t which lighteth every man that cometh into the
world shone into the Crowhurst cottage--that Light greater than all
lights which can be lit by priest or philosopher, as the sun is greater
than all our oil-lamps, gas, and candles. When Phoebe first had
congestion of the lungs, not a single note of murmuring at the trouble
caused escaped a soul in the household. The mother sat up with her at
night, and a poor woman half a mile off came in during the day and saw
that things went all straight. To be sure, there was Dr. Turnbull. It
was a long way out of his rounds, but he knew the Crowhursts well, and,
as we have said, he watched over Phoebe as carefully as if she had been
the daughter of a duke. Now Phoebe was ill again, but Dr. Turnbull was
again there, and although her cough was incessant, the care of father,
mother, brother, and sister was perfect in its tenderness, and their self-
forgetfulness was complete. It was not with them as with a man known to
the writer of this history. His wife, whom he professed to love, was
dying of consumption. "I do not deny she suffers," he said "but nobody
thinks of _me_." The sympathy of the agricultural poor with one another
is hardly credible to fine people who live in towns. If we could have a
record of the devotion of those women who lie forgotten under the turf
round country churches throughout England, it would be better worth
preserving than nine-tenths of our literature and histories. Surely in
some sense they still _are_, and their love cannot have been altogether a
thing of no moment to the Power that made them!

Catharine had never been to Phoebe's home before. At the Terrace she was
smart, attractive, and as particular as her mistress about her clothes.
Nobody ever saw Phoebe with untidy shoes or stockings, and even in the
morning, before she was supposed to be dressed, her little feet were as
neat as if she had nothing to do but to sit in a drawing-room. She was
now lying on a stump bedstead with a patchwork coverlet over her, and to
protect her from the draughts an old piece of carpet had been nailed on a
kind of rough frame and placed between her and the door. Catharine's
first emotion when she entered was astonishment and indignation. Therein
she showed her ignorance and stupidity. The owner of the cottage did not
force the Crowhursts to live in it. It was not he who directed that a
girl dying of consumption should lie close to a damp wall in a room eight