ppropriate only to wealth, and which
wealth only purchases. These were never displayed, but I had seen them,
and made them the corner-stones of many an airy castle.

CHAPTER IV.

And who was Peggy?

She was one of the best and noblest women God ever made. She was a
treasury of heaven's own influences.

And yet she wore the form of a servant, and like her divine Master,
there was "no beauty" in her that one should desire to look upon her.

She had followed my mother through good report and ill report. She had
clung to her in her fallen fortunes as something sacred, almost divine.
As the Hebrew to the ark of the covenant,--as the Greek to his country's
palladium,--as the children of Freedom to the star-spangled banner,--so
she clung in adversity to her whom in prosperity she almost worshipped.
I learned in after years, all that we owed this humble,
self-sacrificing, devoted friend. I did not know it then--at least not
all--not half. I knew that she labored most abundantly for us,--that she
ministered to my mother with as much deference as if she were an
empress, anticipating her slightest wants and wishes, deprecating her
gratitude, and seeming ashamed of her own goodness and industry. I knew
that her plain sewing, assisted by my mother's elegant needle-work,
furnished us the means of support; but I had always known it so, and it
seemed all natural and right. Peggy was strong and robust. The burden of
toil rested lightly on her sturdy shoulders. It seemed to me that she
was born with us and for us,--that she belonged to us as rightfully as
the air we breathed, and the light that illumined us. It never entered
my mind that we could live without Peggy, or that Peggy could live
without us.

My mother's health was very delicate. She could not sew long without
pressing her hand on her aching side, and then Peggy would draw her work
gently from her with her large, kind hand, make her lie down and rest,
or walk out in the fresh air, till the waxen hue was enlivened on her
pallid cheek. She would urge her to go into the garden and gather
flowers for Gabriella, "because the poor child loved so to see them in
the room." We had a sweet little garden, where Peggy delved at early
sunrise and evening twilight. Without ever seeming hurried or
overtasked, she accomplished every thing. We had the earliest
vegetables, and the latest. We had fruit, we had flowers, all the result
of Peggy's untiring, providing hand. The surplu