about doing coarse work, and living a narrow, common kind of life, and what do you think she said?"

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"I can't tell, of course. Something blunt and original.” We were out in the garden. She pointed to some plants that were coming up from seeds, that had just two tough, clumsy, coarse leaves. 'What do you call them?' said auntie. Cotyledons, are n't they?' said I. 'I don't know what they are in botany,' said she; but I know the use of 'em. They 'll last awhile, and help feed up what's growing inside and underneath, and by-and-by they'll drop off, when they're done with, and you'll see what's been coming of it. Folks can't live the best right out at first, any more than plants can. I guess we all want some kind ofcotyledons." "

Mrs. Gartney's eyes shone with affection, and something that affection called there, as she looked upon her daughter. "I guess the cotyledons won't hinder your growing," said she.

And so, in a few days after, Mahala was dismissed, and Faith took upon herself new duties.

It was a bright, happy face that glanced hither and thither, about the house, those fair summer mornings; and it was n't the hands alone that were busy, as under their dexterous and delicate touch all things arranged themselves in attractive and graceful order. Thought straightened and cleared itself, as furniture and books were dusted and set right; and while the carpet brightened under the broom, something else brightened and strengthened, also, within.

It is so true, what the author of "Euthanasy" tells us, that exercise of limb and muscle develops not only themselves, but what is in us as we work.

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Every stroke of the hammer upon the anvil hardens

a little what is at the time the temper of the smith's mind."

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The toil of the ploughman furrows the ground, and so it does his brow with wrinkles, visibly; and invisibly, but quite as certainly, it furrows the current of feeling, common with him at his work, into an almost unchangeable channel."

Faith's life-purpose deepened as she did each daily task. She had hold, already of the "high and holy work of love" that had been prophesied.

"I am sure of one thing, mother," said she, gayly; "if I don't learn much that is new, I am bringing old knowledge into play. It's the same thing, taken hold of at different ends. I've learned to draw straight lines, and shade pictures; and so there is n't any difficulty in sweeping a carpet clean, or setting chairs straight. I never shall wonder again that a woman who never heard of a right angle can't lay a table even."

OCTOBER came, and brought small dividends. The expenses upon the farm had necessarily been considerable, also, to put things in "good running order." Mr. Gartney's health, though greatly improved, was not yet so confidently to be relied on, as to make it advisable for him to think of any change, as yet, with a view to business. Indeed, there was little opportunity for business, to tempt him. Everything was flat. The exhaustion of the great financial struggle it had passed through lay, like a paralysis, upon the community. There was neither confidence Without actual capital, nothing could be done. Mr. Gartney must wait. But when a man finds himself, at five-and-forty years of age, out of business, with broken health, and in disastrous times, there is little likelihood of his launching successfully ever again into any large mercantile life. Mrs. Gartney and Faith felt, though they talked of waiting, that the prospect really before them was that of a careful, obscure life, upon a very limited income. The house in Mishaumok had stood vacant all the summer.

nor credit.

There was hope, of course, of letting it now, as the winter season came on, but rents were falling, and people were timid and discouraged. Nobody made any sort of move who could help it.

October was beautiful at Kinnicutt. And Faith, when she looked out over the glory of woods and sky, and felt the joy of the sunshine, as the hem of summer's departing robe overswept the bright frost-broideries of autumn, making such a palpable blessedness abroad felt rich with the great wealth of the world, and forgot about economies and privations. She was so glad they had come here with their altered plans, and had not struggled shabbily and drearily on in Mishaumok!

It was only when some chance bit of news from the city, or a girlish, gossipy note from some school-friend found its way to Cross Corners, that she felt, a little keenly, her denials, — realized how the world she had lived in all her life was going on without her, and how here, environed with the beauty of all earth and heaven, she was yet so nearly shut out from congenial human companionship. There were so many things she had hoped to learn, and to do, and to enjoy, that now must be only dreams! So many things she felt herself fitted for, that now might never come in her way! What a strange thing was life! A longinga reaching an imagining-a hoping, was it ever a substantial grasping? Were we just put here to catch a glimpse of things that might be, and to turn away from all, knowing that it may not be, for us?

It was the old plaint that Glory made, in her dark days of childhood, this feeling of despondency and loss that assailed Faith now and then, "such lots of good times in

the world, and she not in 'em!"

Mrs. Etherege and Saidie were coming home. Gertrude Rushleigh, Saidie's old intimate, was to be married on the twenty-eighth, and had fixed her wedding thus for the very last of the month, that Miss Gartney might arrive to keep her promise of long time, by officiating as bridesmaid.

The family eclipse would not overshadow Saidie. She had made her place in the world now, and with her aunt's aid and countenance, would keep it. It was quite different with Faith, disappearing, as she had done, from notice, before ever actually "coming out."

"It was a thousand pities," Aunt Etherege said, when she and Saidie discussed with Mrs. Gartney, at Cross Corners, the family affairs. "And things just as they were, too! Why, another year might have settled matters for her, so that this need never have happened! At any rate, the child should n't be moped up here, all winter!"

Mrs. Etherege had engaged rooms, on her arrival, at the Mishaumok House; and it seemed to be taken for granted by her, and by Saidie as well, that this coming home was, as Faith had long ago prophesied, a mere visit; that Miss Gartney would, of course, spend the greater part of the winter with her aunt; and that lady extended also an invitation to Mishaumok for a month—including the wedding festivities at the Rushleighs'

to Faith.

Faith shook her head. She " knew she could n't be spared so long." Secretly, she doubted whether it would be a good plan to go back and get a peep at things that might send her home discontented and unhappy.

But her mother reasoned, or felt impulse, otherwise. Faithie must go. "The child must n't be moped up." She would get on, somehow, without her. Mothers always can. So Faith, by a compromise, went for a fortnight. She could n't quite resist her newly-returned sister.