words, dear, and I am sorry to use them. She has gained the riches
she wanted,--the carriages and servants, and tea-gowns, and hammered
silver from Tiffany's, but she looks tired and disappointed, as Bell
says; and I've no doubt she is, poor girl.'

'I don't think you do her justice, Mrs. Winship; I don't, indeed,'
said Laura.

'If you are really attached to her, Laura, don't make the mistake of
admiring her faults of character, but try to find her better
qualities, and help her to develop them. It is a fatal thing when
girls of your age set up these false standards, and order their lives
by them. There are worse things than school-teaching, yes, or even
floor-scrubbing or window-washing. Lovely tea-gowns and silver-
backed brushes are all very pretty and nice to have, if they are not
gained at the sacrifice of something better. I should have said to
my daughter, had I been Mrs. Denton, "We will work for each other, my
darling, and try to do whatever God gives us to do; but, no matter
how hard life is, your heart is the most precious thing in the world,
and you must never sell that, if we part with everything else." Oh,
my girls, my girls, if I could only make you believe that "poor and
content is rich, and rich enough." I cannot bear to think of your
growing year by year into the conviction that these pretty glittering
things of wealth are the true gold of life which everybody seeks.
Forgive me, Laura, if I have hurt your feelings.'

'I know you would never hurt anybody's feelings, if you could help
it, Mrs. Winship,' Laura answered, with a hint of coldness in her
voice, 'though I can't help thinking that you are a little hard on
poor Jessie; but, even then, one can surely like a person without