arms seemed to give her peace and strength ... and when she neared the
crest of the highest mountain she felt new life throbbing in her veins
and new hopes stirring in her heart, and she remembered no more the pain
and weariness of her journey.... And all at once a bright angel appeared
to her and traced the letters of a word upon her forehead and took the
child from her arms and disappeared.... And the angel had the lovely
smile and sad eyes of Martha ... and the word she traced on Miss Vilda's
forehead was "Inasmuch"!




SCENE VII.

_The Old Homestead._

MISTRESS AND MAID FIND TO THEIR AMAZEMENT THAT A CHILD, MORE THAN ALL
OTHER GIFTS, BRINGS HOPE WITH IT AND FORWARD LOOKING THOUGHTS.


It was called the White Farm, not because that was an unusual color in
Pleasant River. Nineteen out of every twenty houses in the village were
painted white, for it had not then entered the casual mind that any
other course was desirable or possible. Occasionally, a man of riotous
imagination would substitute two shades of buff, or make the back of his
barn red, but the spirit of invention stopped there, and the majority of
sane people went on painting white. But Miss Avilda Cummins was blessed
with a larger income than most of the inhabitants of Pleasant River, and
all her buildings, the great house, the sheds, the carriage and dairy
houses, the fences and the barn, were always kept in a state of dazzling