r face was
upturned to him; it was a glorified face, so transformed by the
tender radiance of love shining through it that I saw her then as
Uncle Dick must always see her, and no longer found it hard to
understand how she could be his Rose of joy. Happiness clothed them as
a garment; they were crowned king and queen in the bridal realm of the
springtime.

The Understanding of Sister Sara

June First.

I began this journal last New Year's--wrote two entries in it and then
forgot all about it. I came across it today in a rummage--Sara insists
on my cleaning things out thoroughly every once in so long--and I'm
going to keep it up. I feel the need of a confidant of some kind, even
if it is only an inanimate journal. I have no other. And I cannot talk
my thoughts over with Sara--she is so unsympathetic.

Sara is a dear good soul and I love her as much as she will let me. I
am also very grateful to her. She brought me up when our mother died.
No doubt she had a hard time of it, poor dear, for I never was easily
brought up, perversely preferring to come up in my own way. But Sara
did her duty unflinchingly and--well, it's not for me to say that the
result does her credit. But it really does, considering the material
she had to work with. I'm a bundle of faults as it is, but I tremble
to think what I would have been if there had been no Sara.

Yes, I love Sara, and I'm grateful to her. But she doesn't understand
me in the least. Perhaps it is because she is so much older than I am,
but it doesn't seem to me that Sara could really ever have been young.
She laughs at things I consider the most sacred and calls me a
romantic girl, in a tone of humorous toleration. I am chilled and
thrown back on myself, and the dreams and confidences I am bubbling
over with have no outlet. Sara couldn't understand--she is so
practical. When I go to her with some beautiful thought I have found
in a book or poem she is quite likely to say, "Yes, yes, but I noticed
this morning that the braid was loose on your skirt, Beatrice. Better
go and sew it on before you forget again. 'A stitch in time saves
nine.'"

When I come home from a concert or lecture, yearning to talk over the
divine music or the wonderful new ideas with her, she will say, "Yes,
yes, but are you sure you didn't get your feet damp? Better go and
change your stockings, my dear. 'An ounce of prevention is worth a
pound of