Sarah. "We
were born poor, and we've lived poor all our lives, and we don't know
how to get happiness out of money."

David sighed. "We can't go back to Millville to live," he said
thoughtfully. "At least we can't get back our old place." Sarah's face
was already clouded, but at these words a deeper shadow passed over it.
She had known, when she left the Millville house, that the owner of the
property intended tearing down the cottage and building a tenement house
for the mill-workers, and every time she thought of her house in ruins,
she had a dull heartache. "I never hankered after riches," mused David,
his mind still occupied with the mysterious ways of the Providence that
had made him rich. "I never even tried to invent that machine. It just
seemed to come to me, without any thinkin' or tryin' on my part; and
when I patented the thing, I never supposed it would do any more than
make us fairly comfortable in our old age. But here's the money comin'
in all the time; it's ours, and it's honest money, and we've got to take
it and make the best of it. But," tenderly, "I'm not goin' to let it
worry you to death if I can help it. What is it that bothers you most,
honey?"

Sarah moved her head restlessly on the pillow and sighed heavily. "Oh!
everything; but I believe the servants are the worst aggravation of
all."

"What's the matter with 'em?" asked David; "don't they do their work
right?"

"No, they don't," said Sarah despairingly. "I never saw such cleanin' as
that Bertha does--dust behind the doors and on the window sills; and she
never takes up a rug, and the windows look like Jacob's cattle, all
ringed and striped and streaked. And Nelly's just as bad. The dish
towels are a sight, and the kitchen closet's in such a mess I can't
sleep for thinkin' of it. I never could stand dust, especially in my
kitchen; you know that, David. And here we are payin' these
good-for-nothin' creatures every week almost as much money as you used
to earn in a month! It's enough to drive me crazy." It was the
lamentation of a housekeeper, a cry as old as civilization, that Sarah
was uttering, and David heard it sympathetically, for his wife's
troubles were his own.

"Can't you make 'em do their work right?" he asked.

"Make 'em?" Sarah's voice rose in a petulant wail. "No, I can't. I can
make myself work, but I don't know how to make anybody else work."

"Do they ever give you any back talk?" asked David.

"No, they don't," said