d curiously.

"Many things--his prayers most of all. Lessons of patience and faith,
too, that money never could buy."

She remained silent until we reached Mrs. Larkum's. We found the doctor
there. He was an old acquaintance. I had met him at a good many evening
parties, and at a garden-party or two, where he had several times been my
partner in lawn tennis, and an excellent partner I had found him, making
up for any lack of skill on my part.

His greeting was exceedingly cordial, and in a blunt way he plunged right
into the business in hand. "We are very glad to see you; we have some
grave advice to ask."

"I feel quite elated at making one in a medical consultation," I said
with a smile.

"I am not sure if you have not done more to restore health in this house
than I. The world is too slow recognizing other healers than those
embraced by the medical faculties."

"It's my opinion doctors knows less than one thinks of folks' insides.
They're as apt to make mistakes about people dying or getting well as any
of us. I don't put near as much faith in 'em as the common run of folks,"
Mrs. Blake said with delicious candor.

"Really, I thought you had a better opinion of us as a profession than
that. If you get sick, you will of course dispense with our services."

Mrs. Blake looked perplexed, but after a moment's hesitation she said:

"If I was sick I'd want to see a doctor just as much as anybody. Their
medicine is all right; for God made that. It's their judgment that's so
onreliable."

"And who is to blame for their judgment?" the doctor asked mischievously.

She hesitated, but her mother wit soon extricated her from the
difficulty.

"There's lots of folks doing what the Lord didn't intend them to
do--doctors as well as others."

"Well done, Mrs. Blake, I will retire from the field before I am
annihilated altogether."

"You needn't be in a hurry to go. We'd like to get this business
settled first," Mrs. Blake said, a trifle anxiously, misunderstanding
the doctor's meaning. He threw me a meaning glance, and afterward
whispered,--"That woman is a diamond in the rough. Given a fair start
in life, she would have found a proper sphere in almost any calling."

"I believe she would. She has done more for me than any other single
individual."

"She!" he asked with keen surprise.

"Yes, she wakened me from selfish ease to see the sufferings of others,
and to realize my sisterhood to them."

"Yes, but you mus