e, and to be as
energetic and work as steadily as she likes?"

"Yes, dearest, she shall, for all I'll do or say to the contrary. And
when my ship comes in I'll pay her back with interest for the loans
she's made me lately."

The doctor went off to visit his patients. His step had grown light,
his face had lost its look of alert yet furtive dread. He looked twenty
years younger. And no wonder. He no longer had to dodge Potter at every
turn, and a big package of receipted bills, endorsed and dated, lay
snugly in his desk, the fear of duns exorcised thereby. A man whose path
has been impeded by the thick underbrush of debts he cannot settle, and
who finds his obligations cancelled, may well walk gaily along the
cleared and brightened roadway, hearing birds sing and seeing blue sky
beaming above his head.

The Ten took hold of the first reading with enthusiasm. Flags were
borrowed, and blazing boughs of maple and oak, with festoons of crimson
blackberry vine and armfuls of golden rod transformed the long room into
a bower. Seats were begged and borrowed, and all the cooks in town made
cake with fury and pride for the great affair. The tickets were sold
without much trouble, and the girls had no end of fun in rehearsing the
tableaux which were decided on as preferable in an entertainment given
by the King's Daughters, because in tableaux everybody has something to
do. Grace was to read from "Young Lucretia" and a poem by Hetta Lord
Hayes Ward, a lovely poem about a certain St. Bridget who trudges up to
heaven's gate, after her toiling years, and finds St. Peter waiting to
set it wide open. The poor, modest thing was an example of Keble's
lovely stanza:

"Meek souls there are who little dream
Their daily life an angel's theme,
Nor that the rod they bear so calm
In heaven may prove a martyr's palm."

Very much astonished at her reception, she is escorted up to the serene
heights by tall seraphs, who treat her with the greatest reverence. By
and by along comes a grand lady, one of Bridget's former employers. She
just squeezes through the gate, and then,

"Down heaven's hill a radiant saint
Comes flying with a palm,
'Are you here, Bridget O'Flaherty?'
St. Bridget cries, 'Yes ma'am.'

"'Oh, teach me, Bridget, the manners, please,
Of the royal court above.'
'Sure, honey dear, you'll aisy learn
Humility and love.'"

I haven't time to tell you all about the entertainment,