knew the farm was goin' to be sold, I didn't
seem to realize I was goin' to break up, until John came, day before
yesterday."

She was very friendly with me, when I said I should think she would be
sorry to go away: but she seemed glad to find I had been in Boston a
great deal, and that I was not at all unhappy there. "But I suppose
you have folks there," said she, "though I never supposed they was so
sociable as they be here, and I ain't one that's easy to make
acquaintance. It's different with young folks; and then in a case o'
sickness I should hate to have strange folks round me. It seems as if
I never set so much by the old place as I do now I'm goin' away. I
used to wish 'he' would sell, and move over to the Port, it was such
hard work getting along when the child'n was small. And there's one of
my boys that run away to sea, and never was heard from. I've always
thought he might come back, though everybody gave him up years ago. I
can't help thinking what if he should come back, and find I wa'n't
here! There; I'm glad to please John: he sets everything by me, and I
s'pose he thinks he's going to make a spry young woman of me. Well,
it's natural. Every thing looks fair to him, and he thinks he can have
the world just as he wants it; but _I_ know it's a world o' change,--a
world o' change and loss. And you see, I shall have to go to a strange
meetin' up there. Why, Mis' Sands! I am pleased to see you. How did
you get word?" And then Mrs. Wallis made another careful apology for
moving away. She seemed to be so afraid some one would think she had
not been satisfied with the neighbourhood.

The auctioneer was a disagreeable-looking man, with a most unpleasant
voice, which gave me a sense of discomfort, the little old house and
its surroundings seemed so grave and silent and lonely. It was like
having all the noise and confusion on a Sunday. The house was so shut
in by the trees, that the only outlook to the world beyond was a narrow
gap in the pines, through which one could see the sea, bright, blue and
warm with sunshine, that summer day.

There was something wistful about the place, as there must have been
about the people who had lived there; yet, hungry and unsatisfied as
her life might have been in many ways, the poor old woman dreaded the
change.

The thought flashed through my mind that we all have more or less of
this same feeling about leaving this world for a better one. We have
the ce