ere: grey, bent forms, with circular capes and faded mantillas,
with hats of faded splendor and turned or threadbare dresses. She
saw an unheard-of number of wrinkled faces, sunken mouths, dim eyes
and shrivelled hands, but not a single hand which wore a plain gold
ring.

Yes, Mamsell Fredrika understood it now. It was all the old maids
who had passed away in the land of Sweden who were keeping midnight
mass in the Oesterhaninge church.

Her dead sister leaned towards her.

"Sister, do you repent of what you have done for these your sisters?"

"No," said Mamsell Fredrika. "What have I to be glad for if not
that it has been bestowed upon me to work for them? I once
sacrificed my position as an authoress to them. I am glad that I
knew what I sacrificed and yet did it."

"Then you may stay and hear more," said the sister.

At the same moment some one was heard to speak far away in the
choir, a mild but distinct voice.

"My sisters," said the voice, "our pitiable race, our ignorant and
despised race will soon exist no more. God has willed that we shall
die out from the earth.

"Dear friends, we shall soon be only a legend. The old Mamsells'
measure is full. Death rides about on the road to the church to
meet the last one of us. Before the next midnight mass she will be
dead, the last old Mamsell.

"Sisters, sisters! We are the lonely ones of the earth, the
neglected ones at the feast, the unappreciated workers in the
homes. We are met with scorn and indifference. Our way is weary and
our name is ridicule.

"But God has had mercy upon us.

"To _one_ of us He gave power and genius. To one of us He gave
never-failing goodness. To one of us He gave the glorious gift of
eloquence. She was everything we ought to have been. She threw
light on our dark fate. She was the servant of the homes, as we had
been, but she offered her gifts to a thousand homes. She was the
caretaker of the sick, as we had been, but she struggled with the
terrible epidemic of habits of former days. She told her stories to
thousands of children. She lead her poor friends in every land. She
gave from fuller hands than we and with a warmer spirit. In her
heart dwelt none of our bitterness, for she has loved it away. Her
glory has been that of a queen's. She has been offered the treasures
of gratitude by millions of hearts. Her word has weighed heavily
in the great questions of mankind. Her name has sounded through the
new and the old world. And