may atone somewhat for our lack of wisdom and skill. We read among Thy mysteries that the divine Child was born of a virgin. May He be born again and born daily in our hearts, already touched by that remembrance and consecrated by its meaning. And this we ask for love’s sake. Amen.’ Then there was a space of silence—one of those silences in which we seem to be caught up into the heart of things, when hidden meanings are revealed, when the soul stretches itself and grows a little. It was a few minutes later when Rhoda said, ‘I am fired with zeal, I confess it. Henceforth my single aim shall be to bring Marm Lisa into her lost kingdom and inheritance. But meanwhile, how, oh how shall I master the hateful preliminaries? How shall I teach her to lace her shoes and keep them laced, unless I invent a game for it? How shall I keep her hair from dangling in her eyes, how keep her aprons neat?—though in those respects she is no worse than Pacific Simonson. I promised her a doll yesterday, and she was remarkably good. Do you object, Mistress Mary?’ ‘I don’t know how much rewards are used in these cases,’ answered Mary, ‘but why do you begin with them when the problem presents no insuperable difficulties as yet? Whenever she herself, her awkward hands, her weak will, her inattention, her restlessness, give her some task she likes, some pleasure or occupation for which she has shown decided preference, and thus make happiness follow close upon the heels of effort. We who see more clearly the meaning of life know that this will not always happen, and we can be content to do right for right’s sake. I don’t object to your putting hosts of slumbering incentives in Lisa’s mind, but a slumbering incentive is not vulgar and debasing, like a bribe.’