But before the morning other teachers had been there. Death and Anguish--those merciful curses sent to keep the world, which had ceased to be Eden, from becoming a sensual Elysium, idle, selfish, and purposeless--visited the house that night. Another life was ushered into the world under the shadow of Death itself. In the morning Placidia lay feebly rejoicing in the infant-life for which her own had been so nearly sacrificed. Rejoicing in a gift which had cost her so much, and which was to cost her so much more of patient sacrifices, toil and watching, sacrifices for which no one would especially admire her, and for which she would not admire herself; rejoicing as she had never rejoiced in any possession before. Not by any supernatural effort of virtue, but by the simple natural fountain of motherly love which had been opened in her heart. One of the first things she said was to Rachel, who was watching with her through the next night. Very softly, as Rachel sat by her bed-side with the baby on her knee, Placidia said,-- "Strange such a gift should have been given to me and not to thee." "And," said Rachel (when she told me of it), "I could not answer her all in a moment, for there are seas stronger and deeper than those outside our dykes around our hearts. And it's not safe, even in the quietest weather, opening the cranny to let in those tides. So I said nothing. And in a few moments Mistress Nicholls spoke again, 'For thou art good and worthy, Rachel,' said she, 'and it would be no great wonder if the Lord gave thee the best He has to give.' "Then I understood what she meant, and my heart was nigh as glad as if the child had been given to me. For I thought there was a soul new born to God as a little child, meek and lowly. The Lord had led her along the hardest step on the way to Himself, the first step down. And she said no more. I smoothed her pillow, laid the babe beside her, and she and it fell asleep. But I sat still and cried quietly for joy. And the next morning, when the light broke in, Mistress Nicholls looked up and saw those two heaps Mistress Dorothy had set apart, and then she looked down on the babe, and murmured as if to herself,-- "'Poor motherless little ones! God has given me thee and spared me to thee. The poor motherless babes, they shall have the things.' "And then," pursued Rachel, "I turned away and cried again to myself half for gladness, and half for trouble. For I thought sure the Lord's a-going to take her, poor lamb, if she's so changed as that." But Aunt Dorothy, when Rachel narrated this, although she wiped her eyes sympathetically, at the same time gave her head a consolatory shake and said,-- "Never fear, neighbour, never fear, not yet. Depend on it, the old Enemy will have a fight for it yet. Depend on it, there's a good deal of work to be done for her in this world yet, before she's too good to be left in it." LETTICE'S DIARY.