The reader will be so kind as to take the assurance which the writer
hereby gives him, that the letter was received under the circumstances
now stated, and that it is not a fiction. Certain names and the date
only are, for obvious reasons, omitted.

THE LETTER.

MY DEAR FATHER,--

You have so recently heard from and about those of us left here, and
that in a so much more satisfactory way than through letters, that it
scarcely seems worth while to write just yet. But Mary left Kate's poor
little baby in such a pitiable state, that I think it will be a relief
to all to hear that its sufferings are ended. It died about ten o'clock
the night that she left us, very quietly and without a struggle, and at
sunset on Friday we laid it in its last resting-place. My husband and I
went out in the morning to select the spot for its burial, and finding
the state of affairs in the cemetery, we chose a portion of ground and
will have it inclosed with a railing. They have been very careless in
the management of the ground, and have allowed persons to inclose and
bury in any shape or way they chose, so that the whole is cut up in a
way that makes it difficult to find a place where two or three graves
could be put near each other. We did find one at last, however, about
the size of the Hazel Wood lots; and we will inclose it at once, so that
when another, either from our own family or those of the other branches,
wants a resting-place, there shall not be the same trouble. Poor old
Timmy lies there; but it is in a part of the grounds where, the sexton
tells us, the water rises within three feet of the surface; so, of
course, we did not go there for this little grave. His own family
selected his burial-place, and probably did not think of this.

Kate takes her loss very patiently, though she says that she had no idea
how much she would grieve after the child. It had been sick so long that
she said she wanted to have it go; but I knew when she said it that she
did not know what the parting would be. It is not the parting alone, but
it is the horror of the grave,--the tender child alone in the far off
gloomy burial-ground, the heavy earth piled on the tender little breast,
the helplessness that looked to you for protection which you could not
give, and the emptiness of the home to which you return when the child
is gone. He who made a mother's heart and they who have borne it, alone
can tell the unutterable pain of all this. The little