"Now," said Albert, "you'll see that girl will have everything quietly tucked away in just the right place; not a word said. She is a born housewife; it's in her, as much as it is in a pointer to show game." "Rose is my right hand," said Olivia; "I should be lost without her." Whence comes it, that, just on the verge of the great crises and afflictions of life, words are often spoken, that, to after view, seem to have had a prophetic meaning? So often do we hear people saying, "Ah, the very day before I heard of this or that, we were saying so and so!" It would seem sometimes as if the soul felt itself being drawn within the dark sphere of a coming evil, of which as yet nothing outward tells. Then the thoughts and conversation flow in an almost prophetic channel, which a coming future too well interprets. The evening passed cheerfully with our friends, notwithstanding the grave conversation in the arbor. The mourning veil was laid away in a drawer along with many of its brilliant companions, and with it the thoughts it had suggested; and the merry laugh ringing from the half-open parlor-door showed that Father Payson was no despiser of the command to rejoice with them that do rejoice. Rose played and sung, the children danced, and the mirth was prolonged till a late hour in the evening. Olivia and Albert were lingering in the parlor after the departure of the family, busy in shutting windows, setting back chairs, and attending to all the last duties of orderly householders. A sudden shriek startled them; such a shriek as, once heard, is never forgotten. With an answering cry of horror, they rushed up the stairs. The hall lamp had been extinguished, but the passage and staircase were red with a broad glare from the open door of the nursery. A moment more showed them the drapery of the bed in which their youngest child was sleeping all in flames; then they saw a light form tearing down the blazing curtains. "Oh, Rose! Rose! take care, for God's sake! your dress! you'll kill yourself! oh, God help us!" There were a few moments--awful moments of struggle--when none knew or remembered what they did; a moment more and Rose lay panting in her father's arms, enveloped in a thick blanket which he had thrown around her burning night-dress. The fire was extinguished, the babe lay unawakened, and only the dark flecks of tinder scattered over the bed, and the trampled mass on the floor, told what had been. But Rose had breathed the hot breath of the flame, deadly to human life, and no water could quench that inward fire.