believed, I was for the time being exhausted in body and stunned in
mind, and partly that, in those young, impetuous days, grief was such an
all-convulsing passion with me, when I yielded to it, that to the utmost
of my strength I resisted it at the outset, and seldom dared suffer
myself to suffer at all. But, as he also believed, "this could not last
long"; and it did not.

One afternoon, as I sewed in the arbor, a sweet little girl, who had
been in Fanny's class in her Sunday school, stole into the garden and up
to me, looked wistfully into my face as if seeking some likeness there,
kissed my cheek timidly, laid a large nosegay of delicate flowers upon
my knee, and crept away as gently as she came. The flowers were all
white; and I saw at once that they were meant for Fanny's grave. I might
go there for the first time now, as well as at any other time. The
Doctor and his wife were out together, and no one was at home to
question me.

Fanny had been laid, I need scarcely say, just where she wished. My
guardian had driven me there early one morning to point out the place;
and we found the withered clovers in the grass. It had rained often
since. The swollen turf was nearly healed. I untied the flowers, and
slowly, and with minute precision, arranged them in a cross above her
breast. At last, when there was no blossom more to add or alter, I sat
down again in my solitude where I sat with her so lately, with the same
leaves fluttering on the same trees, the same grass waving on the same
graves, and her beneath instead of upon it.

At first I could not think,--I could only cry. For now at length I had
to cry; and cry I did, in a tornado and deluge of grief that by degrees
swept and washed away the accumulated vapors from my mind, and brought
it to a clearer, healthier calm. I believe God in His mercy has
appointed that those who are capable of the strongest, shall not in
general be capable of the _longest_ anguish. At least, I am sure that it
is so, not only with myself, but with one better and dearer than myself;
so that the experience of life has taught me to see in the sharpest of
pangs the happiest augury of their brevity.

Thus it could not have been very long before I was able to raise my
head, and wipe my eyes, and look once more upon my two dear graves. The
setting sun glowed over them. They looked soft and bright. From one of
them the echo of an angel's voice seemed still to say, "Here, by mamma,
is where I _