soil, and the presbyters
and deacons determined to recommend the congregation who should assemble
at the love-feast to give their assistance to the steward's children.

The elders had still much to discuss, so Hannah and Paulina were charged
with the task of appealing to the hearts of the well-to-do members of the
congregation to provide for the orphans. The poor widow first conducted
her wealthy friend and hostess to the little room where Arsinoe was
waiting with growing impatience. She looked paler than usual but, in
spite of her tear-reddened eyes which she kept fixed on the ground, she
was so lovely, so touchingly lovely, that the mere sight of her moved
Paulina's heart. She had once had two children, an only daughter besides
her son. The girl bad died in the spring-time of her maidenhood, and
Paulina thought of her at every hour of her life. It was for her sake
that she had been baptized and devoted her existence to a series of
painful sacrifices. She strove with all her might to be a good
Christian--for surely she, the self-denying woman who had taken up the
cross of her own free will, the suffering creature who loved stillness
and who had made her country-house, which she visited daily, a scene of
unrest, could not fail to win Heaven, and there she hoped to meet her
innocent child.

Arsinoe reminded her of her Helena, who certainly had been far less fair
than the steward's lovely daughter, but whose image had assumed new and
glorified forms in the mother's faithful heart. Since her son had left
home for a foreign country she had often asked herself whether she might
not find some young creature to take into her home, to attach to herself,
to bring up as a Christian, and to bring as an offering to her Saviour's
feet.

Her daughter had died a heathen, and nothing troubled Paulina so deeply
as that her soul was lost, and that her own struggling and striving for
grace could not lead her to the goal beyond the grave. No sacrifice
seemed too great to purchase her child's beatitude, and now, standing
before Arsinoe and looking at her with deep emotion and admiration, she
was seized with an idea which swiftly ripened to resolve. She would win
this sweet soul for the Redeemer, and implore Him with ceaseless prayers
to save her hapless child as a reward for the work of grace in Arsinoe's
soul; and she felt as if she had signed the compact with the Redeemer,
when, fully determined on this course, she went up to the girl