“I ast that pore innocent feller if there was any parsley in the gairdin,” she chuckled to Hetty, “an’ he said he’d fetch me a bunch to gairnish me dishes. But I’ve niver laid eyes onto him since. I mistrust he don’t know one yarb from another. Is he ‘all there,’ d’ye think, mem?” “He is not quick, but he is not an idiot, by any means,” returned his patroness. “He is a faithful, honest fellow, always thankful for a kind word, very industrious, and perfectly truthful. We think a great deal of Homer. I saw him in the garden just now, looking for the parsley. I will find him and send him in with it. Don’t sugar the berries; we do that on the table. Keep them in a cool place until they are wanted for dessert.” She strolled down the garden walk, singing low to herself the catching tune to which she had set the words the Gilchrists had overheard the Sunday night of their first call: O Life and Love! O happy throng Of thoughts whose only speech is song. O heart of man! canst thou not be Blithe as the air is, and as free? Homer had vanished from the main alley that led directly to the orchard, yet she walked on down the whole length of it. Blazing tulips had supplanted faded hyacinths; the faint green globes of snowball bushes were bleaching hourly in May sunshine and breeze; the lilac hedge, lining the post-and-board fence at the bottom of the parsonage lot, was set thick with purple and mauve and white spikes. “Such a dear, old-fashioned garden!” Hetty said, half aloud. “It reminds me of the one we had at home!” Leaning upon the orchard gate she abandoned herself to reverie. The robins’ whistle in the apple tree was low and tender; fleecy clouds, drifting toward the west, began to blush on the sunward side, the blending odors of a thousand flowers hung in the air. The word “home” took thought back—thoughts of the only one she had ever had, and the mother whose death lost it to her. Since then she had stood alone, and helped weaker people to stand. A great longing for rest in a love she could claim as all hers drove tears to her eyes. The longing was not new, but the hope that softened it was. Hitherto, it had been linked with her mother’s image only. She wanted her now, as much, and more than ever before, but that she might sympathize with what she began to comprehend tremblingly. Her mother would enter into her trembling and her joy. Especially if she had seen what Hetty never could describe—a look the memory of which renewed the shy, delicious shame expressed in the blush March had pitied, while rejoicing in the sight of it.