was healthy at home, strong, and full of life. But since little Violet
came, Lark is pale and weak, and has no strength at all. Aunt Grace is
staying with her now. Why, I can't look at dear old Larkie without
half crying.

"Take even you, my precious Carol, perfectly happy, oh, of course, but
all your originality, your uniqueness, the very you-ness of you, will
be absorbed in a round of missionary meetings, and prayer-meetings, and
choir practises, and Sunday-school classes. The hard routine, my dear,
will take the sparkle from you, and give you a sweet, but un-Carol-like
precision and method. Oh, yes, you are happy, but thank you, dear, I
think I'll keep my Self and do my work, and--be an old maid.

"Mr. Orchard offers himself as an alternative to the roars every now
and then, and I expound this philosophy of mine in answer. He shouts
with laughter at it. He says it is so, so like a baby in business. He
reminds me of the time when gray hairs and crow's-feet will mar my
serenity, and when solitary old age will take the lightness from my
step. But I've never noticed that husbands have a way of banishing
gray hairs and crow's-feet and feeble knees, have you? Babies are
nice, of course, but I think I'll baby myself a little.

"I do get so homesick for the good old parsonage days, and all the
bunch, and-- Still, it is nice to be a baby in business, and think how
wonderful it will be when I graduate from my baby-hood, and have brains
enough to write books, big books, good books, for all the world to read.

"Lovingly as always,

"Baby Con."