be so much less
stumbling if we looked earnestly within for 'the light which lighteth
every man that cometh into the world.'"

"Well," said Mrs. Harcourt, Annette's grandmother, "there is one thing
about Annette that I like. She is very attentive to her books. If you
want to keep that child out of mischief just put a book in her hand; but
then she has her living to get and she can't get it by nursing her hands
and reading books. She has got to work like the rest of us."

"But why not give her a good education? Doors are open to her which were
closed against us. This is a day of light and knowledge. I don't know
much myself, but I mean to give my girls a chance. I don't believe in
saying, let my children do as I have done, when I think some of us have
done poorly enough digging and delving from morning till night. I don't
believe the good Lord ever sent anybody into his light and beautiful
world to be nothing but a drudge, and I just think it is because some
take it so easy that others, who will do, have to take it so hard."

"It always makes my blood boil," said a maiden lady who was present, "to
see a great hulk of a man shambling around complaining of hard times,
and that he can't get work, when his wife is just working herself down
to the grave to keep up the family." I asked Mrs. Johnson, who just
lives in the wash tub and is the main stay of her family, what would her
husband do if she were to die? and she said, 'get another wife.' Now, I
just think she has spoiled that man and if she dies first, I hope that
he will never find another woman to tread in her footsteps. He ought to
have me to deal with. When he got through with me he would never want
to laze around another woman."

"I don't think he ever would," said Mrs. Harcourt, while a gleam of
humor sparkled in her eye. Her neighbor was a maiden lady who always
knew how to manage other people's husbands, but had never succeeded in
getting one of her own, and not having any children herself understood
perfectly well how to rate other people's.

Just then a knock was heard at the door and Mr. Thomas, Annette's former
school teacher, entered the room. After an exchange of courtesies he
asked, "How does Annette come on with her new teacher?"

"I have not heard any complaint," said Mrs. Harcourt. "At first Mrs.
Joseph's girl did not want to sit with Annette, but she soon got over it
when she saw how well the other girls treated Annette and how pleasant
the teach