sole occupant of the cottage for many years. She was a
type of old-fashioned neighborliness, and made a specialty of
ministration to the needs of sick and poor throughout the village. One
frequently met her on some errand of mercy; the basket on her arm
contained good things prepared with her own hands for the needy; the
large and stately figure had grown rather mountainous with advancing
years, and the dignity of her slow and measured pace suggested the
steady progress of a ship moving in calm waters. The solemnity of her
countenance, and the grave manner of her carefully chosen words, were
lovably familiar to those who knew her warm and generous heart.

When Miss Cooper's health failed she was obliged to undergo an operation
which left her a cripple, unable to get about except in a wheel-chair
propelled by an attendant. Always a faithful communicant of Christ
Church, her disability occasioned what came to be almost a parochial
ceremony, for when Miss Cooper made her communion she was wheeled to the
chancel steps, and the priest came forward to administer to her, while
the other communicants respectfully waited until she had withdrawn.

[Illustration: _C. A. Schneider_

BYBERRY COTTAGE as originally built]

Added to her other infirmities, an affection of the eyes gradually
darkened her vision until she became totally blind. In a condition of
helplessness which would seem to make existence unendurable, Miss Cooper
found much to make her happy, and life was sweet to her to the end. She
enjoyed the society of friends, and it gave her keen pleasure, blind and
crippled as she was, to be seated in state at large social functions.
Such was her habitual solemnity of manner that few gave her credit for
the sense of humor which lightened many of her dark days. She uttered
her jests with so much gravity that they were often taken in earnest.
Now and again she made sport of her own infirmities. Meeting her one
day in her wheel-chair, after her eyesight had begun to fail, a neighbor
inquired for her health. "Quite comfortable," replied Miss Cooper, in
solemn tones, "except for my eyes. They tell me it is a fine day, with
beautiful blue sky. The sky is blue, but to my eyes it is shrunk to the
size of a bachelor's-button!" Miss Cooper was very reluctant in
consenting to the amputation which prolonged her life for several years.
Even after the surgeons stood ready in the operating-room she for a time
declined to submit to the orde