s wild
with the swift blood of boyhood, and that the hours are long which wait
his coming. It may be that your heart echoes in silence the mother's
sobs, as she watches his fits of waywardness, and showers upon his very
neglect excess of love.

Danger perhaps creeps upon little, joyous Nelly, which makes you tremble
for her life; the mother's tears are checked that she may not deepen
your grief; and her care guards the little sufferer like a Providence.
The nights hang long and heavy; dull, stifled breathing wakes the
chamber with ominous sound; the mother's eye scarce closes, but rests
with fond sadness upon the little struggling victim of sickness; her
hand rests like an angel touch upon the brow, all beaded with the heats
of fever; the straggling, gray light of morning breaks through the
crevices of the closed blinds,--bringing stir and bustle to the world,
but in your home--lighting only the darkness.

Hope, sinking in the mother's heart, takes hold on Faith in God; and her
prayer, and her placid look of submission,--more than all your
philosophy,--add strength to your faltering courage.

But little Nelly brightens; her faded features take on bloom again; she
knows you; she presses your hand; she draws down your cheek to her
parched lip; she kisses you, and smiles. The mother's brow loses its
shadow; day dawns within as well as without, and on bended knees God is
thanked!

Perhaps poverty faces you;--your darling schemes break down. One by one,
with failing heart, you strip the luxuries from life. But the sorrow
which oppresses you is not the selfish sorrow which the lone man feels:
it is far nobler; its chiefest mourning is over the despoiled home.
Frank must give up his promised travel; Madge must lose her favorite
pony; Nelly must be denied her little _fete_ upon the lawn. The home
itself, endeared by so many scenes of happiness and by so many of
suffering, must be given up. It is hard, very hard, to tear away your
wife from the flowers, the birds, the luxuries, that she has made so
dear.

Now she is far stronger than you. She contrives new joys; she wears a
holy calm; she cheers by a new hopefulness; she buries even the memory
of luxury in the riches of the humble home that her wealth of heart
endows. Her soul, catching radiance from that heavenly world where her
hope lives, kindles amid the growing shadows, and sheds balm upon the
little griefs,--like the serene moon, slanting the dead sun's life, upon
t