g enough to satisfy her
wildest dreams. The rich relation's parlour was in festival array, and
the country cousin sails in, looking back at her sweeping flounces with
such artless rapture that no one had the heart to laugh at the pretty
jay in borrowed plumes. She has confidences with herself in the mirror,
from which it is made evident that she had discovered all is not gold
that glitters, and has found greater temptations than those a girlish
love of pleasure, luxury, and flattery bring her. She is sought by a
rich lover; but her honest heart resists the allurements he offers,
and in its innocent perplexity wishes 'mother' was there to comfort and
counsel.

A gay little dance, in which Dora, Nan, Bess, and several of the boys
took part, made a good background for the humble figure of the old woman
in her widow's bonnet, rusty shawl, big umbrella, and basket. Her naive
astonishment, as she surveys the spectacle, feels the curtains, and
smooths her old gloves during the moment she remains unseen, was very
good; but Josie's unaffected start when she sees her, and the cry:
'Why, there's mother!' was such a hearty little bit of nature, it hardly
needed the impatient tripping over her train as she ran into the arms
that seemed now to be her nearest refuge.

The lover plays his part; and ripples of merriment greeted the old
woman's searching questions and blunt answers during the interview which
shows the girl how shallow his love is, and how near she had been to
ruining her life as bitterly as poor 'Elizy' did. She gives her answer
frankly, and when they are alone, looks from her own bedizened self
to the shabby dress, work-worn hands, and tender face, crying with a
repentant sob and kiss: 'Take me home, mother, and keep me safe. I've
had enough of this!'

'That will do you good, Maria; don't forget it,' said one lady to her
daughter as the curtain went down; and the girl answered: 'Well, I'm
sure I don't see why it's touching; but it is,' as she spread her lace
handkerchief to dry.

Tom and Nan came out strong in the next scene; for it was a ward in
an army hospital, and surgeon and nurse went from bed to bed, feeling
pulses, administering doses, and hearing complaints with an energy and
gravity which convulsed the audience. The tragic element, never far from
the comic at such times and places, came in when, while they bandaged
an arm, the doctor told the nurse about an old woman who was searching
through the hospital