And when we returned, she would inquire in the most tender and affectionate manner after the wellbeing of "the Bidefuls;" and add new interest to their histories and fate, by her brilliant or witty suggestions. Were there really no little people that lived in the little cupboard under the library? It is so hard to believe now that it was all a myth; and that the lovely Lucy, the last of that ancient family, had no material existence.

With all the fine health of my father and mother, we had a great deal of sickness in our house. Our elder brothers and sisters had inherited delicate constitutions from their mother, and three of my mother's children were far from strong. This may have been caused by the disparity of years in our parents. But I think the health of all was materially affected by our mother's entire ignorance on the subject. It was the one great defect of her intelligence that she had no appreciation of that ounce of prevention which is worth more than a pound of cure. With an iron constitution herself, strong nerves, and healthy blood, she had no understanding of how the lack of these things may be supplied and built up by patient forethought and care. But when her warm heart was wrung by the sufferings of those for whom she would have cheerfully given her life, we could only regret that she had known so little how to avert the calamities she deplored. She was a very faithful and devoted nurse in the severe illnesses that occurred, not only in her own family, but in those of her neighbors and friends; always ready to lose her sleep, night after night, as long as any one

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needed it. But, the moment all danger was over, the patient was well to her mind, and it was high time to set about the real business of life, in which sickness was an untold interruption. Usually, if an illness was a low nervous fever, not dangerous, but requiring much care, she thought it a good time to improve all our minds by a course of reading aloud, for which there was never any uninterrupted time in our ordinary life. And I remember one such illness, when Ranke's "History of the Popes," and Carlyle's "French Revolution" were manfully put through under what would have been serious difficulties to any one else. She always seemed to consider nerves rather as vicious portions of the human character than as constituents of the mortal frame; and as they interfered sadly with duty, with benevolence, and every other virtue, they must be discharged without delay. She desired to be thankful that she was born before nerves were the fashion. She believed entirely in the power of mind over body. Alas! she forgot that so long as the two are united there must be constant action and reaction of each upon the other; and we, who saw her mistakes in this wise, knew that some of the heaviest trials of her life came from this one-sided view of the subject. Yet even here her forcible character implanted a grand outlook in the heart of an invalid; and one, at least, of that large family has never known whether most to deplore the ignorance and false view that wrought such sad consequences, or to thank and bless her for the belief so powerfully inculcated, that though the outward man perish the inward may be renewed day by day.

CHAPTER VI.

Let a man, then, say: "My house is here in the county, for the culture of the county; an eating-house and sleeping-house for travellers it shall be, but it shall be much more. I pray you, O excellent wife, not to cumber yourself and me to get a rich dinner for this man or this woman, who has alighted at our gate, nor a bedchamber made ready at too great a cost. These things, if they are curious in, they can get for a dollar at any village. But let this stranger, if he will, in your looks, in your accent and behavior, read your heart and earnestness, your thought and will,-which he cannot buy at any price, in any village or city, and which he may well travel fifty miles, and dine sparely and sleep hard, in order to behold. Certainly, let the board be spread, and let the bed be dressed for the traveller; but let not the emphasis of hospitality lie in these things. Honor to the house, where they are simple to the verge of hardship, so that there the intellect is awake and reads the laws of the universe, the soul worships truth and love, honor and courtesy flow into all deeds."- EMERSON.

Y father was forty-four years old, my mother

MY

twenty-two, at the time of their marriage. It has been said by such numbers of people that they were the handsomest couple that ever came into Northampton, that I think it must have been. true. Beauty is certainly a passport to all hearts, and when, as in their case, the life is "in accordance with the curious make and frame of one's creation," there is an influence about it that cannot well be computed. They now became the centres of a social circle, not easy to describe in these days,—