futile--that is, when I did not work in unison with my surroundings, and
made haste only when impelled. If I could have felt thus concerning
Hal's departure, I should have been of more service to him, and saved
myself from hearing "Oh, Emily, don't," falling as an entreaty from his
lips, at sight of my swelled eyes and woeful countenance. I think he was
heartily glad of the innovation made in our family circle, which, of
itself, was as wonderful to me as the story of Aladdin's Lamp to the
mind of a child. It happened so strangely too. Before I tell you of this
event I must explain that our family circle consisted of father, mother,
Halbert, Ben and myself. It was half past six in the evening of July 8,
18--, and we had just finished supper, when a loud knock was heard at
the back door, and opening it we received a letter from the hands of a
neighbor, who came over from the post-office and kindly brought our mail
with him. We received a good many letters for farming people, and I had
kept up a perfect fire of correspondence with Mary Snow ever since she
went to the home of her uncle, who lived some twenty miles distant, but
this appeared to be a double letter, and mother broke the seal, while we
all listened to her as she read it. It is not necessary to quote the
whole of it, but the gist of the matter was this: A distant cousin of
father's who had never seen any of us, nor any member of the family to
which her mother and my father belonged, had settled in the city of
----, about thirty miles from our little village. Her husband dying
shortly afterward, she was left a widow with one child, a son. In some
unaccountable way she had heard of father, and she now wrote telling us
that she proposed to come to see us the very next day, only two days
before Hal was to leave us. She went on to say that she hoped her visit
would not be an intrusion, but she wanted to see us, and if we could
only accommodate her during the summer she would be so glad to stay, and
would be willing to remunerate us doubly. Mother said simply, "Well, she
must come." Father looked at her and said nothing, while I flew at the