think I ever have,' said Clare frankly.

'Ah, well, my circumstances have made it easy for me to do so. My
house is too big to live alone in it, and so I have relays of young
visitors who need a little brightness in their lives. It is so sad to
think of some young lives being cramped and dwarfed by their
surroundings; and some natures utterly sink beneath the burden of
household cares and anxieties, that ought not to touch them at all in
youth.'

'You are very good, Miss Villars, are you not?'

Miss Villars laughed brightly. 'Not at all, my dear child. I wish I
were.'

'I wish I were too,' said Clare, with sudden impulse. 'You look so
happy--I wish I knew your secret.'

'"Happy is that people whose God is the Lord,"' said Miss Villars
softly.

Clare sighed. 'I never have found religion make me happy, Miss
Villars.'

'No more have I. It is only the Lord Himself who can do that. Do you
know Him as your Friend and Saviour?'

Clare had never had such a question put to her before. 'I don't know
Him at all,' she said earnestly; 'God seems such a long way off.'

'You know how you can get near Him?'

'By being very religious, I suppose.'

'The Bible doesn't say so. It says this: "But now in Christ Jesus ye
who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ. For
He is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the
middle wall of partition between us." Think that verse over, dear, and
look it up in your own Bible.'

'But,' said Clare, hesitating a little, 'I don't think I want to be
brought nearer to God. That has no attraction for me.'

'Then you will never know real happiness. Any soul away from its
Creator knows no peace.'

Clare was silent, and then Miss Foster entered the room again, and the
subject was changed; but Clare had plenty of food for reflection as she
drove home.

It was a lovely afternoon in June--so warm that for once the four
sisters were together in the shady verandah outside the drawing-room
windows, taking their ease and waiting for their afternoon tea. Agatha
was the only one who was doing anything, and she was stitching away at
some small garment for one of the farm carter's children. It was a
still, drowsy afternoon; the very bees seemed too lazy to hum, and were
settling sleepily on the rose bushes close to their hives.

'This is the most sleepy time in the day,' observed Gwen, leaning back
in her low wicker chair, her head resting on her a