the moment
as likely to be needed; but now I started a process of analysis and
elimination. Pneumonia, diphtheria, scarlatina and measles--all these
were among the more obvious possibilities. I was enough of a doctor to
trust my ability to diagnose. I knew that my wife would in that respect
rather rely on me than on the average country-town practitioner. All the
greater was my responsibility.

Since the horses had not been fed for their midday-meal, I had in any
case to put in at the one-third-way town. It had a drug store; so there
was my last chance of getting what might possibly be needed. I made a
list of remedies and rehearsed it mentally till I felt sure I should not
omit anything of which I had thought.

Then I caught myself at driving the horses into a gallop. It was hard to
hold in. I must confess that I thought but little of the little girl's
side of it; more of my wife's; most of all of my own. That seems
selfish. But ever since the little girl was born, there had been only
one desire which filled my life. Where I had failed, she was to succeed.
Where I had squandered my energies and opportunities, she was to use
them to some purpose. What I might have done but had not done, she was
to do. She was to redeem me. I was her natural teacher. Teaching her
became henceforth my life-work. When I bought a book, I carefully
considered whether it would help her one day or not before I spent the
money. Deprived of her, I myself came to a definite and peremptory end.
With her to continue my life, there was still some purpose in things,
some justification for existence.

Most serious-minded men at my age, I believe, become profoundly
impressed with the futility of "it all." Unless we throw ourselves into
something outside of our own personality, life is apt to impress us as
a great mockery. I am afraid that at the bottom of it there lies the
recognition of the fact that we ourselves were not worth while, that we
did not amount to what we had thought we should amount to; that we did
not measure up to the exigencies of eternities to come. Children are
among the most effective means devised by Nature to delude us into
living on. Modern civilization has, on the whole, deprived us of the
ability for the enjoyment of the moment. It raises our expectations too
high--realization is bound to fall short, no matter what we do. We
live in an artificial atmosphere. So we submerge ourselves in business,
profession, or superficial a