Retirement, rural, quiet, friendship, books,
Ease and alternate labor, useful life,
Progressive virtue, and approving Heaven.--Thomson.

'Mid pleasures and palaces, though we may roam,
Be it ever so humble, there's no place like home.
--J.H. Payne, in the Opera of "Clari."



No word in the English language approaches in sweetness
the sound of this group of letters. Out of this grand syllable rush
memories and emotions always chaste, and always noble. The murderer in
his cell, his heart black with crime, hears this word, and his crimes
have not yet been committed; his heart is yet pure and free; in his mind
he kneels at his mother's side and lisps his prayers to God that he, by
a life of dignity and honor, may gladden that mother's heart; and then
he weeps, and for a while is not a murderer. The Judge upon his bench
deals out the dreaded justice to the scourged, and has no look of
gentleness. But breathe this word into his ear, his thoughts fly to his
fireside; his heart relents; he is no longer Justice, but weak and
tender Mercy.

What makes that small, unopened missive so precious to that great rough
man? Why, 'tis from Home--from Home, that spot to which his heart is
tied with unseen cords and tendrils tighter than the muscles which hold
it in his swelling chest. Perhaps he left his Home caring little for it
at the time. Perhaps harsh necessity drove him from its tender roof to
lie beneath