Transcriber's Note: Inconsistent hyphenation and spelling in the original document have been preserved. Obvious typographical errors have been corrected. Italic text is denoted by _underscores_. AMAZING GRACE [Illustration: I took up the first one] AMAZING GRACE _Who Proves That Virtue Has Its Silver Lining_ By KATE TRIMBLE SHARBER _Author of_ THE ANNALS OF ANN, AT THE AGE OF EVE, ETC. ILLUSTRATED BY R. M. CROSBY INDIANAPOLIS THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY PUBLISHERS COPYRIGHT 1914 THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY PRESS OF BRAUNWORTH & CO. BOOKBINDERS AND PRINTERS BROOKLYN, N. Y. TO LAURA NORVELL ELLIOTT WHO HAS THE OLD LETTERS-- CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I STRAINED RELATIONS 1 II A GLIMPSE OF PROMISED LAND 26 III NIP AND TUCK 40 IV THE QUALITY OF MERCY 59 V ET TU, BRUTE! 82 VI FLAG DAY 99 VII STRAWS POINT 115 VIII LONGEST WAY HOME 128 IX MAITLAND TAIT 141 X IN THE FIRELIGHT 157 XI TWO MEN AND A MAID 168 XII AN ASSIGNMENT 186 XIII JILTED! 211 XIV THE SKIES FALL 230 XV THE JOURNEY 244 XVI LONDON 278 XVII HOUSE OF A HUNDRED DREAMS 312 AMAZING GRACE AMAZING GRACE CHAPTER I STRAINED RELATIONS Some people, you will admit, can absorb experience in gentle little homeopathic doses, while others require it to be shot into them by hypodermic injections. Certainly my Dresden-china mother up to the time of my birth had been forced to take this bitter medicine in every form, yet she had never been known to profit by it. She would not, it is true, fly in the very face of Providence, but she _would_ nag at its coat tails. "You might as well name this child 'Praise-the-Lord,' and be done with it!" complained the rich Christie connection (which mother had always regarded as outlaws as well as in-laws), shaking its finger across the christening font into mother's boarding-school face on the day of my baptism. "Of course all the world knows you're _glad_ she's posthumous, but--" "But with Tom Christie only six weeks in spirit-land it isn't decent!" Cousin Pollie finished up individually. "Besides, good families don't name their children for abstract things," Aunt Hannah put in. "It--well, it simply isn't done." "A woman who never does anything that isn't done, never does anything worth doing," mother answered, through pretty pursed lips. "But, since you must be freakish, why not call her Prudence, or Patience--to keep Oldburgh from wagging its tongue in two?" Aunt Louella suggested.