In that Book--a pure and holy one was hers--though not without a few dark and sad pages--Rachel Gray often read. And now, the sight of the yellow flower of spring took her back, to a happy day of her childhood. She saw herself a little girl again, with her younger sister Jane, and the whole school to which they belonged, out on a holiday treat in a green forest. Near that forest there was a breezy field; and there it was that Rachel first saw the yellow crocuses bloom. She remembered her joy, her delight at the wonderful beauty of the wild field flowers--how she and Jane heaped their laps with them, and sat down at the task; and how, when tired with the pleasant labour, they rested, as many yellow crocuses as before seemed to blow and play in the breeze around them. And she remembered, too, how, even then, there passed across her childish mind, a silent wonder at their multitude, an undefined awe for the power of the Almighty Hand who made the little flower, and bade it bloom in the green fields, beneath the misty azure of a soft spring sky. And then swiftly followed other thoughts. Where was little, blue-eyed Jane, her younger sister, her little companion and friend? Sleeping in a London grave, far from the pleasant and sunny spots where God's wild flowers bloom. And she--why she was pursuing her path in life, doing the will of God Almighty. "And what more," thought Rachel, "can I hope or wish for?" "Now, Rachel, what are you moping about?" tartly asked her mother, who, though half blind, had a quick eye for her daughter's meditative fits. Abruptly fled the dream. The childish memories, the holy remembrance of the dead, sank back once more to their quiet resting-place in Rachel's heart. Wakening up with a half-lightened start, she hastily resumed her work. "I don't think there ever was such a moper as that girl," grumbled Mrs. Gray to herself. Rachel smiled cheerfully in her mother's face. But as to telling her that she had been thinking of the yellow crocuses, and of the spots they grew in, and of the power and greatness and glory of Him who made them, Rachel did not dream of it. "There's Mrs. Brown," said Mrs. Gray, as a dark figure passed by the window. "Go, and open the door, Mary." Mary did not stir, upon which Jane officiously rose and said, "I'll go." She went, and in came, or rather bounced, Mrs. Brown--a short, stout, vulgar-looking woman of fifty or so, who at once filled the room with noise.