"She not only endured them, but she loved them; and soon, very soon, they were neither ragged nor untidy. A smile and a word from mamma accomplished more than a long lecture from another would have done. As the children learned to read, they carried Bibles and little religious publications into their parents’ miserable homes: gradually a taste for reading was produced, and my father took care that it should be gratified by useful and improving works. All this time my parents were making every effort to collect subscriptions for building and endowing a church--regular schools followed, until at length our poor village became the dear, peaceful, happy little place that you behold it now." "Well," cried Ada, "it must have given your parents a great deal of pleasure to see all the good that they had done." "You do admit then," said Flora, archly, "that even the country may have its pleasures?" "Yes; but only think at what a price the pleasure was purchased! Only think of the misery of being imprisoned in a place quite out of the world, with no society at all; your only occupation--picking your way into dirty hovels through rivers of mud, tumbling over ragged urchins, lecturing poachers and sheep-stealers, coaxing and coddling sick old women, and then returning home to write begging-letters for subscriptions to friends who are sure to have ’so many calls’ that they wish you at Nova Zembla for adding another!" Ada interrupted herself as a sweet golden-haired little boy lifted the latch of the gate of a tiny garden, and timidly, as if abashed by the presence of a stranger, offered a bunch of violets to Flora. She received them as graciously as though they had been a chaplet of pearls, and her words of thanks made the face of the child radiant with joy. "Quite a chivalrous attention," said Ada, as they moved on. "Oh, my children love me, and often bring me their little offerings. On my birth-day our myrtle was quite covered with their garlands of early spring flowers." She now stopped at the door of a cottage and knocked. A feeble "Come in" sounded from the interior, and she entered, followed by Ada, who gathered together the folds of her silk dress, afraid to let them come in contact with the walls of the lowly dwelling. But her own luxurious home could not have presented a picture of more perfect cleanliness and neatness than that humble abode; there was nothing to shock even the refined taste of a lady of fashion. An aged woman, in a snowy cap, was seated in an arm-chair beside a small fire; while a woman who had been engaged in ironing, paused in her occupation to drop a humble courtesy to Flora. "How are you feeling to-day?" said Flora, in a tone of gentlest sympathy, approaching the invalid, and laying her soft fingers on the thin wrinkled hand that feebly grasped the arm of the chair.