ars--often people
to whom I had done no kindness or did not even know; how others,
whom I had quarrelled with or did not like, forgot the poor puny
quarrels and the dislike, and begged to do for me whatever they
could; how friends went softly around the garden, caring for a
flower, putting a prop under a too heavily-laden limb, or climbing
on step-ladders to tie sacks around the finest bunches of grapes,
with the hope that I might be well in time to eat them--touching
nothing themselves, having no heart to eat; how dear, dear ones
would never leave me day or night; how a good doctor wore himself
out with watching, and a good pastor sent up for me his spotless
prayers; and at last, when I began to mend, how from far and near
there poured in flowers and jellies and wines, until, had I been
the multitude by the Sea of Galilee, there must have been baskets
to spare. God bless them! God bless them all! And God forgive
us all the blindness, the weakness, and the cruelty with which we
judge each other when we are in health.

This and more my beloved old negroes told me a few hours ago, as
I sat in deep comfort and bright health again before my blazing
hickories; and one moment we were in laughter and the next in
tears--as is the strange life we live. This is a gay household now,
and Dilsy cannot face me without a fleshly earthquake of laughter
that I have become such a high-tempered tiger about punctual meals.

In particular, my two nearest neighbors were much at odds as to
which had better claim to nurse me; so that one day Mrs. Walters,
able to endure it no longer, thrust Mrs. Cobb out of the house by
the shoulder-blades, locked the door on her, and them opened the
shutters and scolded her out of the window.

One thing I miss. My servants have never called the name of
Georgiana. The omission is unnatural, and must be intentional.
Of course I have not asked whether she showed any care; but that
little spot of silence affects me as the sight of a tree remaining
leafless in the woods where everything else is turning green.

XI

To-day I was standing at a window, looking out at the aged row of
cedars, now laden with snow, and thinking of Horace and Soracte.
Suddenly, beneath a jutting pinnacle of white boughs which left
under themselves one little spot of green, I saw a cardinal hop
out and sit full-breasted towards me. The idea flashed through
my mind that this might be that shyest, most beautiful fellow who