MRS. POWERS,
_Mental Heeler_.

Oh, what a naughty, ignorant, amusing, hypocritical, pathetic world it
is! I tuck the note in my pocket to brighten the day for Helen, and we
pass on.

As we progress we gather into our train Levi, Jacob, David, Moses,
Elias, and the other prophets and patriarchs who belong to our band. We
hasten the steps of the infant Garibaldi, who is devouring refuse fruit
from his mother's store, and stop finally to pluck a small Dennis
Kearney from the coal-hod, where he has been put for safe-keeping. The
day has really begun, and with its first service the hands grow willing
and the heart is filled with sunshine.

As the boys at my side prattle together of the "percession" and the
"sojers" they saw yesterday, I wish longingly that I could be
transported with my tiny hosts to the sunny, quiet country on this
clear, lovely morning.

[Illustration: "THE BOYS AT MY SIDE PRATTLE TOGETHER."]

I think of my own joyous childhood, spent in the sweet companionship of
fishes, brooks, and butterflies, birds, crickets, grasshoppers,
whispering trees and fragrant wild flowers, and the thousand and one
playfellows of Nature which the good God has placed within reach of the
happy country children. I think of the shining eyes of my little Lucys
and Bridgets and Rachels could I turn them loose in a field of golden
buttercups and daisies, with sweet wild strawberries hidden at their
roots; of the merry glee of my dear boisterous little prophets and
patriots, if I could set them catching tadpoles in a clear wayside pool,
or hunting hens' nests in the alder bushes behind the barn, or pulling
yellow cow lilies in the pond, or wading for cat-o'-nine-tails, with
their ragged little trousers tucked above their knees. And oh! hardest
of all to bear, I think of our poor little invalids, so young to
struggle with languor and pain! Just to imagine the joy of my poor, lame
boys and my weary, pale, and peevish children, so different from the
bright-eyed, apple-cheeked darlings of well-to-do parents,--mere babies,
who, from morning till night, seldom or never know what it is to cuddle
down warmly into the natural rest of a mother's loving bosom!

* * * * *

Monday morning came and went,--Monday afternoon also; it was now two
o'clock, and to my surprise and disappointment Patsy had not appeared.
The new chair with its pretty red cushion stood expectant but empty.
Helen had put a coat o