“When I was born, my papa was a very young man, and he was very fond of reading poetry.” “Why, I thought your papa was a doctor.” “Well!” “I thought only ladies, and poets, and idle silly people, cared for poetry.” “They can hardly be silly if they care rightly for real poetry, Bessie,” said Miss Fosbrook; “at least, so my papa would say. It has been one of his great helps. Well, in those days he was very fond of a poem about a lady called Christabel, who was so good and sweet, that when evil came near, it could not touch her so as to do her any harm; and so he gave his little daughter her name.” “How very nice!” cried Elizabeth. “You must not envy me, my dear, for I have been a good deal laughed at for my pretty name, and so has Papa; and I do not think he would have chosen anything so fanciful if he had been a little older.” “Then isn’t he—what is it you call it—poetical now?” “Indeed he is, in a good way;” and as the earnest eyes looked so warmly at her, Christabel Fosbrook could not help making a friend of the little maiden. “He has very little time to read it; for you know he is a parish surgeon in a great parish in London, full of poor people, worse off than you can imagine, and often very ill. He is obliged to be always hard at work in the narrow close streets there, and to see everything sad, and dismal, and disagreeable, that can be found; but, do you know, Bessie, he always looks for the good and beautiful side; he looks at one person’s patience, and another person’s kindness, and at some little child’s love for its mother or sister, that hinders it from being too painful for him.” “But is that poetry? I thought poetry meant verses.” “Verses are generally the best and most suitable way of expressing our feelings about what is good and beautiful; but they are not always poetry, any more than the verses they sang to-night about the bread and butter, because, you know, wanting thick butter was not exactly a beautiful feeling. I think the denying themselves their little indulgences for the sake of giving the poor woman a pig, is much more poetical, though nobody said a word in verse.” They both laughed; and Elizabeth said, “That wasn’t what you meant about your papa. Susy cares for goodness.” “No, it was not all I meant; but it was seeing high and noble thoughts expressed in beautiful verses that gives him pleasure; and when he has a little bit of leisure, it is his great treat to open a book of that sort, and read a little bit to us, and tell us why we like it. He says it makes him young again, and takes him out of the dingy streets, and from all his cares as to how the bills are to be paid.” “Did you like coming here?” was Bessie’s home question; and Miss Fosbrook winked away a little moisture, as she said, “I was glad to be growing a woman, and to be able to help about some of those bills; and then I was glad to come into the beautiful country that Papa has so often told us about.”