayer, losing themselves 
 in vagueness, ending in stony despondency. 
 
 A little past midnight, I saw Winnie's lips move. I 
 bent over her. " Lift me up," she murmured, faintly. 
 
 Quick as thought, I was put aside. Paul's arms were 
 under her ; deftly, tenderly, he raised her. 
 
 Not less prompt Was Aunt Vin with a spoonful of stimu- 
 lant. As it touched her lips, Winnie half opened her eyes. 
 There was a gasp, a sigh. Her head fell lifelessly over 
 upon Paul's arm. The unswallowed liquid flowed from her 
 mouth. 
 
 Aunt Vin laid down her spoon with a gesture of entire 
 relinquishment, needing no word to enforce its meaning. 
 
 Dr. Heartwell turned moodily away. In the faces of
 
 SHILOH. 475 
 
 'both, at that instant, was even more of discomfiture than 
 grief. 
 
 For a moment we stood looking at each other, in ghastly 
 silence. We had seen understood, but could not realize. 
 
 Then, manifestations of grief broke forth. Variously, 
 according to temperament. None are made alike. God, 
 who rounds no two pebbles on the seashore to perfect iden- 
 tity of shape, molds humanity also into infinitude of form 
 and character. 
 
 Mr. Taylor, hurrying in at somebody's frantic call, knelt 
 and began the Commendatory Prayer. I believe he thought 
 her, not dead, but dying. The solemn words brought in- 
 stant hush. 
 
 Paul gently lowered his white, motionless burden to the 
 pillow, and, with one arm still under her and his eyes fixed 
 on her face, sank upon his knees. I dropped beside him. 
 Two soul-cries, voiceless and unheard on earth, rang pierc- 
 ingly up to heaven. Not the calm " Thy will be done ! " 
 of Christlike power and patience, but the sharp passion of 
 anguish that once echoed over the waters of Gennesareth, 
 " Help, Lord, or we perish ! " 
 
 And then, there came to pass a thing so marvelous that 
 I should fear to be discredited in the telling, if you were not 
 the listener. One of those strange, unlooked-for happenings 
 that reason terms " coincidence," and faith, " God." 
 
 A shrill, sombre cry rang through the chamber. So 
 sudden, so weird, so startling, we held our breath in super- 
 stitious awe, and looked fearfully in each other's faces. 
 None understood its import ; none could tell whence it 
 came ! 
 
 There ensued an intense, terrified silence. But some- 
 thing awful in the silence. A horror that had suddenly 
 come out of it, and might come again. 
 
 Two three minutes ; they seemed like hours to our 
 strained sense and shortened breath. 
 
 Once again it smote our ears ; three piercing, rising-
 
 476 SHILOH. 
 
 inflected notes, sad as a human wail, sharp as a cry of mor- 
 tal distress. 
 
 Afterward a rustle of the lilac leaves behind me. 
 
 Now I began to understand. I breathed again; my 
 chilled blood resumed its regular flow. 
 
 A whippowill was hidden in the lilac, uttering his wild, 
 lugubrious cry close to the window. Not softened by twi- 
 light distances, as usually heard ; but loud, shrill, startling, 
 because so near.* 
 
 The explanation did not mitigate the wonder. That a 
 bird so shy, a dweller in woods and by streams, haunting 
 the twilight, escaping into the darkness, should thus ap- 
 proach a lighted window and send foi'th his voice within a 
 few feet of a dozen people, was a circumstance so amazing 
 as to leave little room for marvel at what followed. 
 
 For, at the third weird repetition, smiting sharply again 
 the chamber's hush, Winnie lifted the eyelids we had thought 
 would never lift more. Suddenly, as if startled from slum- 
 ber by the strange sound. Quickly her eyes went round the 
 room, seeking its cause. 
 
 They fell on the circle of familiar faces. Perfect con- 
 sciousness, perfect recognition were in their look. 
 
 Lastly, they rested upon Paul Vernier. A swift light of 
 joy, slowly clouded by a vague amaze, a struggling recol- 
 lection. 
 
 He leaned down over her close, answering them with 
 something in his own that she alone saw. She read it, and 
 was satisfied. The estranged hearts, the tried souls, met 
 again. Not at the old point of divergence, but at a new, 
 diviner point of union. 
 
 The boughs of the lilac tree shook. There was a whirr 
 
 O 
 
 of wings. The bird of the night, its appointed work being 
 done, had flown ! 
 
 * Lest this incident should seem not only marvelous, but impos^ 
 sible, it may be well to state that it is an actual occurrence.
 
 SHILOH. 477 
 
 Its work ? To pierce the failing sense with its sharp 
 cry. To reach after the flying consciousness, and startle it 
 back to its place and its function. To recover lost identity 
 out of dreamless void. To return the naked soul to the cast- 
 off garmenting of the body. To bring Winnie back from 
 the gate of death to the gate of life, that Love, standing 
 there, in the person of Paul, might seize her and draw her 
 in. So said I. 
 
 But Science, in the person of Dr. Heartwell, said some- 
 thing else. He averred that Winnie was not dead, after 
 all, only in a swoon. That consciousness, struggling up 
 from temporary anaesthesia, was met half-way by the bird's 
 shrill cry, and startled at once into vigorous action. That 
 wonder and. joy, together, kindled anew the failing spark 
 of the spirit, and sent the ebbing life-current back to the 
 heart. 
 
 What, after all, is the difference ? 
 
 For Science did not attempt to explain the whippowill's 
 temporary forgetfulness and abdication of all its well-known 
 habits. Nor why it happened just at that moment and at 
 that spot. 
 
 Here, finally, Faith (still in the person of Dr. Heartwell), 
 had somewhat to say. That science always has to stop 
 something short of the Soul and its Maker. That no probe 
 ever yet found spirit, though it made the opening through 
 which that etherial tenant escaped. That no dissecting 
 knife ever laid open its structure or its laws. That far be- 
 low the point which science reaches and explains, the finger 
 of God works on, invisibly, inscrutably. That any science 
 which does not admit this, and grow humble with the ad- 
 mission, and glad, finally, to put its feeble hand into that 
 of faith, is only a learned ignorance. 
 
 But this talk came afterward ! 
 
 Commonplaces thrust themselves into the tenderest, 
 as in the grandest of earthly scenes. Between Winnie 
 and P,aul came Aunt Vin's prompt spoonful of stim-
 
 478 SHILOH. 
 
 ulant. Meekly Winnie swallowed it. As if it had been 
 nectar. 
 
 Then her eyes closed wearily, her head still resting upon 
 Paul's arm. 
 
 Dr. Heartwell bent over her, scanning her well. Then 
 he came toward us. " There is hope ! She sleeps ! " he 
 whispered. His gesture said the rest. " Clear the room. 
 Leave her in quiet." 
 
 Is joy harder to bear than sorrow ? It would seem so. 
 
 For no sooner had we reached the " out-room," with the 
 door shut, than sobs and tears broke forth. The long ten- 
 sion of nerve and spii'it gave way. Some wept silently in a 
 corner ; others threw themselves into the nearest arms and 
 shed their tears in common. 
 
 A sudden crash startled us. Amazed, we beheld the 
 articles on the table flinging themselves on the floor, with- 
 out hands. Would the night's wonders never cease ? 
 
 Alice, coolest of us all, perhaps because the vivid glo- 
 ries of her inner world of imagination make all outer events 
 seem tame in comparison, stooped and dragged forth from 
 the debris Jack Warren ! 
 
 The boy had crept under the table for his own private 
 " cry." Thinking Himself not sufficiently concealed, it had 
 occurred to him to pull the table-cover further over from 
 beneath. Near the edge were books, a vase, a card- 
 receiver, a candlestick. These fell with a crash, not less 
 startling to' the author of their destruction, than to us, the 
 astonished spectators. 
 
 Now, the full reaction came. From joyful tears to joy- 
 ous laughter the way is easy, to hearts exhausted with deep 
 emotion. It takes but little to set' them upon that path. 
 Jack's misadventure sufficed for us. And the laugh let us 
 down easily into sober gladness of heart. 
 
 Then Dr. Heartwell, standing on the hearth, ordered us 
 all peremptorily to bed. 
 
 " For there is plenty of nursing and watching yet to be
 
 SHILOH. 4T9 
 
 provided for," said he. " It will be days before Winnie is 
 past danger. You, Francesca Golden, must be ready to 
 take that queer old nurse's place in the morning ; she will 
 need rest by that time, though she is made of steel. To- 
 night, there will be but little to do. Winnie will sleep 
 most of the time. And if 'Axint Vin ' (is that what you 
 call her ?) wants help, she has it at hand. Mr. Venner is a 
 fixture in that room, for the present, I suspect ! Mrs. 
 Divine,' 1 with a wide, bottomless yawn, " where shall I 
 find a 'shakedown'*" 
 
 So, Paul Venner and Axmt Yin kept the rest of that 
 night-watch. 
 
 They were very quiet, peaceful days that followed. 
 Winnie was too weak to talk or to listen. But her face 
 was full of a deep content, a quiet joy, that could wait for 
 utterance. Much of the time she slept, recruiting so the 
 waste of disease. 
 
 It was a week before Dr. Heartwell would let us talk of 
 the past. When the full explanation came, it was no longer 
 needed. Mutual love, mutual trust, had carried them far 
 past that point. They felt the blessedness of faith in each 
 other, " without sight." 
 
 Each would have assumed the whole blame of the mis- 
 understanding. " Forgive me," said Winnie, " I ought to 
 have known you better." 
 
 " Forgive me," said Paul, " I ought not to have trusted 
 a flower, nor a circumstance. In such a matter, a man 
 should ask and wait for the spoken word, the unmistakable 
 yea or nay." 
 
 Easy to see it now ! For moments like these are the 
 mountain-tops of life, giving one a clear outlook before and 
 behind. Happy they who find wisdom there, to carry with 
 them down to the valleys ! 
 
 So I left them. For home needed me, now, more than 
 they. Sufficient, henceforth, each to the other.
 
 STRIKING TENT. 
 
 ERE beginneth the end, Francesca. The 
 end of the old life, the beginning of the 
 new. For all life's ends are beginnings, 
 till its final end begins the Endless. 
 
 I have sent them all out, Ruth, Alice, 
 Essie, Flora, fluttering down the staircase 
 in their snowy draperies like a flock of white 
 doves; the last moments of Winnie Frost shall be 
 given to you. If that white-robed vision which I beheld, 
 just now, in the ancient mirror over the modern toilet-table 
 be really she, for I have my doubts ! It was so different 
 from anything I have seen there before, so softly radiant 
 with happiness, as if diaphanous and lit from within, 
 that I failed to recognize it for an acquaintance. 
 
 Yes, let me write it down and ponder it well, I am 
 happy ! Not through any seeking, planning, or expecta- 
 tion of my own, but by the gracious gift of God. That is 
 what makes it so sweet ; because it is so manifestly of His 
 providence, so straight from His hand. The cup of earthly 
 pleasure which we mix for ourselves hath ever its great 
 drop of bitterness at bottom ; but " His blessing maketh 
 rich, and he addeth no sorrow with it." The happiness 
 that He gives ; springing out of sorrow and ripened out of 
 pain ; holding the promise of the life that is to come, as 
 well as of that which " now is ; " is happiness indeed ! 
 Best and beautifullest of it all is it to feel how tenderly
 
 SHILOH. 481 
 
 God has been leading me hither, all these days ; that the 
 error, the separation, the pain, the complete relinquishment 
 of hope, were only so many necessary steps to this end. Be- 
 yond all question, Paul and I needed just the lessons that we 
 have learned. Without them, our present joy would lack 
 its subtlest, most enduring flavor; our future relation be 
 robbed of its most quickening and preservative element. 
 The fact is profoundly suggestive. Perhaps the most won- 
 drous of all the wonderful revelations of the Last Day, will 
 be that those very burdens and trials under which we were 
 most restive, which seemed absolute hindrances to our 
 power of being or of doing good, the cups which we prayed 
 most earnestly might pass from us, and which, if Christ had 
 been a Deliverer from present trouble instead of future 
 woe, He would surely have removed; that these were 
 the very steps by which we climbed, with His help, to our 
 place in the heavenly habitations. 
 
 It is good to be able to take this lesson, this realization, 
 into coming times of trial. For happiness, I know well, is 
 no lasting condition of human life ; save, perhaps, as an in- 
 ward spring ; never as an outward cii-cumstance. Hearts 
 that rest upon God will have their inward sun shining be- 
 hind and gilding all earth's clouds ; but the clouds will 
 visit them none the less with needful shadow and rain. 
 Life will be a battle-ground and a conflict all the same, 
 with inevitable foes of sin and mortal calamity standing in 
 array ; though Divine and earthly love combine to arm 
 and to strengthen us for the fight. 
 
 Not for earthly bliss merely, or mainly, therefore, do 
 we join hands ; but for mutual help, comfort, elevation ; 
 mutual strengthening of heavenly hope and faith ; mutual 
 encouragement in a life of earnest striving toward the 
 right. And so long as we keep faith with each other in 
 this point, we may look hopefully for God's blessing on 
 our union. Along the borders of the path that tends to- 
 ward higher things, He will graciously cause the human 
 21
 
 482 SHILOH. 
 
 happiness that we do not live for, to blossom as a wayside 
 flower, or gush forth as a wayside spring, full of casual 
 sweetness, full of unexpected refreshment, and leading us 
 continually more and more to acknowledge His wisdom, 
 and praise His goodness. This, we dare to hope. For we 
 have not hesitated to tell each other frankly that we could 
 have done without each other, if He had so willed. Our 
 onward lives had ceased to look dark ; the love of Christ 
 would have been sufficient for us, here, not less than here- 
 after. Do we, therefore, love each other less ? No ! more 
 infinitely more ! Not till His human children have 
 learned to hold all love as subordinate to His, does God 
 pour into their hearts the richest treasures of earthly affec- 
 tion. When the gift will no longer harm, but wholly bless, 
 He gives it to them without stint. " Seek first the King- 
 dom of God and His righteousness, and all these things 
 shall be added unto you." 
 
 Pray for us, Francesca, that we may so seek, and so be 
 added unto ! 
 
 But the moments are gliding fast, and I forget that you 
 are still in the dark upon several important points ; I think 
 nothing, save the wedding day, was fixed when I Avrote 
 you before, all else was undelightfully chaotic. 
 
 Dr. Heartwell came to our help at last Paul's and 
 mine and forbade that grand, glittering, wearisome city 
 wedding which we so deprecated, but upon which Aunt 
 Belle had set her heart. 
 
 " If you want to kill your niece outright," said he, 
 bluntly, " drag her through all that parade and fatigue, for 
 which she has neither strength nor nerves ; and you can't 
 well miss of your aim. But if you want her to live, 
 marry her the quickest and speediest way possible, and get 
 her out of this climate before Old "Winter is upon us in good 
 earnest. There is a spark of pulmonic disease about her 
 which he might fan into a flame : a warm climate will 
 quench it. If you must make a fuss over her, Mrs. Frost,
 
 SHILOH. 483 
 
 do it when she conies back next April, well and strong. 
 Then you may give her the most costly, fashionable, and 
 absurd ' reception ' that you and Brown and Delmonico 
 can devise among you. But not before, with my consent." 
 
 There was no disputing professional dictum like this ; 
 and Aunt Belle, finding that she must needs yield the 
 point, was good enough to do it gracefully. 
 
 She is here; so are Uncle John and Flora and the 
 younger ones, down to that unconscious agent of Provi- 
 dence, little Bella. The old house is brimming over with 
 guests ; yet not more so than the hearts of its owners with 
 genuine, old-time hospitality, neither overlabored nor 
 overcareless, giving of its best as freely as the sky of its 
 sunshine, and with as little self-misgiving. Mr. and Mrs. 
 Divine were never more easy, more unembarrassed, more 
 wholly themselves,, than now. Aunt Belle looks at them 
 with growing wonder and respect ; she will carry some 
 new lights upon farmers and farm-life back to her aristo- 
 cratic home. 
 
 The old house is full of cheer, too, but of a subdued 
 and heart-deep kind ; none that need turn aside, in its ful- 
 lest flow, from Uncle True's chair ; which Alice has had 
 the lovely inspiration to wreathe with white flowers, fast- 
 ened here and there by dainty bows of soft, white ribbon. 
 The same pure taste and felicitous touch have been busy 
 throughout the house, causing flowers to fall and cling to- 
 gether everywhere, in such wise as must needs have sprung 
 from the unhindered operation of their own sweet laws of 
 being ; and using autumn leaves, where flowers grew 
 scarce, with wonderful richness and harmony of effect. 
 To me, the latter have the deeper meaning. The fullest 
 beauty of life and love has been revealed to me through 
 the frost-touch of sorrow. 
 
 What further miracles of decoration Alice and her 
 corps of assistants have wrought, over at the church, re- 
 mains to be seen. I only know that they have been busy
 
 484 SHILOH. 
 
 there half the morning, and that Aunt Belle took care that 
 they should be amply supplied with flowers. 
 
 For we are to be married in St. Jude's, Mr. Taylor offi- 
 ciating. All Shiloh will be there to see, if it pleases. For 
 all Shiloh is, in one sense, a friend. 
 
 We go to Cuba for the winter. Alice accompanies us ; 
 I cannot yet do without my deft little hand-maiden, who 
 has been hands and feet, strength and motion, to me, so 
 long. During my illness, I learned to value her as she 
 deserves. Her quick insight, which used to annoy me so 
 much, was a rare treasure in my sick-room ; divining what 
 I wanted before I knew it myself. Moreover, I desire to 
 kindle her imagination and enrich her memory with tropi- 
 cal pictures palms waving and shimmering in moonlight 
 glory, the golden gloom of orange groves, the rythmic 
 tread of the breeze in the canefield, the purple distances of 
 starry nights ; sometime, perhaps, to be distilled, by her 
 thought-alembic, into verse that shall set them, in all their 
 finest essence and deepest sentiment, before eyes that every- 
 where long for, yet are denied the actual sight. The trip 
 will not unhinge the self-poised, self-moved little maiden. 
 She will come back to the old, quiet life, with vision cleared 
 to discern its hidden beauty and value ; to brighten the 
 venerable house with her quickened thought and fuller 
 knowledge ; to be Mr. Taylor's faithful helper ; to succeed 
 me in my secretaryship and Sunday teaching ; to take up 
 whatever work I lay down, and carry it forward to better 
 end, I hope, than I have done. Sometime, too, I trust, to 
 become the centre and light of a home of her own ; which, 
 I now have good reason to believe, will also be the home 
 of Harry Burcham. 
 
 A few days ago, I laughingly hinted this conviction to 
 Ruth. She heard it in silence, turning her face away. 
 When her time for practice came, instead of the vocalizes 
 which I expected, there rose from the outroom a song (if 
 song it could be called, that had no distinguishable words,
 
 SHILOH. 485 
 
 only a wild melody), which seemed to give full, fit expres- 
 sion to every pang and pain that could rend a human 
 heart. Never, it seemed to me, were tones so deeply 
 pathetic* so exquisitely sweet, so heart-breakingly mourn- 
 ful. Sorrow seemed to have been molten into music. I held 
 my breath to listen, with unconscious tears in my eyes. 
 
 But, while the anguish was yet at its profoundest depth, 
 the voice seemed to soar out of it, as it were, and, with 
 only enough of sorrow left for richest sweetness, gradually 
 to rise and float out of hearing. 
 
 x And thus was it revealed, to Ruth and myself, that she 
 has the faculty of musical improvisation ! So, when Sig- 
 ner Canto gets his coveted pupil, he will find' her even more 
 gifted than he expects. And he will get her very soon. 
 For, it has been arranged that Ruth shall take my vacant 
 place in Uncle John's household, this winter. Flora has 
 taken an immense fancy to her ; so has Uncle John ; even 
 Aunt Belle has been quickened into un wonted kindliness of 
 interest by her beauty, her talent, and her misfortune. In 
 the spring, when Paul and I return to set up our temporary 
 home in the city, during the prosecution of his theological 
 studies, she will come to us. So far as human prevision goes, 
 Ruth's future is assured. Needless to add that, so far as 
 human plans and purposes are of avail, it will be musical. 
 That is her desire. 
 
 " I must give my life to music, now" she said to me, 
 recently, with an unconscious betrayal of some hidden dis- 
 appointment, some incommunicable sorrow. "And some- 
 time, no doubt, I shall be quite happy in it," she added, 
 sighing low, yet with eyes deeply lit by inward resolve and 
 hope. Her genius, baptized in pain, will now soar on 
 strong and purified wing ! 
 
 Essie came to me, a few days since, with a blush on her 
 cheek and a new sweetness in her blue eyes. She, too, is 
 won. I have promised, if I am in life, to be here for her 
 wedding in the spring. I am glad to be furnished with so
 
 486 SHILOH. 
 
 pleasant an excuse for an early visit to Shiloh ; a spot that 
 will always be thickly embroidered with golden memories 
 and suggestions. I came to it seeking rest. I got, first, 
 work ; then, peace ; finally, joy. It may be a type. For 
 all healthful life is labor, death may be only a peaceful 
 sleep, and heaven is surely joy ! 
 
 I learn that Mrs. Thorne is slowly getting the better of 
 the paralytic attack, but will probably be more or less of an 
 invalid, for the rest of her days. Carrie, of course, is with 
 her. So are Rick and Pearl. The latter will soon be in 
 the enjoyment of their inheritance. Paul saw a good 
 deal of them, at New Orleans, and liked them much. He 
 avers that Pearl has only enough of singularity left, to 
 make her charming ; and that the twain are excellently 
 well suited to each other. A degree of friendship sprang 
 up between him and Rick, out of which grew certain con- 
 fidences that prepared him for your letter, and helped to 
 interpret its meaning. 
 
 Mrs. Danforth is still here ; also her diamonds. Both 
 will lend their brilliancy to my wedding. But they are 
 not so inseparable as formerly ; the lady is sometimes seen, 
 now, without the jewels. She said to me, this morning, 
 laughingly indicating them, 
 
 " It is the last time that they will go into St. Jude's ; 
 and they will certainly never go into any other church, ex- 
 cept to do honor to a wedding ! I have learned better 
 than to wear them to service. I wonder that I ever had 
 the bad taste ! So much good, you see, if no more, has 
 grown out of my exile in Shiloh, slow, stupid, dear, de- 
 lightful spot ! " 
 
 That exile is almost over. Mr. Danforth is expected on 
 the next steamer, his business having been brought to a 
 satisfactory and prosperous termination. 
 
 Harry Burcham cannot yet leave his father in that des- v 
 olate home. It is probable that he will never return to 
 Italy, except for a visit. Life has shifted its human prom- 
 ise, its best reality, to Ms native land.
 
 SHILOH. 487 
 
 The question of the ownership of Leo, mooted by Har- 
 ry, was referred to Leo, himself. The two masters shook 
 hands, separated in opposite directions, and each called the 
 dog. There was a moment of hesitation ; then, Leo rub- 
 bed his head against Harry's hand, by way of farewell, 
 and followed the master whose life he had saved, and whom 
 he had served so long and so well. If he had done other- 
 wise, I think it would almost have broken the farmer's 
 heart ! Certainly, it is best so. For both, alas ! are grow- 
 ing old. Let the last sands of their simple, genuine, and 
 unselfish lives run out together ! 
 
 Dear, noble, absurd Aunt Vin was one of the visitors 
 turned out of my room at the beginning of this epistle. 
 " She had come," she said, " to offer me her conglomerations. 
 Also, to utter a Jeremy ; Shiloh would be as dissolute as a 
 grave without Alice, and Ruth, and me." She has prom- 
 ised to visit me in my own home. Aunt Belle could not 
 refrain from a comic lifting of her eyebrows, when she heard 
 the invitation given and accepted ; doubtless, she was pic- 
 turing Aunt Vin's introduction to some of our city friends. 
 Nevertheless, even she has learned to esteem the faithful, 
 self-devoted nurse at an approximation to her real value ; 
 and Aunt Vin will meet with all due courtesy at her hands. 
 
 In Mr. Warren there is no positive change for the better. 
 The most that can be said, is that he is less cynical, less 
 morose, less ready with his scepticism, than formerly. Also, 
 he has taken to studying the Bible ; but whether to find 
 matter for cavil or for faith, I know not. But his wife 
 hopes and prays. 
 
 Mrs. Prescott will be left to carry on the Sewing Society, 
 and other lay Church-work, almost alone. She will do it 
 with more tact and discretion than formerly, I think ; she 
 cannot do it with more zeal, perse vei*ance, and singleness of 
 heart. With all her faults, would there were more like her ! 
 
 Mr. Taylor is still in that spell-hedged dwelling, the 
 Gwynne Place, whereof it is yet to be written that ever 
 Angel of Life or Death has crossed its threshold. His work
 
 488 SHILOII. 
 
 in Shiloh, so far as his temporal support is concerned, at 
 least, will rest hereafter upon a more assured basis. As 
 a thank-offering to God for His tender mercy toward us, 
 Paul has bestowed upon St. Jude's an ample endowment. 
 Many would consider it wasted upon a place so small, so 
 out of the way, and so sparsely populated ; but he thinks 
 otherwise. These by-ways of New England, he says, these 
 quiet, out-lying farm districts, hidden away among the hills, 
 are the sources whence the waste of our towns and cities 
 is largely supplied ; whence, too, the great West draws 
 much of its best brain and energy. It behooves us of the 
 city, therefore, to see to it that these springs of our being 
 are not poisoned by indifference or infidelity ; that this 
 strength, wherewith we continually recruit our exhausted 
 energies, is not of the Spirit of Evil, unto destruction, but 
 of the Spirit of Good, unto God. 
 
 And Bona and Mala ? Both remain with me. My heart 
 is still to be shaken and trampled by their irreconcilable 
 warfare ; the entity called " I " is still to be tossed to and 
 fro on the tide of battle, the will burdened with the ever- 
 recurring necessity of declaring for one or the other. Every 
 life, which is not all a miserable defeat, must needs be a 
 conflict. The hour of death, only, is the hour of complete 
 victory. Thanks be to God, who, in that hour, through 
 our Lord Jesus Christ, maketh us " more than conquerors ! " 
 
 And now, oh, Francesca ! they call me Winnie Frost no 
 more ! But not less faithfully yours is 
 
 WINNIE VENNEK. 
 
 THE END
 
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