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I. CONSECRATION. As the weeks passed by, bringing no intelligence to New Hope that Paul was living,--when there was no longer a doubt of his death,--Father Surplice held a memorial service. It was on Sunday, and all the people were at church. Appropriate for the occasion were the words which he read from the New Testament of the widow of Nain,--how, "as Jesus came nigh to the city, there was a dead man carried out, the only son of his mother, and she was a widow; and when the Lord saw her, he had compassion on her, and said, 'Weep not!'" Consoling and comforting were his own words, which sank deep into the hearts of the stricken people; and though the good man said, "Weep not!" tears dropped from his own eyes, and fell upon the great Bible which lay open before him. It was a sad and solemn service. Though the heart of the mother was yearning for her son, yet she could say, "The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord." Mrs. Parker still lived in the little old cottage. The neighbors were very kind, and she wanted for nothing, for Colonel Dare remembered his promise. Peaceful was her life. The birds sang cheerful songs; sweet was the humming of the bees, fragrant the flowers in the garden, and steady the flowing of the river; and as she listened to the waterfall, she thought of Paul as standing by the River of Life. How, then, could she mourn for him? Yet she missed him. Sometimes she listened as if to hear his footsteps coming up the garden walk. Sometimes her eyes filled with tears, as her heart went out to the lonely battle-field where she thought him lying. O, if she could but behold him again,--clasp him in her arms,--and once more lay her hand upon his brow, and bless him with a mother's tenderest love! But he was gone, and for him she could work no more. His comrades were bearing on the flag, upholding it on bloody fields, fighting as he fought, suffering as he suffered, needing help and comfort and cheer from those at home. There was work to be done for them; so through the days she sat in the old kitchen, knitting and sewing for the soldiers, wishing that she had half a dozen hands instead of two, that she might help them more. There was one who came to aid her every day,--Azalia, who, in the silence and seclusion of her chamber, had looked out upon the yellow harvest-fields where the farmers were gathering the first ripe ears of seed-corn, and had tried to still t
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