of a spiritual heritage and living thereby.

"And don't you see," she had urged, at least a score of times,
"if we could only teach all the cripples to let their minds
run--free-limbed--over hilltops and pleasant places, their natures
would never need to warp and wither after the fashion of their poor
bodies. And the time to begin is in childhood, when the mind is
learning to walk alone."

Usually the House Surgeon was easily convinced to the Margaret MacLean
side of any argument; but this time, for reasons of his own, he turned
an unsympathetic and stubborn ear. He was coming to believe very
strongly that all this fanciful optimism was so much laughing-gas, with
only a passing power, and when the effect wore off there would be the
Dickens to pay. He did not want to see Margaret MacLean turn into a
bitter-minded woman of the world--stripped of her trust and her dreams.
He--all of them--had need of her as she was. Her belief in the
ultimate good of things and persons, however, was beyond power of human
achievement; and the surest cure for disappointments was to amputate
all expectations. So the House Surgeon hardened his heart and became
as professionally severe as he knew how to be.

"It's absolutely impossible to expect a group of incurable children in
an institution to be made as normal and happy as other children. It
can't be done. Those kiddies are up against a pretty hard proposition,
I know; but the kindest thing you can do for them is to toughen them
into not feeling--"

The nurse in charge of Ward C wrenched away her hands fiercely.
"You're just like the Senior Surgeon. He thinks the whole dependent
world--the sick and the poor and the incompetent--have no business with
ideas or feelings of their own. He's always saying, 'Train it out of
them; train it out of them; and it will make it easier for institutions
to take care of them.' It's for ever the 'right of the strong' with
him. Unless you are able to take care of yourself you are not entitled
to the ordinary privileges of a human being."

"I'm not at all like the Senior Surgeon. I don't mean that, and you
know it. What I am trying to make you understand is that these kiddies
can't keep you always; some time they will have to learn to do without
you. When that happens it will come tough on them. It would come
tough on anybody; and the square thing for you to do is to stop
being--so all-fired adorable." The House Surgeon flung back his head