on of refined taste is amply
fulfilled. While nothing is costly, there is a touch of grace, a hint
of beauty in everything permitting simple adornment. The mistress of
these rooms is not satisfied with neatness and order merely; it is her
instinct to add something to please the eye--a need essential to her,
yet too often conspicuously absent in rented quarters of a similar
character.

It is remarkable to what a degree people's abodes are a reflex of
themselves. Mrs. Alida Ostrom had been brought to these rooms a happy
bride but a few months since. They were then bare and not very clean.
Her husband had seemed bent on indulging her so far as his limited
means permitted. He had declared that his income was so modest that he
could afford nothing better than these cheap rooms in an obscure
street, but she had been abundantly content, for she had known even the
extremity of poverty.

Alida Ostrom had passed beyond the period of girlhood, with its
superficial desires and ambitions. When her husband first met her, she
was a woman of thirty, and had been chastened by deep sorrows and some
bitter experiences. Years before, she and her mother had come to this
town from a New England city in the hope of bettering their
circumstances. They had no weapons other than their needles with which
to fight life's battle, but they were industrious and
frugal--characteristic traits which won the confidence of the
shopkeepers for whom they worked. All went as well, perhaps, as they
could expect, for two or three years, their secluded lives passing
uneventfully and, to a certain extent, happily. They had time to read
some good books obtained at a public library; they enjoyed an
occasional holiday in the country; and they went to church twice every
Sunday when it was not stormy. The mother usually dozed in the obscure
seat near the door which they occupied, for she was getting old, and
the toil of the long week wearied her.--Alida, on the contrary, was
closely attentive. Her mind seemed to crave all the sustenance it
could get from every source, and her reverential manner indicated that
the hopes inspired by her faith were dear and cherished. Although they
lived such quiet lives and kept themselves apart from their neighbors,
there was no mystery about them which awakened surmises. "They've seen
better days," was the common remark when they were spoken of; and this
was true. While they had no desire to be social with the people am