Queenie and Cathy were largely given to conversations such as these. It was just talking out their thoughts, as they called it. They aired all manner of quaint subjects in this way, these two honest-hearted girls. Both were a little vague at times; most women are. Cathy always amused her friend mightily. She had a habit at certain times, in her "goody moods," as she termed them, of taking herself to pieces to examine her moral mechanism, just as though she were examining the works of a new watch, as Queenie would tell her, clogging the wheels and stopping progress all the time. "If you are always taking yourself up by the roots to see how you grow you won't grow at all," she assured her in her droll way. "You ought not always to be looking at your defects and blemishes in the glass. People freckle from the sun sometimes; but I don't believe over-much sunshine hurts any one. Keep tight hold of the reins, never let go, and then try and forget everything but the road you are travelling. Forget nothing but yourself; mamma always said that." There was something very fresh and sweet in this girlish intercourse, devoid as it was of vanity and selfishness; they were tolerably equal in capacity; neither could teach the other much, but they could learn together. It was as though they were two young gleaners following the reapers: now one gathered a stray sheaf and tossed it into the lap of the other; everything--an idea, a thought--was just a golden ear to be winnowed into grain. At times their content would have filled a granary. Happy season of youth! when everything is delightful because everything is new; when harvests are more bountiful; when the mildew and the blight and the canker-worm are unknown; when the sky and earth meet and touch softly; when beautiful thoughts steal like strange birds in the twilight; when the glimmer of a star will provoke a reverie; when a hand-clasp will wake a world of dreams; when the whole universe is not too big a setting for one small beating heart; when one believes in one's guardian angel, and heaven is so near--so near. It is not always so. Alas! alas! for the anointed eyes purged from their youthful blindness, made wise with the serpent-knowledge of evil and good. Tread softly here, ye worldlings, with lifted sandals and bated breath; for here, as in all real lovely things fresh from the Maker's hand, is indeed holy ground. Queenie was moderate in her praises of Hepshaw church; nevertheless, it pleased her with a certain sense of fitness. There was no beauty of architecture, no tastefulness of detail; it was just a village church, adapted to the needs of a rustic population.