better than this."

"I don't know," replied Mercy, looking out of the window, with an earnest
gaze, as if she were reading a writing a great way off,--"I don't know
about that. I doubt very much if looking out for one's self, as you call
it, is the best way to provide for one's self."

That very night Mr. Allen wrote to Stephen; in two weeks, the whole matter
was settled, and Mercy and her mother had set out on their journey. They
carried with them but one small valise. The rest of their simple wardrobe
had gone in boxes, with the furniture, by sailing vessel, to a city which
was within three hours by rail of their new home. This was the feature of
the situation which poor Mrs. Carr could not accept. In the bottom of her
heart, she fully believed that they would never again see one of those
boxes. The contents of some which she had herself packed were of a most
motley description. In the beginning of the breaking up, while Mercy was
at her wits' end, with the unwonted perplexities of packing the whole
belongings of a house, her mother had tormented her incessantly by
bringing to her every few minutes some utterly incongruous and frequently
worthless article, and begging her to put it in at once, whatever she
might be packing. Any one who has ever packed for a long journey, with an
eager and excited child running up every minute with more and more
cumbrous toys, dogs, cats, Noah's arks, and so on, to be put in among
books and under-clothing, can imagine Mercy's despair at her mother's
restless activity.

"Oh, mother, not in this box! Not in with the china!" would groan poor
Mercy, as her mother appeared with armfuls of ancient relics from the
garret, such as old umbrellas, bonnets, bundles of old newspapers, broken
spinning-wheels, andirons, and rolls of remains of old wall-paper, the