r gatherings before the winter ended; it resembled the
occasion that we described at the beginning of this history, with the
difference that Mrs. Farrinder was not there to oppress the company with
her greatness, and that Verena made a speech without the co-operation of
her father. This young lady had delivered herself with even finer effect
than before, and Olive could see how much she had gained, in confidence
and range of allusion, since the educative process in Charles Street
began. Her _motif_ was now a kind of unprepared tribute to Miss
Birdseye, the fruit of the occasion and of the unanimous tenderness of
the younger members of the circle, which made her a willing mouthpiece.
She pictured her laborious career, her early associates (Eliza P.
Moseley was not neglected as Verena passed), her difficulties and
dangers and triumphs, her humanising effect upon so many, her serene and
honoured old age--expressed, in short, as one of the ladies said, just
the very way they all felt about her. Verena's face brightened and grew
triumphant as she spoke, but she brought tears into the eyes of most of
the others. It was Olive's opinion that nothing could be more graceful
and touching, and she saw that the impression made was now deeper than
on the former evening. Miss Birdseye went about with her eighty years of
innocence, her undiscriminating spectacles, asking her friends if it
wasn't perfectly splendid; she took none of it to herself, she regarded
it only as a brilliant expression of Verena's gift. Olive thought,
afterwards, that if a collection could only be taken up on the spot, the
good lady would be made easy for the rest of her days; then she
remembered that most of her guests were as impecunious as herself.

I have intimated that our young friends had a source of fortifying
emotion which was distinct from the hours they spent with Beethoven and
Bach, or in hearing Miss Birdseye describe Concord as it used to be.
This consisted in the wonderful insight they had obtained into the
history of feminine anguish. They perused that chapter perpetually and
zealously, and they derived from it the purest part of their mission.
Olive had pored over it so long, so earnestly, that she was now in
complete possession of the subject; it was the one thing in life which
she felt she had really mastered. She was able to exhibit it to Verena
with the greatest authority and accuracy, to lead her up and down, in
and out, through all the dark