eat remembrance. She wore the simple
look of sainthood and unfeigned devotion. My heart was moved by the
sight of her plain sweet face, weather-worn and gentle in its looks,
her thin figure in its close dress, and the strong hand that clasped a
shepherd's staff, and I could only hold William in new reverence; this
silent farmer-fisherman who knew, and he alone, the noble and patient
heart that beat within her breast. I am not sure that they
acknowledged even to themselves that they had always been lovers; they
could not consent to anything so definite or pronounced; but they were
happy in being together in the world. Esther was untouched by the fret
and fury of life; she had lived in sunshine and rain among her silly
sheep, and been refined instead of coarsened, while her touching
patience with a ramping old mother, stung by the sense of defeat and
mourning her lost activities, had given back a lovely self-possession,
and habit of sweet temper. I had seen enough of old Mrs. Hight to know
that nothing a sheep might do could vex a person who was used to the
uncertainties and severities of her companionship.

IX.

Mrs. Hight told her daughter at once that she had enjoyed a beautiful
call, and got a great many new things to think of. This was said so
frankly in my hearing that it gave a consciousness of high reward, and
I was indeed recompensed by the grateful look in Esther's eyes. We did
not speak much together, but we understood each other. For the poor
old woman did not read, and could not sew or knit with her helpless
hand, and they were far from any neighbors, while her spirit was as
eager in age as in youth, and expected even more from a disappointing
world. She had lived to see the mortgage paid and money in the bank,
and Esther's success acknowledged on every hand, and there were still a
few pleasures left in life. William had his mother, and Esther had
hers, and they had not seen each other for a year, though Mrs. Hight
had spoken of a year's making no change in William even at his age.
She must have been in the far eighties herself, but of a noble courage
and persistence in the world she ruled from her stiff-backed
rocking-chair.

William unloaded his gift of dried fish, each one chosen with perfect
care, and Esther stood by, watching him, and then she walked across the
field with us beside the wagon. I believed that I was the only one who
knew their happy secret, and she blushed a little as we