CHAPTER XXII.

I believe there is a power and solemnity in the near approach of death
which often makes itself felt even before it invades a household; and
something of this kind was experienced by the change which came over
Grandma Adams about this time. It would have been difficult for her
dearest friends to have explained in what the change consisted; but a
change there certainly was which impressed all who saw her. She still
sat in her arm-chair, she suffered no pain, and her countenance was
cheerful and happy, and her intellect seemed unusually strong and clear;
but to the eye of experience it was evident that this aged pilgrim, who
for more than eighty years had trod the uneven and often toilsome
journey of life, would soon be forever at rest. The Widow Green remarked
to my aunt one day in a mysterious whisper, "that she was sure grandma
was drawing near the brink of the dark river, and the bright expression
of her countenance was but a reflection of the happiness in store for
her on the other side." Strong and self-reliant as was my aunt, the
death of her mother was something of which she could not bear to speak,
and the widow was one who so often talked of dreams and mysterious
warnings, that my aunt usually paid little heed to her remarks in this
respect. But she could not reason away the change in her mother's
appearance. Her mother had been so long spared to her that she had
almost forgotten that it could not always be thus, and the All-wise
Father, who sees the end from the beginning, willed it that the sudden
death of her aged and pious mother should in a great measure be the
means of preventing her from placing her affections too much on the
perishable things of earth. One evening, when I closed the Bible after
spending the usual time in reading to grandma, she said: "If you are not
tired, Walter, read for me once more my favorite psalm." I read the
psalm from the beginning in a clear distinct voice as I knew pleased her
best, and when I had finished she said: "You have often, dear Walter,
during the two past years forsaken your books or your play to read to
me, and you have been to me a great blessing, and you will be rewarded
for it, for respect and veneration from youth toward age and
helplessness is a noble virtue, and the youth who pays respect to the
aged will be prospered in his ways." There was something in the look and
manner of my aged relative which affected me strangely. Her countenance
loo