es, I don't believe it will grow with them; it is a
greenhouse flower, and used to delicate living."

"O, as to that, a flower never inquires whether its owner is rich or
poor; and Mrs. Stephens, whatever else she has not, has sunshine of as
good quality as this that streams through our window. The beautiful
things that God makes are his gift to all alike. You will see that my
fair rose will be as well and cheerful in Mrs. Stephens's room as in
ours."

"Well, after all, how odd! When one gives to poor people, one wants to
give them something _useful_--a bushel of potatoes, a ham, and such
things."

"Why, certainly, potatoes and ham must be supplied; but, having
ministered to the first and most craving wants, why not add any other
little pleasures or gratifications we may have it in our power to
bestow? I know there are many of the poor who have fine feeling and a
keen sense of the beautiful, which rusts out and dies because they are
too hard pressed to procure it any gratification. Poor Mrs. Stephens,
for example: I know she would enjoy birds, and flowers, and music, as
much as I do. I have seen her eye light up as she looked on these things
in our drawing room, and yet not one beautiful thing can she command.
From necessity, her room, her clothing, all she has, must be coarse and
plain. You should have seen the almost rapture she and Mary felt when I
offered them my rose."

"Dear me! all this may be true, but I never thought of it before. I
never thought that these hard-working people had any ideas of _taste_!"

"Then why do you see the geranium or rose so carefully nursed in the old
cracked teapot in the poorest room, or the morning glory planted in a
box and twined about the window? Do not these show that the human heart
yearns for the beautiful in all ranks of life? You remember, Kate, how
our washerwoman sat up a whole night, after a hard day's work, to make
her first baby a pretty dress to be baptized in."

"Yes, and I remember how I laughed at you for making such a tasteful
little cap for it."

"Well, Katy, I think the look of perfect delight with which the poor
mother regarded her baby in its new dress and cap was something quite
worth creating: I do believe she could not have felt more grateful if I
had sent her a barrel of flour."

"Well, I never thought before of giving any thing to the poor but what
they really needed, and I have always been willing to do that when I
could without going far out of