here was too
much reversal of the natural order of the protector and the protected in
it; and her life was on too different a plane of thought, feeling, and
interest from the life of the uncultured, undeveloped, childish, old
woman. Yet no one who saw them together would have detected any trace of
this shortcoming in Mercy's feeling towards her mother. She had in her
nature a fine and lofty fibre of loyalty which could never condescend even
to parley with a thought derogatory to its object; was lifted above all
consciousness of the possibility of any other course. This is a sort of
organic integrity of affection, which is to those who receive it a tower
of strength, that is impregnable to all assault except that of death
itself. It is a rare type of love, the best the world knows; but the men
and the women whose hearts are capable of it are often thought not to be
of a loving nature. The cheaper and less lasting types of love are so much
louder of voice and readier of phrase, as in cloths cheap fabrics, poor to
wear, are often found printed in gay colors and big patterns.

The day before they left home, Mercy, becoming alarmed by a longer
interval than usual without any sound from the garret, where her mother
was still at work over her fantastic collections of old odds and ends, ran
up to see what it meant.

Mrs. Carr was on her knees before a barrel, which had held rags and
papers. The rags and papers were spread around her on the floor. She had
leaned her head on the barrel, and was crying bitterly.

"Mother! mother! what is the matter?" exclaimed Mercy, really alarmed; for
she had very few times in her life seen her mother cry. Without speaking,
Mrs. Carr held up a little piece of carved ivory. It was of a creamy
yellow, and shone like satin: a long shred of frayed pink ribbon hung from
it. As she held it up to Mercy, a sunbeam flashed in at the garret window,
and fell across it, sending long glints of light to right and left.

"What a lovely bit of carving! What is it, mother? Why does it make you
cry?" asked Mercy, stretching out her hand to take the ivory.

"It's Caley's whistle," sobbed Mrs. Carr. "We allus thought Patience
Swift must ha' took it. She nussed me a spell when he was a little feller,
an' jest arter she went away we missed the whistle. Your father he brought
that hum the same v'yage I told ye he brought the blue crape. He knowed I
was a expectin' to be sick, and he was drefful afraid he wouldn't g