ie Veneer. It was mentioned
to her that he would like to call and see how she was, and she
consented,--not with much apparent interest, for she had reasons of her
own for not feeling any very deep conviction of his sympathy for persons
in sorrow. But he came, and worked the conversation round to religion,
and confused her with his hybrid notions, half made up of what he had
been believing and teaching all his life, and half of the new doctrines
which he had veneered upon the surface of his old belief. He got so
far as to make a prayer with her,--a cool, well-guarded prayer, which
compromised his faith as little as possible, and which, if devotion were
a game played against Providence, might have been considered a cautious
and sagacious move.

When he had gone, Elsie called Old Sophy to her.

"Sophy," she said, "don't let them send that cold hearted man to me any
more. If your old minister comes--to see you, I should like to hear him
talk. He looks as if he cared for everybody, and would care for me. And,
Sophy, if I should die one of these days, I should like to have that old
minister come and say whatever is to be said over me. It would comfort
Dudley more, I know, than to have that hard man here, when you're
in trouble, for some of you will be sorry when I'm gone,--won't you,
Sophy?"

The poor old black woman could not stand this question. The cold
minister had frozen Elsie until she felt as if nobody cared for her or
would regret her,--and her question had betrayed this momentary feeling.

"Don' talk so! don' talk so, darlin'!" she cried, passionately. "When
you go, Ol' Sophy'll go; 'n' where you go, Ol' Sophy'll go: 'n' we'll
both go t' th' place where th' Lord takes care of all his children,
whether their faces are white or black. Oh, darlin', darlin'! if th'
Lord should let me die firs', you shall fin' all ready for you when you
come after me. On'y don' go 'n' leave poor Ol' Sophy all 'lone in th'
world!"

Helen came in at this moment and quieted the old woman with a look. Such
scenes were just what were most dangerous, in the state in which Elsie
was lying: but that is one of the ways in which an affectionate friend
sometimes unconsciously wears out the life which a hired nurse, thinking
of nothing but her regular duties and her wages, would have spared from
all emotional fatigue.

The change which had come over Elsie's disposition was itself the cause
of new excitements. How was it possible that her fathe