REKA DOM.

"What is home, and where, but with the loving?"

FELICIA HEMANS.


At last Ida was allowed to go out. She was well wrapped up, and
escorted by Nurse in a short walk for the good of her health. It was
not very amusing, but the air was fresh and the change pleasant,
although the street did not prove quite that happy region it had
looked from the nursery windows. Moreover, however strong one may
fancy one has become indoors, the convalescent's first efforts out of
doors are apt to be as feeble as those of a white moth that has just
crept from the shelter of its cocoon, giddy with daylight, and
trembling in the open air. By-and-by this feeling passed away, and one
afternoon Ida was allowed to go by herself into the garden, "just for
a run."

The expression was metaphorical, for she was far from being able to
run; but she crept quietly up and down the walks, and gathered some
polyanthuses, putting them to her face with that pleasure which the
touch of fresh flowers gives to an invalid. Then she saw that the
hedge was budding, and that the gap through which she had scrambled
was filled up. Ida thought of the expedition and smiled. It had
certainly made her very ill, but--it had led to Mrs. Overtheway.

The little old lady did not come that day, and in the evening Ida was
sent for by her uncle. She had not been downstairs in the evenings
since her illness. These interviews with the reserved old gentleman