In truth a great change had passed over Winifred. She had passed that place "where the brooks and rivers meet." She had from a simple child become a woman, with all a woman's cares and feelings, living the best part of her life in another. And she could no more go back to what she was before the memorable night when she walked over the fields with Arthur Carew, than she could return to the days when she played contentedly for hours with a doll and a few bits of broken earthenware. Winifred had now to learn what all women must learn, sooner or later, that it often requires as much courage, though of a somewhat different kind, to live one's common every-day life, as it does to risk that life in some great danger or adventure. She sometimes found it hard not to be pettish and impatient with Jack when he boasted of what he would do when he was a sailor, and she sometimes found herself looking with disgust upon the little cares and the common every-day work which occupied her from morning till night, without seeming, after all, to bring anything to pass. But Winifred was too truly a Christian, and too strongly confirmed in the habit of honest self-examination, to allow this frame of mind to become a habit. She soon perceived that she was growing fretful and discontented, and even moody and impatient of the society of those about her. And she set herself resolutely to remedy the evil, by earnest prayer, and by a steady, straightforward analysis of her own feelings and conduct. "God has placed me where I am," she argued with herself. "He hath called me to this state of life, and the work I am obliged to do every day—feeding the fowls, sweeping and scouring, waiting upon my grandfather and Jack, and helping Priscilla in the dairy—all this is as much His work, as saving Mr. Carew's life or helping my lady. And if I let myself be unfaithful and discontented in these little matters, just because they do not seem to come to anything, what right have I to expect strength when any great temptation comes to try me? And if I sit thinking of all that has happened, and of Mr. Arthur Carew, when I ought to be saying my prayers—and I know I have done so a good many times—I have no right to expect my devotions will seem as pleasant to me as they have done before. "I might take pattern of my lady about that. Of course the suspense about Mr. Arthur must be much worse for her than for me, yet she seems to go about everything just as usual—visiting the poor sick folks, the school, and the old women at the almshouses, reading and working, though I dare say all these things are often as tiresome to her as my spinning and knitting are to me. I will not be so silly any more!" was the conclusion of her meditation.