-these reach their destined moment, to pass on and make room
for the harvest. Blessed are the lives in which all these sweet early
petals float off gently and in season for the perfect setting of the holy
fruit!

On this morning, when Parson Dorrance entered Mercy's room, it was already
decorated as if for a festival. Every blooming thing she had brought from
"The Cedars" the day before had taken its own place in the room, and
looked as at home as it had looked in the fields. One of Mercy's great
gifts was the gift of creating in rooms a certain look which it is hard to
define. The phrase "vitalized individuality," perhaps, would come as near
describing it as is possible; for it was not merely that the rooms looked
unlike other rooms. Every article in them seemed to stand in the place
where it must needs stand by virtue of its use and its quality. Every
thing had a certain sort of dramatic fitness, without in the least
trenching on the theatrical. Her effects were always produced with simple
things, in simple ways; but they resulted in an impression of abundance
and luxury. As Parson Dorrance glanced around at all the wild-wood beauty,
and the wild-wood fragrance stole upon his senses, a great mastering wave
of love for the woman whose hand had planned it all swept over him. He
recalled Mercy's face the day before, when she had said,--

"You are the youngest person I know;" and, as she crossed the threshold of
the door at that instant, he went swiftly towards her with outstretched
hands, and a look on his face which, if she had seen, she could not have
failed to interpret aright.

But she was used to the outstretched hands; she always put both her own in
them, as simply as a child; and she was bringing to her teacher now a
little poem, of which her thoughts were full. She did not look fully in
his face, therefore; for it was still a hard thing for her to show him her
verses.

Holding out the paper, she said shyly,--

"It had to get itself said or sung, you know,--that thought that haunted
me so yesterday at 'The Cedars.' I daresay it is very bad poetry, though."

Parson Dorrance unfolded the paper, and read the following poem:--

WHERE?

My snowy eupatorium has dropped
Its silver threads of petals in the night;
No sound told me its blossoming had stopped;
Its seed-films flutter, silent, ghostly white:
No answer stirs the shining air,
As I ask, "Where?"

Beneath the glossy leaves of wint