Betty's Bright Idea; Deacon Pitkin's Farm; and the First Christmas of New England

ut to the same husking where Diana and Bill had been enjoying themselves. The sight of him resolved a doubt which had been agitating James's mind. The note to his mother which was to explain his a

st particle of a story was like starting a gimlet in a pine board-there was no stop till it had gone through. So he told him in brief that

rubbin' round the world-and then they make money. Jes' see, there's Cap'n Stebbins and Cap'n Andrews and Cap'n Merryweather-all livin' on good farms, with good, nice houses, all got goin' to sea. Expect Mis' Pitkin'll take it sort o' hard, she's so sot on you; bu

't stop, and I'd rather wal

? I've got fifty silver dollars laid up: you tak

trust me with it I'll hope t

some fumbling brought out a canvas

f I peep a single word. Farmin's drefful slow, but when a feller's got a gal he's got a cap'n; he has to mind orders.

James, shaking the hard hand heartily, as he t

service the news might be said to be everywhere. The minister's general custom on Thanksgiving Day was to get off a political sermon reviewing the State of New England, the United States of America, and Europe, Asia, and Africa; but it may be doubted if all the affairs of all these continents produced as much sensation among the girls in the singers' seat that day as did the news that James Pitkin h

sense of sorrow, awakened in a soul that

of exclamations went up around the table, while Mrs. Pitkin, pale and calm, read the letter and then passed it to her husband without a word. The bright, fixed color in Diana's face had meanwhile been slowly ebbing away, till, with cheeks and lips pale as ashes, she hastily rose and left the table and went to her room. A strange, new, terrible pa

and his scholarship, and had set his heart on his going through college, and had no more serious purpose in what he said the day before than the general one of making his son feel the difficulties and straits he was put to for him. Young men were tempted at college to be too expensive, he thought, and to forget what it cost their parents at home. In short, the whole thing had been

, mot

ite pathetic in the ap

d in subdued tones; "all we

VE

made her victorious over all troubles, that habit of trust in the Infinite Will that actually

ishes, hopes and efforts. That wish had been cut off in a moment, that hope had sunk under her feet, and now only remained to her the task of comforting the undisciplined soul whose unguided utterances had wrou

words to his son, "don't worry about it now; you didn't mean it. James is a good boy, and he'll

from her husband she s

been thinking it over. Oh, if the ship wouldn't sail! and I'd go to Salem and beg him to come back, on my knees. Oh, if I had only known yesterday! Oh

t just as it is, now that it is done. Don't

it hastily. "Well, I don't wonder! But I do care! I love him better than anybody or anything under the sun, and I never will forget him; he's a brave, noble

there is no w

's like death-you don't know where they are, and you can't h

don't; you distress

ou. But, cousin, I'll try to be good and comfort you. I'll try to be a daughter to you. You need somebody to think of you, for you never think of yourself. Let's go in his room," she said, and taking the mother by the hand they crossed to the empty room. There was his writing-table, there his forsaken books, his papers, some of his clothes h

the ocean is like death-wide, dark, stormy, unknown?

ea," said the mother, soothingly. "I trust,

n't help thinking of that. There was Michael D

to a table on which lay a Bible, she opened and read: "If I take the wings of the morning and dwell i

he inseparable Heart-friend-the Father seeing in secret, on whose bosom all her tears of sorrow had been she

en the face of an angel. She kisse