diligent in filling up little interstices of time.

I was present at a funeral, where, in the sickness or absence of the
pastor, Mr. Gallaudet had been requested to officiate. It was on a bleak
and wintry day in spring: the wind blew, and the late and unwelcome snow
was falling. There was much to make the occasion melancholy. It was the
funeral of a young girl, the only daughter of a widow, who had expended
far more than the proper proportion of her scanty means in giving the
girl showy and useless accomplishments. A cold taken at a dance had
resulted in quick consumption, and in a few weeks had hurried her to the
grave. Without proper training and early religious instruction, it was
difficult to know how much reliance might safely be placed on the
eagerness with which she embraced the hopes and consolations of the
Gospel set before her on her dying bed. Her weak-minded and injudicious
mother felt that she should be lauded as a youthful saint, and her death
spoken of as a triumphant entrance into heaven.

There was much to offend the taste in the accompaniments of this
funeral. It was an inconsistent attempt at show, a tawdry imitation of
more expensive funeral observances. About the wasted face of the once
beautiful girl were arranged, not the delicate white blossoms with
which affection sometimes loves to surround what was lovely in life, but
gaudy flowers of every hue. The dress, too, was fantastic and
inappropriate. The mother and little brothers sat in one of the two
small rooms; the mother in transports of grief, which was real, but not
so absorbing as to be forgetful of self and scenic effect. The little
boys sat by, in awkward consciousness of new black gloves, and crape
bands on their hats. Everything was artificial and painfully forlorn;
and the want of genuineness, which surrounded the pale sleeper, seemed
to cast suspicion on the honesty and validity of her late-formed hope