t be lawyers, they have so much to
start with!

Poor David! He wasn't sensible of what had befallen him. How should he
be? He didn't know why he smarted up his dress, why Bay-fishing wasn't
profitable, or why working on the land agreed with him best. He hadn't
even found out, as late as June, why he liked to have her bring out the
luncheon-basket to the mowers. But before the autumn he had discovered
his own secret. He knew very well, then, why he thought it a good plan
for Mary Ellen to come in and pare apples with Miss Joey at the halves.

I could have wished him a pleasanter way, though, of finding out his
secret.

There was another that saw the alteration, and that was Emily, the sick
one,--the care and the blessing of the household. For twelve summers her
foot had never pressed the greensward. They told me that once she was a
gay, frolicsome girl. 'Twas hard to believe, so tranquil, so spiritual,
so heavenly was the expression which long suffering had brought to her
face. That face, apart from this wonderful expression, was beautiful to
look upon. It seemed as if sickness itself was loath to meddle with
aught so lovely. So, while her body slowly wasted from the ravages of
disease, her countenance remained fair and youthful.

She often had days of freedom from suffering,--days when, as she
expressed it, her Father called away His unwelcome messengers. At these
times she would sit in her stuffed chair, or lie on the sofa, and the
family went in and out as they chose. Everybody liked to stay in Emily's
room. Its very atmosphere was elevating.

Then there were collected so many beautiful things,--for these she
craved. "I need them, mother," she would say,--"my soul has need of
them. If there are no flowers, get green leaves, or a picture of Christ,
or of some saint, or little child." And sometimes I would dream, for a
moment, that even I, with all my obtuseness, my earthiness, could have
some faint perception of the way in which, in the midst of suffering,
any form of beauty was a strength and a consolation.

And singularly enough for a sick girl, she liked gold ornaments and
jewels. People used to lend her their chains and bracelets. "I know it
is strange, mother," she said, one day, while holding in her hand a ruby
bracelet,--"strange that I care for them; but they look so strong, so
enduring, so full of life: hang them across the white vase, please; I
love to see them there."

It was good for her when Mary E