od. That is all a little child can
know of religion. Yet we must all believe God and His Son were one." The
last words were murmured rather than spoken--almost self-directed.

"Is His Son a little boy, and will he be fond of my mother?" I asked.
"Will she love him too? Oh, she loved me so much, so much!" and, in an
agony of grief, I caught Miss Glen around the neck, and sobbed
convulsively on her sympathetic breast. Again Evelyn smiled, I suppose,
for I heard Miss Glen say, rebukingly:

"My dear Miss Erle, you must not make light of your little sister's
sufferings. They are very severe, I doubt not, young as she is. All the
more so that she does not know how to express them."

Revolving these words, I came later to know their import. They seemed
unmeaning to me at the time, but the kind and deprecating tone of voice
in which they were conveyed was unmistakable, and that sufficed to
reassure me.

"And now, Miriam, let me go to my room and take off my bonnet and shawl,
for I am going to stay with you. Perhaps you will show me the way
yourself," she said, pausing. "Bring Dolly, too;" and we walked off
hand-in-hand together to the large, commodious chamber Mrs. Austin
pointed out as that prepared for our governess. I recognized my affinity
from that hour.

There, sitting on her knee, with her gentle hand on my hair, and her
sweet eyes fixed on mine, I learned at once to love Miss Glen, or
"Constance," as she made us call her, because her surname seemed
over-formal. She wished us to regard her as an elder sister, she said,
rather than mere instructress, deeming rightly that the law of love
would prove the stronger and better guidance in our case, and
understanding well, and by some line magnetic sympathy as it appeared,
my own peculiar nature, to which affection was a necessity.

Ours was a peaceful and happy childhood under her gentle and fostering
rule; and, when it ceased, all the wires of life seemed jangled and
discordant again.

She lived with us three years as friend and teacher. At the end of that
time her vocation and sphere of action were enlarged, not changed, for
she married my father, and thus our future welfare seemed secured.

Alas for human foresight! Alas for affection powerless to save! Alas for
the vanity of mortal effort to contend with Fate!

Our home was in one of the chief Northern cities of that great republic
which has for so many years commanded the admiration, respect, and
wonder, of the