“I need not tell you how delightful such society was to me, nor how surprised I was when, on the last day before we parted, Mr. Warburton, who had answered many questions of mine during these long chats of ours, asked me a very serious one, and I found that I could answer it as he wished.  It brought me great honor as well as happiness.  I fear I was not worthy of it, but I tried to be, and felt a tender satisfaction in thinking that I owed it to dear Lucretia, in part at least; for my effort to imitate her made me fitter to become a wise man’s wife, and thirty years of very sweet companionship was my reward.”

As she spoke, Mrs. Warburton bowed her head before the portrait of a venerable old man which hung above the mantel-piece.

It was a pretty, old-fashioned expression of wifely pride and womanly tenderness in the fine old lady, who forgot her own gifts, and felt only humility and gratitude to the man who had found in her a comrade in intellectual pursuits, as well as a helpmeet at home and a gentle prop for his declining years.

The girls looked up with eyes full of something softer than mere curiosity, and felt in their young hearts how precious and honorable such a memory must be, how true and beautiful such a marriage was, and how sweet wisdom might become when it went hand in hand with love.

Alice spoke first, saying, as she touched the worn cover of the little book with a new sort of respect, “Thank you very much!  Perhaps I ought not to have taken this from the corner shelves in your sanctum?  I wanted to find the rest of the lines Mr. Thornton quoted last night, and didn’t stop to ask leave.”

“You are welcome, my love, for you know how to treat books.  Yes, those in that little case are my precious relics.  I keep them all, from my childish hymn-book to my great-grandfather’s brass-bound Bible, for by and by when I sit ‘Looking towards Sunset,’ as dear Lydia Maria Child calls our last days, I shall lose my interest in other books, and take comfort in these.  At the end as at the beginning of life we are all children again, and love the songs our mothers sung us, and find the one true Book our best teacher as we draw near to God.”

As the reverent voice paused, a ray of sunshine broke through the parting clouds, and shone full on the serene old face turned to meet it, with a smile that welcomed the herald of a lovely sunset.

“The rain is over; there will be just time for a run in the garden before dinner, girls.  I must go and change my cap, for literary ladies should not neglect to look well after the ways of their household and keep themseves tidy, no matter how old they may be.”  And with a nod Mrs. Warburton left them, wondering what the effect of the conversation would be on the minds of her young guests.