frequently found bathed in tears,
and bending over Lizzie's Bible, which now was his daily companion.

Lucy, too, seemed greatly changed. She had loved her sister as
devotedly as one of her nature could love, and for her death she
mourned sincerely. Lizzie's words of love and gentle persuasion had
not been without their effect, and when Mr. Dayton saw how kind, how
affectionate and considerate of other people's feelings his daughter
had become, he felt that Lizzie had not died in vain.

Seven times have the spring violets blossomed, seven times the flowers
of summer bloomed, seven times have the autumnal stores been gathered
in, and seven times have the winds of winter sighed over the New
England hills since Lizzie was laid to rest. In her home there have
been few changes. Mr. Dayton's hair is whiter than it was of old, and
the furrows on his brow deeper and more marked. Grandma, quiet and
gentle as ever, knits on day after day, ever and anon speaking of "our
dear little Lizzie, who died years ago."

Lucy is still unmarried, and satisfied, too, that it should be so. A
patient, self-sacrificing Christian, she strives to make up to her
father for the loss of one over whose memory she daily weeps, and to
whose death she accuses herself of being accessory. Dr. Benton and his
rather fashionable wife live in their great house, ride in their
handsome carriage, give large dinner parties, play chess after supper,
and then the old doctor nods over his evening paper, while Berintha
nods over a piece of embroidery, intended to represent a little dog
chasing a butterfly and which would as readily be taken for that as
for anything else, and for anything else as that.

Two years ago a pale young missionary departed to carry the news of
salvation to the heathen land. Some one suggested that he should take
with him a wife, but he shook his head mournfully, saying, "I have one
wife in heaven." The night before he left home, he might have been
seen, long after midnight, seated upon a grassy grave, where the
flowers of summer were growing. Around the stone which marks the spot
rose bushes have clustered so thickly as to hide from view the words
there written, but push them aside and you will read, "Our darling
Lizzie."

***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HOMESTEAD ON THE HILLSIDE***

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