the land where pain is unknown. During the last twelve hours of his
life, as I sat before the fire with him on my lap, poor F---
kneeling in a perfect agony of grief by my side, my greatest comfort
was in looking at that exquisite photograph from Kehren's picture of
the "Good Shepherd," which hangs over my bedroom mantelpiece, and
thinking that our sweet little lamb would soon be folded in those
Divine, all-embracing Arms. It is not a common picture; and the
expression of the Saviour's face is most beautiful, full of such
immense feminine compassion and tenderness that it makes me feel
more vividly, "In all our sorrows He is afflicted." In such a grief
as this I find the conviction of the reality and depth of the Divine
sympathy is my only true comfort; the tenderest human love falls
short of the feeling that, without any words to express our sorrow,
God knows all about it; that He would not willingly afflict or
grieve us, and that therefore the anguish which wrings our hearts is
absolutely necessary in some mysterious way for our highest good. I
fear I have often thought lightly of others' trouble in the loss of
so young a child; but now I know what it is. Does it not seem
strange and sad, that this little house in a distant, lonely spot,
no sooner becomes a home than it is baptized, as it were, with
tears? No doubt there are bright and happy days in store for us
yet, but these first ones here have been sadly darkened by this
shadow of death. Inanimate things have such a terrible power to
wound one: though everything which would remind me of Baby has been
carefully removed and hidden away by F---'s orders, still now and
then I come across some trifle belonging to him, and, as Miss
Ingelow says--
"My old sorrow wakes and cries."

Our loss is one too common out here, I am told: infants born in