e present in
his hand--a few flowers, a spring chicken, some nice fruit, a partridge.
This queer rustic scaffold for my books and work, Harry constructed it
himself, and I would not exchange it for the most elegant and ingenious
of whatnots. I could do nothing for him but listen to his long thoughts
and aspirations: that was when you were out of hearing, and he could
neither talk nor write to his dear little Bessie."

"It was a great gap, but it did not make us strangers," said Bessie.

"When he went to Oxford he sent us word of his arrival, and how he liked
his college and his tutor--matters that were as interesting to us as if
he had been our own. And when he found how welcome his letters were, he
wrote to Mr. Moxon often, and sent him any report or pamphlet that he
thought might please him; and several times he gave himself the trouble
both at the Bodleian and in London to search for and copy out extracts
from works that Mr. Moxon wanted and had no means of procuring here. You
can have no idea how helpful he has been to my husband in such things.
Poor fellow! what a grief it was to us that term he had to stay away
from Oxford on account of his health! Already we began to fear for the
future, but his buoyant spirit would not anticipate any permanent
hindrance to his progress; and that check did make him more prudent. But
it is not to be; he sees himself cut short of the career where he
planned to be famous; he gives way, however, to neither anger nor
repining. Oh, my love! that I could win you to believe that if you clasp
this cross to your heart, as the gift of Him who cannot err, you will
never feel it a burden!"

Bessie smiled. She did not feel it a burden now, and Harry was not
abandoned to carry its weight alone. She did not speak: she was not apt
at the expression of her religious feelings, but they were sincere as
far as life had taught her. She could have lent her ears for a long
while to Harry Musgrave's praises without growing weary, but the vicar
now appeared, followed by the doctor, talking in a high, cheerful voice
of that discovery he had made of a remarkable mathematical genius in
Littlemire: "A most practical fellow, a wonderful hard head--will turn
out an enterprising engineer, an inventor, perhaps; has the patience of
Job himself, and an infinite genius for taking pains."

Bessie recollected rather pathetically having once heard the sanguine,
good vicar use very similar terms in speaking of her be