Stepping Heavenward [114]
and last year, and years ago. But let her think, what she pleases. A new life is opening before her; I believe it is to be a life of entire devotion to God, and that out of her sorrow there shall spring up a wondrous joy.
SEPT. 2, Sweet Briar Farm.-Ernest spent Sunday with us, and I have just driven him to the station and seen him safely off. Things have prospered with us to such a degree that he has been extravagant enough to give me the use, for the summer, of a bonnie little nag and an antiquated vehicle, and I have learned to drive. To be sure I broke one of the shafts of the poor old thing the first time I ventured forth alone, and the other day -nearly upset my cargo of children in a pond where I was silly enough to undertake to water my horse. But Ernest, as usual, had patience with me and begged me to spend as much time as possible in driving about with the children. It is a new experience, and I enjoy it quite as much as he hoped I should. Helen is not with us; she has spent the whole summer with Martha; for Martha, poor thing, is suffering terribly from rheumatism and is almost entirely helpless. I am so sorry for her, after so many years of vigorous health, how hard it must be to endure this pain. With this drawback, we have had a delightful summer; not one sick day; nor one sick night. With no baby to keep me awake, I sleep straight through, as Raymond says, and wake in the morning refreshed and cheerful. We shall have to go home soon; how cruel it seems to bring up children in a great city! Yet what can be done about it? Wherever there are men and women there must be children; what a howling wilderness either city or country would be without them!
The only drawback on my felicity is the separation, from Ernest, which becomes more painful every year to us both. God has blessed our married life; it has had its waves and its billows, but, thanks unto Him, it has at last settled down into a calm sea of untroubled peace. While I was secretly braiding my dear husband for giving so attention to his profession as to neglect me and my children, he was becoming, every day, more the ideal of a physician, cool, calm, thoughtful, studious, ready to sacrifice his life at any moment in the interests of humanity. How often I have mistaken his preoccupied air for indifference; how many times I have inwardly accused him of coldness, when his whole heart and soul were filled with the grave problem of life, aye, and of death likewise.
But we understand each other now, and I am sure that God dealt wisely and kindly with us when He brought together two such opposite natures. No man of my vehement nature could have borne with me as Ernest has done, and if he had married a woman as calm, as undemonstrative as himself what a strange home his would have been for the nurture of little children? But the heart was in him, and only wanted to be waked up, and my life has called forth music from his., Ah, there are no partings and meetings now that leave discords in the remembrance, no neglected birthdays, no forgotten courtesies. It is beautiful to see the thoughtful brow relax in presence of wife and children, and to know that ours is, at last, the happy home I so long sighed for. Is the change all in Ernest? Is it not possible that I have grown more reasonable, less childish and aggravating?
We are at a farm-house. Everything is plain, but neat and nice. I asked Mrs. Brown, our hostess; the other day, if she did not envy me my four little pets; she smiled, said they were the best children she ever saw, and that it was well to have a family if you have means to start them in the world; for her part, she lived from, hand to mouth as it was, and was sure she could never stand the worry and care of a house full of young ones.
"But the worry and care is only half the story," I said. "The other half is pure joy and delight."
"Perhaps so, to people that are well-to-do," she replied; "but to poor folks, driven to death as we are, it's another thing. I was telling him yesterday what a mercy it was there wasn't any young ones round
SEPT. 2, Sweet Briar Farm.-Ernest spent Sunday with us, and I have just driven him to the station and seen him safely off. Things have prospered with us to such a degree that he has been extravagant enough to give me the use, for the summer, of a bonnie little nag and an antiquated vehicle, and I have learned to drive. To be sure I broke one of the shafts of the poor old thing the first time I ventured forth alone, and the other day -nearly upset my cargo of children in a pond where I was silly enough to undertake to water my horse. But Ernest, as usual, had patience with me and begged me to spend as much time as possible in driving about with the children. It is a new experience, and I enjoy it quite as much as he hoped I should. Helen is not with us; she has spent the whole summer with Martha; for Martha, poor thing, is suffering terribly from rheumatism and is almost entirely helpless. I am so sorry for her, after so many years of vigorous health, how hard it must be to endure this pain. With this drawback, we have had a delightful summer; not one sick day; nor one sick night. With no baby to keep me awake, I sleep straight through, as Raymond says, and wake in the morning refreshed and cheerful. We shall have to go home soon; how cruel it seems to bring up children in a great city! Yet what can be done about it? Wherever there are men and women there must be children; what a howling wilderness either city or country would be without them!
The only drawback on my felicity is the separation, from Ernest, which becomes more painful every year to us both. God has blessed our married life; it has had its waves and its billows, but, thanks unto Him, it has at last settled down into a calm sea of untroubled peace. While I was secretly braiding my dear husband for giving so attention to his profession as to neglect me and my children, he was becoming, every day, more the ideal of a physician, cool, calm, thoughtful, studious, ready to sacrifice his life at any moment in the interests of humanity. How often I have mistaken his preoccupied air for indifference; how many times I have inwardly accused him of coldness, when his whole heart and soul were filled with the grave problem of life, aye, and of death likewise.
But we understand each other now, and I am sure that God dealt wisely and kindly with us when He brought together two such opposite natures. No man of my vehement nature could have borne with me as Ernest has done, and if he had married a woman as calm, as undemonstrative as himself what a strange home his would have been for the nurture of little children? But the heart was in him, and only wanted to be waked up, and my life has called forth music from his., Ah, there are no partings and meetings now that leave discords in the remembrance, no neglected birthdays, no forgotten courtesies. It is beautiful to see the thoughtful brow relax in presence of wife and children, and to know that ours is, at last, the happy home I so long sighed for. Is the change all in Ernest? Is it not possible that I have grown more reasonable, less childish and aggravating?
We are at a farm-house. Everything is plain, but neat and nice. I asked Mrs. Brown, our hostess; the other day, if she did not envy me my four little pets; she smiled, said they were the best children she ever saw, and that it was well to have a family if you have means to start them in the world; for her part, she lived from, hand to mouth as it was, and was sure she could never stand the worry and care of a house full of young ones.
"But the worry and care is only half the story," I said. "The other half is pure joy and delight."
"Perhaps so, to people that are well-to-do," she replied; "but to poor folks, driven to death as we are, it's another thing. I was telling him yesterday what a mercy it was there wasn't any young ones round