that very day without his rubbers. Having no children of her own,
Mrs. Francis did not know that the day after the "rubberman" had been
in town quite a few people went without rubbers, not because they
were careless of their health either, but because they had
thoughtlessly left them in the front porch, where little boys can
easily get them.

Half an hour after they began to discuss it, everybody felt that not
only was the church suffering severely, but that they had been the
unconscious witnesses of a domestic tragedy.

They formed a committee on "ways and means," another one to solicit
aid from country members, and a social committee to get up a pie
social to buy a new stair-carpet for the parsonage, and they
appointed Mrs. Francis and Mrs. Ducker to approach Mr. Burrell on the
subject of his wife's coming.

The unconscious object of their solicitude was quite surprised to
receive that evening a visit from Mrs. Francis and Mrs. Ducker.
Reverend John Burrell did not look like a man who was pining for the
loved and lost--he was a small, fair man, with a pair of humorous
blue eyes. A cheerful fire was burning in the Klondike heater, and an
air of comfort pervaded his study.

The ladies made known their errand, and then waited to see the glad
look that would come into their pastor's face.

He stirred the fire before replying.

"It is very kind of you ladies to think of fixing up the parsonage,"
he said. "Mrs. Burrell is having a very pleasant visit with her
mother in Toronto."

"Yes; but her place is here," Mrs. Ducker said with decision, feeling
around in the shadowy aisles of her mind for some of the Fireside
Visitor's "It is lonely for you, and it must be for her."

Mr. Burrell did not say it was not.

Mrs. Francis was filled with enthusiasm over the idea of fixing up
the parsonage, and endeavoured, too, to give him some of the reasons
why a church prospers better spiritually when there is a woman to
help in the administration of its affairs.

When the women had gone, the Reverend John Burrell sat looking long
and earnestly into the fire. Then he got up suddenly and rattled down
the coals with almost unnecessary vigour and murmured something
exclamatory about sainted womanhood and her hand being in every good
work, though that may not have been the exact words he used!

The work of remodelling the parsonage was carried on with enthusiasm,
and two months later Mrs. Burrell arrived.

Mrs. Ducker, Mrs. Fra