_A little half-worn shoe!_ And yet no magician could conjure up such blissful visions; no artist could trace such vivid pictures; no harp of sweetest sounds could so fill the ear with music. Eight years since the little Daisy withered! And yet, to the mother's eye, she still blossomed fair as Paradise. The soft, golden hair still waved over the blue-veined temples; the sweet, earnest eyes still beamed with their loving light; the little fragile hand was still outstretched for maternal guidance, and in the wood and by the stream they still lingered. Still, the little hymn was chanted at dawn, the little prayer lisped at dew-fall; still, that gentle breathing mingled with the happy mother's star-lit dreams. A little, bright-eyed creature, crept to Ruth's side, and lifting a long, wavy, golden ringlet from a box on the table near her, laid it beside her own brown curls. "Daisy's in heaven," said little Katy, musingly. "Why do you cry, mamma? Don't you like to have God keep her for you?" A tear was the only answer. "_I_ should like to die, and have you love _my_ curls as you do Daisy's, mother." Ruth started, and looked at the child; the rosy flush had faded away from little Katy's cheek, and a tear stole slowly from beneath her long lashes. Taking her upon her lap, she severed one tress of her brown hair, and laid it beside little Daisy's golden ringlet. A bright, glad smile lit up little Katy's face, and she was just throwing her arms about her mother's neck, to express her thanks, when, stopping suddenly, she drew from her dimpled foot one little shoe, and laid it in her mother's palm. 'Mid smiles and tears Ruth complied with the mute request; and the little sister shoes lay with the twin ringlets, lovingly side by side. Blessed childhood! the pupil and yet the teacher; half infant, half sage, and whole angel! what a desert were earth without thee! CHAPTER XXV. Hotel life is about the same in every latitude. At Beach Cliff there was the usual number of vapid, fashionable mothers; dressy, brainless daughters; half-fledged wine-bibbing sons; impudent, whisker-dyed roués; bachelors, anxious to give their bashfulness an airing; bronchial clergymen, in search of health and a text; waning virgins, languishing by candle-light; gouty uncles, dyspeptic aunts, whist-playing old ladies, flirting nursery maids and neglected children. Then there were "hops" in the hall, and sails upon the lake; there were nine-pin alleys, and a gymnasium; there were bathing parties, and horse-back parties; there were billiard rooms, and smoking rooms; reading rooms, flirtation rooms,--room for everything but--thought.