And so she was. In less than half an hour after the sale was made, in this off-hand fashion, Mrs. Cartwright sat alone in her parlor, looking down upon the naked floor. But she had five ten-dollar gold pieces in her hand, and they were of more value in her eyes than twenty carpets. Not long did she sit musing here. There was other work to do. The old carpet must be replaced upon the parlor floor ere her husband's return. And it was replaced. In the midst of her hurried operations the old blinds with the new hangings came in, and were put up to the windows. When Mr. Cartwright returned home, and stepped inside of the little parlor, where he found his wife awaiting him, he gave an exclamation of surprise. "Why, Mary! What is the meaning of this? Where is the new carpet?" She laid the five gold pieces in his hand, and then looked earnestly, and with tears in her eyes, upon his wondering face. "What are these, Mary? Where did they come from?" "Cousin Sally is gone. The carpet didn't seem attractive in her eyes, and it has lost all beauty in mine. So I sold the unlovely thing, and here is the money. Take it, dear Henry, and let it serve the purpose for which it was designed." "All right again!" exclaimed Mr. Cartwright, as soon as the whole matter was clear to him. "All right, Mary, dear! That carpet, had it remained, would have wrecked, I fear, the happiness of our home. Ah, let us consult only our own eyes hereafter, Mary--not the eyes of other people! None think the better of us for what we seem--only for what we are. It is not from fine furniture that our true pleasure in life is to come, but from a consciousness of right-doing. Let the inner life be right, and the outer life will surely be in just harmony. In the humble abode of virtue there is more real happiness than in the palace-homes of the unjust, the selfish, and wrong-doers. The sentiment is old as the world, but it must come to every heart, at some time in life, with all the force of an original utterance. And let it so come to us now, dear wife!" And thus it did come. This little experience showed them an aspect of things that quickened their better reasons, and its smart remained long enough to give it the power of a monitor in all their after lives. They never erred again in this wise. For two or three years more the old carpet did duty in their neat little parlor, and when it was at last replaced by a new one, the change was made for their own eyes, and not for the eyes of another. End of Project Gutenberg's After a Shadow, and Other Stories, by T. S. Arthur