Sarah Knowles Bolton

“ I have met one who will, I think, fill my vision for life. She is not strictly beautiful. Her blue eyes are calm and clear. Her manner is not responsive, and she would seem to a stranger like one to be worshipped from afar. She has depth of affection, but it is not on the surface.
Edith Graham is to most persons a mystery. She loves nature, sits with me often to enjoy these wonderful sunsets, makes me feel that I am in the presence of a goddess, and goes her way, while I continue to worship her. ”

“ I shall go back to our old home beside the lake, because she will sometime come there, and it will always be a comfort and pleasure to see her, even if she does not see me. Perhaps it is a foolish wish, but I shall hope sometime to rest in the same cemetery where she rests.
I love to think of her the last thing as I sleep, for then ofttimes in my dreams she talks and walks with me, and I awake refreshed by the memory.
Some one has said, “Happiness is not possession. It is giving and growing;” and I know that I am growing more fit for her companionship, even though it come only in another life. ”

“ I never saw a life so blighted as hers. Her whole heart lay beside his in the grave. She lost all interest in life. She grew quiet and sad and more ethereal. She never mentioned his name, but we knew she longed to live with him, even though she must pass through the valley of the shadow.
“Against all my struggling I found my old desire to claim her coming back into my soul. I showed her all the delicate yet unobtrusive kindness possible. Her very sorrow made her unspeakably dear. ”

“ THE SECOND TIME. THE HON. John Crawford had become a prominent man in his community. He had begun life in poverty, had learned economy early, and fortunately had married a girl with tastes and habits similar to his own. Both desired to rise in the world, and she, forgetting herself, bent all her energies toward his progress and success. She did her own housework for years, made her own clothes and those of her children, and in every way saved, that John might be rich and influential. Her history was like that of thousands of other New England women—she wore herself out for her family. ”

“ I was more dead than alive with my wealth of happiness. Mary and I were made one. Marsh, how I live over again those beautiful days. I used to look at your pretty wife beside you as we journeyed, and think of my precious Mary.
“My cup of joy was full to the brim. She accepted my homage, and was grateful. I spared no pains to make her life complete. To have her in my home, to have the blessed influence of her presence evening after evening, was the crowning joy of a man who had loved for years in silence and unreturned affection. ”

“ She was so white with the moonlight streaming in upon her, as she put her hand in mine and said, with an irrepressible tenderness, ‘Burton’ (and nobody else spoke my name as she did) , ‘Burton, I have promised to help Alfred Trumbull win souls.’
At first I was dumb; then I buried my face in my hands and groaned aloud, then I wept [128] like a child that cannot be comforted. Oh, Marsh, there is nothing that bends a man’s soul like that! I felt alone—no support, no guide, no love, no hope. Life was worse than a blank; a dull, dread certainty of sorrow. ”

“ Ah, there is nothing on earth so interesting as a woman, with her tenderness, her solicitude for our welfare, her quiet reserve, her gentle listening, her brightness, her nobleness, her grace!
After Edith left me, taking her little girl by the hand, I confess I was desolate, overwhelmingly desolate. Why is it that one person can make night seem day to us; can bring perfect rest and content? ”

“ As well argue that we must not love flowers and music and sunlight, as to say one must not love the beauty and grace and sweetness of young womanhood.
A home to many if not most young men means all that is restful and delightful; a place for comfort after the toil of the day; a place of companionship with some one whose interests are identical with his, and whose tastes are congenial to his own. He does not wait, as does a woman, to see if love be reciprocal. He loves, and hopes for and asks for a return.
The girl is apt to be less impulsive. ”

“ This is right according to our modern society, but she too often forgets whether she is giving pain needlessly.
It is too much the fashion to argue that men are not deeply touched in such matters; that, full of business as they are, a refusal is easily borne, and another love takes the place.
True, we read in the daily press quite often of a suicide resulting from a rebuff or a broken promise, but we seem to forget, unless perchance it touches our own home circle, and then the mother’s heart breaks for her tenderly reared son or daughter. ”

“ Ten years have worn upon me, for they have been years of constant and hard labor. I could not forget, and would not; but hope will fade into fruition by and by.”
“Cone, you ought to tell me of your life. Much as you respected my wife, you never raised the curtain from the scenes which transpired before we met you. Why have you lived to your age, and taken no heart into your own to bless and hold? Your principles are like adamant, and would keep you anywhere, but every man and woman needs to have his or her heart uncloistered, that others may grow strong and unselfish with him. ”

“ He had earned something by working Saturdays, so that when Christmas morning dawned Kate Wadsworth found some plaid for a new dress outside her door, Jenny a doll, and Willie a sled.
Mrs. Wadsworth’s eyes filled with tears as she kissed Hugh. “It will all come right in the end,” she said. “I wish you could go to college, but many a man succeeds without it, and educates himself. It is blessed that we are alive and well, and are able to work. There is as much room in the world for my children as for anybody’s. You have been a noble son, and we all love you. ”

“ I love Miss Sinclair, but I have never had the means to marry her. I have had a mother and sister to make a home for, and I could not ask another to share my poverty. I do not know that Edith returns my affection, though we have had a delightful friendship together.”
“She loves you, I feel sure,” said her doctor, “and I think your mistake has been that you and she have not had an understanding sooner. Edith is a sensitive, lovely girl, delicately reared, and almost too careful of the conventionalities of life, or she would have shown her love for you.” ”

“ I walk a thousand times past the house where she lives because she is there. I linger in the pathways where she daily walks, with the feeling that her footsteps have given them a special sacredness. I know well the seat in the forest near here where she comes to read and look upon the distant lake. Every friend of hers is nearer to me because her friend. The graves, even, of her dear ones are precious to me. Every tree or flower she has admired is fairer to me. ”

“ Besides, no rowboat could live in the fast-increasing waves. The officers hurried Farneaux off to jail, and he was indicted for homicide. In vain he protested; in vain he begged for clemency till the matter could be investigated. No, they would keep him close in hand, and if anything favorable developed they would give him the benefit.
Meantime what had become of the rowboat? It had drifted out into the deep ocean with its helpless occupant. The sun went down in a blaze of light, but the beautiful red and orange colors brought no joy to the eyes that peered in vain toward the horizon. ”

“ The dog crawled behind the stove and closed her eyes, as though thankful for a place to rest, where at least boys would not throw stones, and men would not kick her with their rough boots.
Days and weeks went by. The black dog, though not having a great supply of food, was living like a prince compared with the starvation of the street. Her bruises healed, her coat became blacker and her eyes brighter. She was indeed the baby’s pet, and the idol of the other children. She went with Annie and Jimmie as they gathered coal. ”

“ When he entered the room he found little Mary Henson with her basket and her dog, her eyes very red with weeping, and the dog whining as though she had heard the whole plan of separation from those she loved in the poor home.
“I’ve brought you my Blackie, sir, to sell her to you. Mamma needs money for rent, and as you are rich I thought you would like to buy her. She will love you very much, and kiss your face. She always sleeps with me, and perhaps she would sleep with you.” ”

“ If he could not be a merchant prince to give with blessed munificence one hundred thousand dollars for homes for the poor, he might have a home for some one who loved him, and many mites to scatter in the alleys of the great cities.
With Giles Mortimer’s man-physique and mind there was a woman’s sensitiveness, and a will that could not always bear the shock of opposition. A mountain is not all quartz, [169] studded with jasper and amethyst, nor is it all trap, brown and coarse. All lives are elements from God’s great storehouse, and earth a crucible which melts and moulds. ”

“ The flower-beds have vanished, save here and there a self-sown golden coreopsis grows among the weeds. The moon shines silently upon the mill as of old. The few remaining aged people of Nineveh still tell of the faithful love of John Harding for the miller’s adopted daughter. ”

“ I don’t see the use of the license law, because it means the death of so many thousands of animals.”
“Neither do I,” said the kind-hearted policeman. “Poor folks can’t always pay the fee. I love my dog, and he’s a great comfort to my children. But I don’t make the law. I only help to enforce it.”
“What is done with the license money? It makes so much heartache it ought to do great good.”
“I’ve heard that it is given sometimes to public schools and to libraries to buy books on kindness to animals, and sometimes to the Humane Society so that they can pay men to catch and kill unlicensed dogs. ”

“ You know there has always been poverty and always will be.”
“But we who are rich have duties to those who are not so fortunate. I learned at the ‘Settlement’ how the luxuries of the rich [215] make the poor feel discouraged and unhappy. They work, and they see idlers all about them who are haughty when they should be kind and courteous. The poor see many of the rich waste their time in hunting or useless pleasure. They see people living for self, with no thought of the homeless or over-worked. They see clothes thrown away or hoarded, when they might be of use to somebody.” ”

“ When John Harding knew that Nellie was really lost to him and married to another, he, longing for companionship, married a worthy girl, prospered in business, and was as happy as a man can be who does not possess the power to forget. ”

“ This companionship is so blessed that I dread to speak to her of love—though my face must always tell it—lest, possibly, the dream be dispelled, and I wake to the dreadful knowledge that she cannot be mine.
Do you know all these feelings, Ernest? Whatever you may think of me, I have grown a nobler man through them. All womanhood is more sacred to me. I can do work I never thought myself capable of before. It would [39] be a pleasure to work for Edith as long as I live. ”

“ He needed what most men need, the stimulus of love to give position or wealth or fame; the encouragement of a voice that has inspiration in it; the touch of a hand that carries hope in its pressure; the look of an eye that shines like a lone star on a dark night. ”

“ Nobody with a God in his heart ever stands there without holding communion with Him. No wonder that the lofty peaks, echoing cañons, and wondrous waterfalls of our own country have written the names of more than one poet on the pages of American literature! Such scenes are the nurseries in which great minds develop. Such grand handiwork of the Builder draws every man very near to Him.
Burton Cone had never forgotten the scenes through which he had passed. ”