came, and the shady house was sunny

with a child’s laugh, and the Divine friend of children, to whom in

her trouble she had confided hers, seemed to take her child in His

Charles Dickens ElecBook Classics

arms, as He took the child of old, and made it a sacred joy to her.

Ever busily winding the golden thread that bound them all

together, weaving the service of her happy influence through the

tissue of all their lives, and making it predominate nowhere, Lucie

heard in the echoes of years none but friendly and soothing

sounds. Her husband’s step was strong and prosperous among

them; her father’s firm and equal. Lo, Miss Pross, in harness of

string, awakening the echoes, as an unruly charger, whipcorrected,

snorting and pawing the earth under the plane-tree in

the garden!

Even when there were sounds of sorrow among the rest, they

were not harsh nor cruel. Even when golden hair, like her own, lay

in a halo on a pillow round the worn face of a little boy, and he

said, with a radiant smile, “Dear papa and mamma, I am very

sorry to leave you both, and to leave my pretty sister; but I am

called, and I must go!” those were not tears all of agony that

wetted his young mother’s cheek as the spirit departed from her

embrace that had been entrusted to it. Suffer them and forbid

them not. They see my Father’s face. O Father, blessed wor