gery that the servant's wage might go
for my tuition in a thorough school. Oh, how we labored, she and I
together, cheating night of many hours o'er books and study that were to
repay us at the last with decent independence.

"The school days ended, the neighbors urged again the _shops_. But 'no'
again. She had not spent her strength to fit me for the yard-stick and
the shop-girl's meagre living. She read the riddle of my being as only
mothers can; saw the stamp upon my soul and fondly called it genius.
Pinned her faith upon that slumbering curse, or blessing, as we choose
each to interpret it.

"I had a little school some sixty miles from home. She had agreed that I
might teach; that was in the course in which she wished my life to go.
The schoolhouse was a cabin in the wood, through which flowed a river.
We cannot tell the route by which we run to fame, and mine lay through
this cabin in the woods. I scribbled bits of rhyme and broken verse,
constantly; and found it fame enough if in the hurried jingle my mother
detected 'improvement,' 'promise.'

"But one day when the river burst its banks, the cabin, deluged, lay
under water for ten days, and I became a temporary prisoner in my
miserable boarding-house, I wrote a story, a simple, earnest little
story. It sold, and more, it won a prize. Two hundred and fifty
dollars,--it would take ten months of the little school to make so much.
When it came--Gertie, I cannot tell you how I felt!--I thought that
somehow in the darkness I had reached my hands out and found them
clasped in God's; held tight and fast, and strong and safe. I kneeled
down in that cabin schoolroom, with the awe-struck children gathered
round me, and choked with sobs and happy tears, thanked God who sent the
blessed treasure.

"I had but one thought--Mother. I sent the children home--my work with
them was done. Now I could go to _her_, and with a sprig of laurel to
lay upon my brow, could silence stinging tongues while I worked quietly
on at home. Home! never would I leave its blessed roof again. Oh, how my
longing heart hurried my laggard feet. I did not write; no pen should
cheat my tongue of the blessed story. I wished to feel her arms, see her
smile, catch her heart-beat while I told her. God! I whispered His name
softly in gratitude and love. I planned my surprise well, but I was
doomed to disappointment. It was midnight when I reached the town; the
streets were silent and no one spoke to me. 'Som