that has got no
bottom to it."

"So bad as that?" said the minister.

"Well, Mr. Richmond knows," the housekeeper went on, "there ain't no
end o' the troubles there is in the world, nor yet o' the poverty; and
Sally Eldridge, she'll be the better maybe, as long as the things last;
but there's all the rest o' Lilac Lane, without speaking of what there
is beside in Shadywalk; and the chilld 'll be without her dollars, and
the world 'll be pretty much where it was."

"I don't see but that reasoning would stop my preaching, Miss Redwood."

"I don't mean it, sir, I'm sure."

"I don't think you mean what you say. What is the use of giving me a
good cup of tea, when so many other people cannot have one at all?"

"The minister knows a cup o' good tea when he sees it," answered the
housekeeper.

Mr. Richmond laughed. "But don't you think Sally Eldridge, for
instance, would know a good bed?"

"There ain't no possibilities o' makin' some o' them folks keerful and
thrivin'," said the housekeeper, firmly. "'Tain't in 'em; and what's
the use o' havin' things if folks ain't keerful? Sally Eldridge had her
house respectable once; I mind her very well, when she kept the gate at
Judge Brockenhurst's big place; and she had wages, and her man he had
good wages; and now the peas is all out o' the basket. And is there any
use, buyin' more to put in? The basket 'll never be mended. It'll let
out as fast as it takes in."

"The basket, as you put it, is out of Sally's hands now," Miss Redwood.
"She is one of the helpless ones. Don't you think it would be a good
thing to make her life more comfortable? I think we had better take her
some of this short-cake, Matilda. Miss Redwood, as for you, I shall
expect to hear that you have lamed your arm doing something for her
comfort, or half broken your back carrying a heavy basket to Lilac
Lane, or something of that sort, judging by what I know of you already."

"I'm willin'," said the housekeeper. "But it ain't this child's
business. She hain't no call to give all she's got to Sally Eldridge."

"I suppose," said the minister, with a look at Matilda, which both she
and the housekeeper read with their hearts,--"I suppose she is thinking
of the word that will be spoken one day, 'Inasmuch as ye did it unto
one of the least of these,'--'He that hath pity upon the poor, lendeth
to the Lord; and that which he hath given will He pay him again'!"

"Then Mr. Richmond thinks it would be a good use