ow old are you? You
can't make much history in ten years."

"No, not much," said Matilda. "But still--it may not be history to
other people, but I think it is to one's self."

"What?"

"Oh, one's life, you know."

"But ten years is not a life," said Norton.

"It is, if one hasn't lived any longer."

"I would like my life to be history to other people," said Norton.
"Something worth while."

"I wouldn't like other people to know my life, though," said Matilda.

"Then could not help it, if it was something worth while," said Norton.

"Why, yes, Norton; one's life is what one thinks and feels; what nobody
knows. Not the things that everybody knows."

"It is what one _does_," said Norton; "and if you do anything worth
while, people will know it. I wonder what there will be to tell of you
and me fifty years from now?"

"Fifty years! Why, then I should be sixty-one," said Matilda; "and you
would be a good deal more than that. But perhaps we shall not live to
be so old."

"Yes, we shall," said Norton. "_I_ shall; and you must, too."

"Why, Norton, we can't _make_ ourselves live," said Matilda, in great
astonishment at this language.

"We shall live to be old, though," said Norton. "I know it. And I wish
there may be something to be said of _me_. I don't think women ought to
be talked of."

"I do not see what good it would do anybody to be talked of, after he
has gone away out of the world," said Matilda. "Except to be talked of
in heaven. That would be good."

"In heaven!" said Norton. "Talked of in heaven! Where did you get that?"

"I don't mean that exactly," said Matilda. "But some people will."

"Who?"

"Why, a great many people, Norton. Abraham and Noah, and David, and
Daniel, and the woman that put all she had into the Lord's treasury,
and the woman that anointed the head of Jesus--the woman who, He said,
had done what she could. I would like to have _that_ said of me, if it
was Jesus that said it."

Norton took hold of Matilda and gave her a little good-humoured shake.
"Stop that!" he said; "and tell me, is that why you are carrying a
Bible out here in the streets?"

"Oh, I haven't any use for it here, Norton."

"Then what have you got it here for?"

"Norton, there are some people in the village who are sick, or cannot
read; and I was going to read to them."

"Where are they?"

"In Lilac Lane."

"Where is that?"

"You go up past the corner a good way, and just by Mr. Barth's foundry