precious babies, or lassooed by ten thousand galloping cares! As well
expect a rose to blossom in midwinter hedges, or a lark to sing in a
snowstorm, as to look for bloom and song in such a life! But just bend
down your ear a minute, poor, tired, overworked and troubled sister, I
have a special word for you. It is simply impossible for circumstances
of any sort to overthrow the high spirit of one who believes in
something yet to come and out of sight. What are poverty and adverse
fate and mocking hopes and disappointed ambition to the soul which is
only journeying through an unfriendly world to a heritage that cannot
fail? As well might a flower complain of the rains that called it from
the sod, of the winds that rocked it, and the cloudless noons that
flamed above it, when June at last has lightly laid the coronal of
summer's perfect bloom upon its bending bough. We shall find our June
somewhere, never fear. Be content then a little longer with
uncongenial surroundings and a life that knows no outlook of hope. Be
all the sweeter and the stronger and the braver that the way is short.
To-morrow, in the Palace of Love, the dark and unfriendly inn that
sheltered us for a night upon the way, shall be forgotten.




V.

SHUT IN.

Were you ever shut in by a fog? Lost at mid-day in a soundless,
rayless world of nebulous vapor--so seemingly alone in the universe
that your voice found no echo, and your ears caught no footfall in all
the vast domain of silence about you? The other morning, when I left