all its thousand forms, "What is life, mother? I am very little,
and I think, and think, until I grow frightened. Oh, mother, tell
me, what is life?"

Had she dealt with these questions wisely? Might it not have been
better to have treated them more seriously? Could life after all
be ruled by maxims learned from copy-books? She had answered as
she had been answered in her own far-back days of questioning.
Might it not have been better had she thought for herself?

Suddenly Edith was kneeling on the floor beside her.

"I will try to be good, mother."

It was the old baby cry, the cry of us all, children that we are,
till mother Nature kisses us and bids us go to sleep.

Their arms were round each other now, and so they sat, mother and
child once more. And the twilight of the old attic, creeping
westward from the east, found them again.

The masculine duet had more result, but was not conducted with the
finesse that Mr. Eppington, who prided himself on his diplomacy,
had intended. Indeed, so evidently ill at ease was that gentleman,
when the moment came for talk, and so palpably were his pointless
remarks mere efforts to delay an unpleasant subject, that Blake,
always direct bluntly though not ill-naturedly asked him, "How
much?"

Mr. Eppington was disconcerted.