conscious that the
chamber had an occupant. She looked around with surprise, and Helen
feared, with displeasure.

"Mittie preferred sleeping alone," she hastened to say, "and I thought
she had a prior right to the other apartment."

"Selfish, selfish to the heart's core!" ejaculated Mrs. Gleason. "But,
my dear child, I cannot allow you to be the victim of an arbitrary will.
The more you yield, the more concessions will be required. You know
not, dream not, of Mittie's imperious and exacting nature."

"I begin to believe, dear mother, that the discipline we most need, we
receive. I did feel very unhappy last night, and when I entered this
room, the dread of remaining all alone, in darkness and silence, almost
stopped the beatings of my heart. It was the first time I ever passed a
night without some companion, for every one has indulged my weakness,
which they believed constitutional. But after the first few moments--a
sense of God's presence and protection, of the guardianship of angels,
of the nearness of Heaven, hushed all my fears, and filled me with a
kind of divine tranquillity. Oh! mother, I feel so much better this
morning for the trial, that I thank Mittie for having cast me, as it
were, on the bosom of God."

"With such a spirit, Helen," said her step-mother, tenderly embracing
her, "you will be able to meet whatever trials the discipline of your
life may need. Self-reliance and God-reliance are the two great
principles that must sustain us. We must do our duty, and leave the
result to Providence. And, believe me, Helen, it is a species of
ingratitude to suffer ourselves to be made unhappy by the faults of
others, for which we are not responsible, when blessings are clustering
richly round us."

Helen felt strengthened by the affectionate counsels of her step-mother,
and did not allow the cloud on Mittie's brow to dim the sunshine of
hers. Mindful of the warnings of the young doctor, she avoided Clinton
as much as possible, whose deep blue eyes with their long sable lashes
often rested on her with an expression she could not define, and which
she shrunk from meeting. True to her promise she visited Miss Thusa once
a day, and took her spinning lessons, till she could turn the wheel like
a fairy, and manufacture thread as smooth and silky as her venerable
teacher. She insisted on bleaching it also, and flew about among the
long grass, with her bright watering pot, like a living flower sprung up
in the wilder