both. Whether any of the ancients or
moderns have mentioned the fact, it is hardly worth while to inquire,
but good-humour is a form of tenderness. Those who are easy to laugh are
likewise ready to be sorry, and they have a fund of sympathy to draw on
whenever the necessity arises. Simplicity and tenderness connect the
highest wisdom with the deepest ignorance, and find the elements of
brotherhood where the intellect is unable to discern it. It was
simplicity and tenderness that bridged the gulf of years that lay
between the old gentlewoman and the young girl. Age can find no comfort
for itself unless it can make terms with youth. Where it stands alone,
depending upon the respect that should belong to what is venerable,
there is something gruesome about it. It quenches the high spirits of
children and young people, and chills their enthusiasm. All that it does
for them is to give notorious advertisement to the complexion to which
they must all come at last. "You see these wrinkled and flabby
features, this gray hair, these faded and watery eyes, these shaking
limbs and trembling hands: well, this is what you must come to." And,
indeed, it is an object lesson well calculated to sober and subdue the
giddy.

Now, age had dealt very gently with Gabriel's grandmother; it became her
well. Her white hair was even more beautiful now than it had been when
she was young, as Meriwether Clopton often declared. Her eyes were
bright, and all her sympathies were as keenly alive as they had been
fifty years before. She had kept in touch with Gabriel and the young
people about her, and none of her faculties had been impaired. She was
the gentlest of gentlewomen.

Once Nan had asked her--"Grandmother Lumsden, what is the perfume I
smell every time I come here? You have it on your clothes."

"Life Everlasting, my dear." For one brief and fleeting instant, Nan had
the odd feeling that she could see millions and millions of years into
the future. Life Everlasting! She caught her breath. But the vision or
feeling was swept away by the placid voice of Mrs. Lumsden. "I believe
you and Gabriel call it rabbit tobacco," she explained.

Nan had a great longing to be with Mrs. Lumsden the moment she heard
that Gabriel had been spirited away by the strong arm of the Government.
She felt that she would be more comfortable there than at home.

"My dear, what put it into that wise little head of yours to come and
comfort an old woman?" Mrs. Lumsde