directress and
companion, in a life of quiet bliss, Lucie sat in the still house in
the tranquilly resounding corner, listening to the echoing footsteps of
years.

At first, there were times, though she was a perfectly happy young wife,
when her work would slowly fall from her hands, and her eyes would be
dimmed. For, there was something coming in the echoes, something light,
afar off, and scarcely audible yet, that stirred her heart too much.
Fluttering hopes and doubts--hopes, of a love as yet unknown to her:
doubts, of her remaining upon earth, to enjoy that new delight--divided
her breast. Among the echoes then, there would arise the sound of
footsteps at her own early grave; and thoughts of the husband who would
be left so desolate, and who would mourn for her so much, swelled to her
eyes, and broke like waves.

That time passed, and her little Lucie lay on her bosom. Then, among the
advancing echoes, there was the tread of her tiny feet and the sound of
her prattling words. Let greater echoes resound as they would, the young
mother at the cradle side could always hear those coming. They came, and
the shady house was sunny with a child's laugh, and the Divine friend of
children, to whom in her trouble she had confided hers, seemed to take
her child in his arms, as He took the child of old, and made it a sacred
joy to her.

Ever busily winding the golden thread that bound them all together,
weaving the service of her happy influence through the tissue of all
their lives, and making it predominate nowhere, Lucie heard in the
echoes of years none but friendly and soothing sounds. Her husband's
step was strong and prosperous among them; her father's firm and equal.
Lo, Miss Pross, in harness of string, awakening the echoes, as an
unruly charger, whip-corrected, snorting and pawing the earth under the
plane-tree in the garden!

Even when there were sounds of sorrow among the rest, they were not
harsh nor cruel. Even when golden hair, like her own, lay in a halo on a
pillow round the worn face of a little boy, and he said, with a radiant
smile, "Dear papa and mamma, I am very sorry to leave you both, and to
leave my pretty sister; but I am called, and I must go!" those were not
tears all of agony that wetted his young mother's cheek, as the spirit
departed from her embrace that had been entrusted to it. Suffer them and
forbid them not. They see my Father's face. O Father, blessed words!

Thus, the rustling of an A