University of Virginia Library

38. CHAPTER XXXVIII.

As Miss Roxy was leaving the dwelling of the Pennels,
she met Sally Kittridge coming toward the house, laughing
and singing, as was her wont. She raised her long lean
forefinger with a gesture of warning.

“What 's the matter now, Aunt Roxy? You look as
solemn as a hearse.”

“None o' your jokin' now, Miss Sally; there is such a
thing as serious things in this 'ere world of our'n, for all you
girls never seems to know it.”

“What is the matter, Aunt Roxy? — has anything happened?
— is anything the matter with Mara?”

“Matter enough. I've known it a long time,” said Miss
Roxy. “She 's been goin' down for three months now; and
she 's got that on her that will carry her off before the
year 's out.”

“Pshaw, Aunt Roxy! how lugubriously you old nurses
always talk! I hope now you hav' n't been filling Mara's
head with any such notions — people can be frightened into
anything.”

“Sally Kittridge, don't be a-talkin' of what you don't
know nothin' about! It stands to reason that a body that
was bearin' the heat and burden of the day long before you
was born or thought on in this world, should know a thing
or two more 'n you. Why, I 've laid you on your stomach
and trotted you to trot up the wind many a day, and I was

pretty experienced then, and it a'n't likely that I 'm a-goin'
to take sa'ce from you. Mara Pennel is a gal as has every
bit and grain as much resolution and ambition as you have,
for all you flap your wings and crow so much louder, and
she 's one of the close-mouthed sort, that don't make no
talk, and she 's been a-bearin' up and bearin' up, and comin'
to me on the sly for strengthenin' things. She 's took
camomile and orange-peel, and snake-root and boneset, and
dash-root and dandelion — and there ha' n't nothin' done her
no good. She told me to-day she could n't keep up no
longer, and I 've been a-tellin' Mis' Pennel and her gran'ther.
I tell you it has been a solemn time; and if you 're
goin' in, don't go in with none o' your light triflin' ways,
'cause `as vinegar upon nitre is he that singeth songs on a
heavy heart,' the Scriptur' says.”

“Oh, Miss Roxy, do tell me truly?” said Sally, much
moved. “What do you think is the matter with Mara?
I 've noticed myself that she got tired easy, and that she
was short-breathed — but she seemed so cheerful. Can
anything really be the matter?”

“It 's consumption, Sally Kittridge,” said Miss Roxy,
“neither more nor less; that ar is the long and the short.
They 're going to take her over to Portland to see Dr.
Wilson — it won't do no harm, and it won't do no good.”

“You seem to be determined she shall die,” said Sally in
a tone of pique.

“Determined, am I? Is it I that determines that the
maple leaves shall fall next October? Yet I know they will
— folks can't help knowin' what they know, and shuttin'
one's eyes won't alter one's road. I s'pose you think 'cause
you 're young and middlin' good-lookin' that you have feelin's
and I has n't — well, you 're mistaken, that 's all. I

don't believe there 's one person in the world that would go
farther or do more to save Mara Pennel than I would, —
and yet I 've been in the world long enough to see that
livin' a'n't no great shakes neither. Ef one is hopefully
prepared in the days of their youth, why they escape a
good deal, ef they get took cross-lots into heaven.”

Sally turned away thoughtfully into the house; there
was no one in the kitchen — and the tick of the old clock
sounded lonely and sepulchral. She went up-stairs to Mara's
room; the door was ajar. Mara was sitting at the open window
that looked forth toward the ocean, busily engaged in
writing. The glow of evening shone on the golden waves
of her hair, and tinged the pearly outline of her cheek.
Sally noticed the translucent clearness of her complexion,
and the deep burning color and the transparency of the
little hands, which seemed as if they might transmit the
light like Sèvres porcelain. She was writing with an expression
of tender calm, and sometimes stopping to consult
an open letter that Sally knew came from Moses.

So fair and sweet and serene she looked that a painter
might have chosen her for an embodiment of twilight, and
one might not be surprised to see a clear star shining out
over her forehead. Yet in the tender serenity of the face
there dwelt a pathos of expression that spoke of struggles
and sufferings past, like the traces of tears on the face of a
restful infant that has grieved itself to sleep.

Sally came softly in on tiptoe, threw her arms around her,
and kissed her, with a half laugh, then bursting into tears,
sobbed upon her shoulder.

“Dear Sally, what is the matter?” said Mara, looking up.

“Oh, Mara, I just met Miss Roxy, and she told me” —
Sally only sobbed passionately.

“It is very sad to make all one's friends so unhappy,”
said Mara, in a soothing voice, stroking Sally's hair. “You
don't know how much I have suffered dreading it. Sally, it
is a long time since I began to expect and dread and fear.
My time of anguish was then — then when I first felt that
it could be possible that I should not live after all. There
was a long time I dared not even think of it; I could not
even tell such a fear to myself; and I did far more than I
felt able to do to convince myself that I was not weak and
failing. I have been often to Miss Roxy, and once, when
nobody knew it, I went to a doctor in Brunswick, but
then I was afraid to tell him half, lest he should say
something about me, and it should get out; and so I
went on getting worse and worse, and feeling every day
as if I could not keep up, and yet afraid to lie down for fear
grandmamma would suspect me. But this morning it was
pleasant and bright, and something came over me that said
I must tell somebody, and so, as it was cool and pleasant, I
walked up to Aunt Roxy's and told her. I thought, you
know, that she knew the most, and would feel it the least;
but oh, Sally, she has such a feeling heart, and loves me so;
it is strange she should.”

“Is it?” said Sally, tightening her clasp around Mara's
neck; and then with a hysterical shadow of gayety she said,
“I suppose you think that you are such a hobgoblin that
nobody could be expected to do that. After all, though, I
should have as soon expected roses to bloom in a juniper
clump as love from Aunt Roxy.”

“Well, she does love me,” said Mara. “No mother could
be kinder. Poor thing, she really sobbed and cried when I
told her. I was very tired, and she told me she would take
care of me, and tell grandpapa and grandmamma, — that

had been lying on my heart as such a dreadful thing to do,
— and she laid me down to rest on her bed, and spoke so lovingly
to me! I wish you could have seen her. And while
I lay there, I fell into a strange, sweet sort of rest. I can't
describe it; but since then everything has been changed. I
wish I could tell any one how I saw things then.”

“Do try to tell me, Mara,” said Sally, “for I need comfort
too, if there is any to be had.”

“Well, then, I lay on the bed, and the wind drew in from
the sea and just lifted the window-curtain, and I could see
the sea shining and hear the waves making a pleasant little
dash, and then my head seemed to swim. I thought I was
walking out by the pleasant shore, and everything seemed
so strangely beautiful, and grandpapa and grandmamma
were there, and Moses had come home, and you were
there, and we were all so happy. And then I felt a sort
of strange sense that something was coming — some great
trial or affliction — and I groaned and clung to Moses, and
asked him to put his arm around me and hold me.

“Then it seemed to be not by our sea-shore that this was
happening, but by the Sea of Galilee, just as it tells about it
in the Bible, and there were fishermen mending their nets,
and men sitting counting their money, and I saw Jesus come
walking along, and heard him say to this one and that one,
`Leave all and follow me,' and it seemed that the moment
he spoke they did it, and then he came to me, and I felt his
eyes in my very soul, and he said, `Wilt thou leave all and
follow me?' I cannot tell now what a pain I felt — what
an anguish. I wanted to leave all, but my heart felt as if it
were tied and woven with a thousand threads, and while I
waited he seemed to fade away, and I found myself then
alone and unhappy, wishing that I could, and mourning that

I had not; and then something shone out warm like the
sun, and I looked up, and he stood there looking pitifully,
and he said again just as he did before, `Wilt thou leave all
and follow me?' Every word was so gentle and full of
pity, and I looked into his eyes and could not look away;
they drew me, they warmed me, and I felt a strange, wonderful
sense of his greatness and sweetness. It seemed as
if I felt within me cord after cord breaking, I felt so free,
so happy; and I said, `I will, I will, with all my heart;'
and I woke then, so happy, so sure of God's love.

“I saw so clearly how his love is in everything, and these
words came into my mind as if an angel had spoken them,
`God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes.' Since then
I cannot be unhappy. I was so myself only this morning, and
now I wonder that any one can have a grief when God is
so loving and good, and cares so sweetly for us all. Why,
Sally, if I could see Christ and hear Him speak, I could not
be more certain that he will make this sorrow such a blessing
to us all that we shall never be able to thank him enough
for it.”

“Oh Mara,” said Sally, sighing deeply, while her cheek
was wet with tears, “it is beautiful to hear you talk; but
there is one that I am sure will not and cannot feel so.”

“God will care for him,” said Mara; “oh, I am sure of
it; He is love itself, and He values his love in us, and He
never, never would have brought such a trial, if it had not
been the true and only way to our best good. We shall not
shed one needless tear. Yes, if God loved us so that He
spared not his own Son, he will surely give us all the good
here that we possibly can have without risking our eternal
happiness.”

“You are writing to Moses, now?” said Sally.

“Yes, I am answering his letter; it is so full of spirit
and life and hope — but all hope in this world — all, all
earthly — as much as if there was no God and no world to
come. Sally, perhaps our Father saw that I could not have
strength to live with him and keep my faith. I should be
drawn by him earthward instead of drawing him heavenward;
and so this is in mercy to us both.”

“And are you telling him the whole truth, Mara?”

“Not all, no,” said Mara; “he could not bear it at once.
I only tell him that my health is failing, and that my friends
are seriously alarmed, and then I speak as if it were doubtful,
in my mind, what the result might be.”

“I don't think you can make him feel as you do. Moses
Pennel has a tremendous will, and he never yielded to any
one. You bend, Mara, like the little blue harebells, and so
the storm goes over you; but he will stand up against it,
and it will wrench and shatter him. I am afraid, instead of
making him better, it will only make him bitter and rebellious.”

“He has a Father in heaven who knows how to care for
him,” said Mara. “I am persuaded — I feel certain that
he will be blessed in the end; not perhaps in the time and
way I should have chosen, but in the end. I have always
felt that he was mine ever since he came a little shipwrecked
boy to me — a little girl. And now I have given him up to
his Saviour and my Saviour — to his God and my God —
and I am perfectly at peace. All will be well.”

Mara spoke with a look of such solemn, bright assurance
as made her, in the dusky, golden twilight, seem like some
serene angel sent down to comfort, rather than a hapless
mortal just wrenched from life and hope.

Sally rose up and kissed her silently. “Mara,” she said,

“I shall come to-morrow to see what I can do for you. I
will not interrupt you now. Good-by, dear.”

There are no doubt many, who have followed this history
so long as it danced like a gay little boat over sunny waters,
and who would have followed it gayly to the end, had it
closed with ringing of marriage-bells, who turn from it indignantly,
when they see that its course runs through the dark
valley. This, they say, is an imposition — a trick upon our
feelings. We want to read only stories which end in joy
and prosperity.

But have we then settled it in our own mind that there is
no such thing as a fortunate issue in a history which does not
terminate in the way of earthly success and good fortune?
Are we Christians or heathen? It is now eighteen centuries
since, as we hold, the “highly favored among women”
was pronounced to be one whose earthly hopes were all cut
off in the blossom, — whose noblest and dearest in the morning
of his days went down into the shadows of death.

Was Mary the highly-favored among women, and was
Jesus indeed the blessed, — or was the angel mistaken? If
they were these, if we are Christians, it ought to be a settled
and established habit of our souls to regard something else
as prosperity than worldly success and happy marriages.
That life is a success which, like the life of Jesus, in its beginning,
middle, and close, has borne a perfect witness to the
truth and the highest form of truth. It is true that God
has given to us, and inwoven in our nature a desire for a
perfection and completeness made manifest to our senses in
this mortal life. To see the daughter bloom into youth and
womanhood, the son into manhood, to see them marry and
become themselves parents, and gradually ripen and develop

in the maturities of middle life, gradually wear into
a sunny autumn, and so be gathered in fulness of time to
their fathers, — such, one says, is the programme which
God has made us to desire; such the ideal of happiness
which he has interwoven with our nerves, and for which our
heart and our flesh crieth out; to which every stroke of a
knell is a violence, and every thought of an early death is
an abhorrence.

But the life of Christ and his mother sets the foot on this
lower ideal of happiness, and teaches us that there is something
higher. His ministry began with declaring, “Blessed
are they that mourn.” It has been well said that prosperity
was the blessing of the Old Testament, and adversity of the
New. Christ came to show us a nobler style of living and
bearing; and so far as he had a personal and earthly life,
he buried it as a corner-stone on which to erect a new immortal
style of architecture.

Of his own, he had nothing, neither houses, nor lands, nor
family ties, nor human hopes, nor earthly sphere of success;
and as a human life, it was all a sacrifice and a defeat. He
was rejected by his countrymen, whom the passionate anguish
of his love and the unwearied devotion of his life
could not save from an awful doom. He was betrayed by
weak friends, prevailed against by slanderers, overwhelmed
with an ignominious death in the morning of youth, and his
mother stood by his cross, and she was the only woman
whom God ever called highly favored in this world.

This, then, is the great and perfect ideal of what God
honors. Christ speaks of himself as bread to be eaten, —
bread, simple, humble, unpretending, vitally necessary to
human life, made by the bruising and grinding of the
grain, unostentatiously having no life or worth of its own

except as it is absorbed into the life of others and lives in
them. We wished in this history to speak of a class of
lives formed on the model of Christ, and like his, obscure
and unpretending, like his, seeming to end in darkness and
defeat, but which yet have this preciousness and value that
the dear saints who live them come nearest in their mission
to the mission of Jesus. They are made, not for a career
and history of their own, but to be bread of life to others.
In every household or house have been some of these, and
if we look on their lives and deaths with the unbaptized
eyes of nature, we shall see only most mournful and unaccountable
failure, — when, if we could look with the eye of
faith, we should see that their living and dying has been
bread of life to those they left behind. Fairest of these, and
least developed, are the holy innocents who come into our
households to smile with the smile of angels, who sleep in
our bosoms, and win us with the softness of tender little
hands, and pass away like the lamb that was slain before
they have ever learned the speech of mortals. Not vain
are even these silent lives of Christ's lambs, whom many an
earth-bound heart has been roused to follow when the Shepherd
bore them to the higher pastures. And so the daughter
who died so early, whose wedding-bells were never rung
except in heaven, — the son who had no career of ambition
or manly duty except among the angels, — the patient sufferers,
whose only lot on earth seemed to be to endure,
whose life bled away drop by drop in the shadows of the
sick-room — all these are among those whose life was like
Christ's in that they were made, not for themselves, but to
become bread to us.

It is expedient for us that they go away. Like their
Lord, they come to suffer, and to die; they take part in his

sacrifice; their life is incomplete without their death, and
not till they are gone away does the Comforter fully come
to us.

It is a beautiful legend which one sees often represented
in the churches of Europe, that when the grave of the
mother of Jesus was opened, it was found full of blossoming
lilies, — fit emblem of the thousand flowers of holy thought
and purpose which spring up in our hearts from the memory
of our sainted dead.

Cannot many, who read these lines, bethink them of such
rooms that have been the most cheerful places in the family,
— when the heart of the smitten one seemed the band that
bound all the rest together, — and have there not been dying
hours which shed such a joy and radiance on all around,
that it was long before the mourners remembered to mourn?
Is it not a misuse of words to call such a heavenly translation
death? and to call most things that are lived out on this
earth life?