childhood? Ah, my soul! Alas, my grown-up friends! Does the moral
belong to childhood alone? Have manhood and womanhood no passionate,
foolish longings, for which we blind ourselves to obvious truth, and
of which the vanity does not lessen the disappointment? Do we not
still toil after rosebuds, to find _feuilles-mortes_?"

No voice answered Mrs. Overtheway's fanciful questions. The hyacinth
nodded fragrantly on its stalk, and Ida nodded in her chair. She was
fast asleep--happily asleep--with a smile upon her face.

The shadows nodded gently on the walls, and like a shadow the little
old lady stole quietly away.

When Ida awoke, she found herself lying partly in the arm-chair, and
partly in the arms of Nurse, who was lifting her up. A candle flared
upon the table, by the fire stood an empty chair, and the heavy scent
that filled the room was as sweet as the remembrance of past
happiness. The little old lady had vanished, and, but for the
hyacinth, Ida would almost have doubted whether her visit had not been
a dream.

"Has Mrs. Overtheway been long gone, Nursey?" she asked, keeping her
eyes upon the flowerpot.

"Ever so long!" said Nurse, "and here you've been snoring away, and
the old lady's been downstairs, telling me how comfortably you were
asleep, and she's coming again to-morrow evening, if you're good."

It was precisely twelve minutes since Mrs. Overtheway left the house,
but Nurse was of a slightly exaggerative turn of mind, and few people