thing else. So passed the evening; and Matilda was very
glad when it was time to go to bed.

Mrs. Laval went with her to her pretty room, and saw with motherly care
that all was in order and everything there which ought to be there. The
room was warm, though no fire was to be seen; the gas was lit; and
complete luxury filled every corner and met every want, even of the
eye. And after a fond good night, Matilda was left to herself. She was
in a very confused state of mind. It was a strange place; she half
wished they were back in Shadywalk; but with that were mixed floating
visions of shopping and her filled wardrobe, visions of driving in the
Park with Norton, fancies of untold wonderful things to be seen in this
new great city, with its streets and its shops and its rich and its
poor people. No, she could not forego the seeing of these; she was glad
to be in New York; were there not the Menagerie and Stewart's awaiting
her to-morrow? But what sort of a life she was to live here, and how
far it would be possible for her to be like the Matilda Englefield of
Shadywalk why, she was _not_ to be Matilda Englefield at all, but
Laval. Could that be the same? Slowly, while she thought all this,
Matilda opened her little trunk and took out her nightdress and her
comb and brush, and her Bible; and then, the habit was as fixed as the
other habit of going to bed, she opened her Bible, brought a pretty
little table that was in the room, put it under the gas light, and
knelt down to read and pray. She opened anywhere, and read without very
well understanding what she read; the thoughts of lions and tigers, and
green poplin, and red cashmere, making a strange web with the lines of
Bible thought, over which her eye travelled. Till her eyes came to a
word so plain, so clear, and touching her so nearly, that she all at
once as it were woke up out of her maze.

"_Who mind earthly things_."

What is that? Must one not mind earthly things? Then she went back to
the beginning of the sentence, to see better what it meant.

"For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even
weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ: whose end is
destruction, whose God is their belly, and whose glory is in their
shame, who mind earthly things."

Must one not _mind_ earthly things? thought Matilda. How can one help
minding them? How can I help it? All the people in this house mind
nothing else. Neither did they all at home,