_Isaac_.
"Plum-porridge and feather beds'll be nought to what they've getten up
yonder.--You see, Mistress _Joyce_, we mun tell her by what she knows,
poor maid!"

"Ay, thou sayest well, _Isaac_," Aunt _Joyce_ made reply. "_Madge_, thy
mother's up yonder."

"I know!" she saith, a-smiling. "She'll come to th' gate when I knock.
He'll sure send her to meet me. She'll know 'tis me, ye ken. It'd
never do if some other maid gave my name, and got let in by mistake for
me. He'll send somebody as knows me to see I get in right. Don't ye
see, that's why we keep a-going one at once? Somebody mun be always
there that'll ken th' new ones."

"I reckon the Lord will ken them, _Madge_," saith Aunt _Joyce_.

"Oh ay, He'll ken 'em, sure enough," saith _Madge_. "But then, ye see,
they'd feel lonely like if they waited to see any body they knew till
they got right up to th' fur end: and th' angels 'd be stoppin' 'em and
wanting to make sure all were right. That wouldn't be pleasant. So
He'll send one o' them as knows 'em, and then th' angels 'll be
satisfied, and not be stoppin' of 'em."

Aunt _Joyce_ did not smile at poor _Madge's_ queer notions. She saith
at times that God Himself teaches them that men cannot teach. And at
after, quoth she, that it were but _Madge_ her way of saying, "He careth
for you."

"Dost thou think she is going, _Isaac_?" saith Aunt _Joyce_. For old
_Isaac_ is an herb-gatherer, or were while he could; and he wist a deal
of physic.

"Now, _Gaffer_, thou'lt never say nay!" cries _Madge_ faintly, as though
it should trouble her sore if he thought she would live through it.

"I'll say nought o' th' sort, _Madge_," said _Isaac_. "Ay, Mistress
_Joyce_. She's been coming to the Lord this ever so long: and now, I
take it, she's going to Him."

"That's right!" saith _Madge_, with a comforted look, and laying of her
head back on her pillows. "It would be sore to get right up to th'
gate, and then an angel as one didn't know just put his head forth, and
say, `Th' Master says 'tis too soon, _Madge_: thou must not come in yet.
Thou'lt have to walk a bit outside.' Eh, but I wouldn't like yon!"

"He'll not leave thee outside, I reckon," saith Aunt _Joyce_.

"Eh, I hope not!" quoth _Madge_, as regretfully. "I do want to see Him
so. I'd like to see if He looks rested like after all He bare for a
poor daft maid. And I want to know if them bad places is all healed up
in His hands and feet, and hur