and feeble ones. "Our mothers" now laid down the weapons of toil over
which they had grown gray, and came out of the vale of honest poverty
into the sunshine of plenty. Their hearts grew warm in this gift of
double love. They renewed their youth.

In their first days at their children's home, one of "our mothers"
spoke of "Henry's new house," when he checked her, saying, "Never call
this my house again. I built it for God and for all of you, and I want
it always called 'our house.' There is yet one thing I want done here
before I shall feel that I have made my thank-offering to God for the
health and strength and the work which have enabled me to build and
pay for this house. I promised then that no stranger or wanderer
should ever go hungry or weary from this door. You have made sure of a
neat and sunny room for our friends. Now I want a bed, a chair, and a
table put in the shed-chamber for such strangers as we cannot ask into
the house. I want also to fill the little store-closet under the back
stairway with provisions to give the needy. They will then not be our
own; and if at any time we should be short of money, we will not be
tempted to say, 'I have nothing to give.' I want to live for more than
self, and I know you all share the feeling. I want to feel that God is
here, and to live as if we saw him and were all under his actual
guidance and care, and to realize that he sees and approves our way in
life."

Thus was "our house" opened, and thus was it kept--a home sanctified
to humanity and to God.

The years rolled away, not without changes, but peace and plenty still
reign in the modest home whose owners are looked up to by all the
town's people--rich as well as poor--as friends and benefactors; for