Anne was left alone in the cottage with the baby, who slept in the clothes-basket she had turned into a cradle. The dog slept, too, having made friends with fortune. A late evening glow lit one side of the wall. When it faded, the dusk would absorb all the room and its inhabitants. Anne, sitting very still lest she should wake the baby, remembered one by one the agonies that had been lived through, whose sole result seemed to be this peaceful evening and the confidently breathing child. She remembered the shock of the disgrace to her, she, who had been a friend of the grandmother's, and how she had carried the burden about. She remembered the new house, and Jane, pretty, spoiled, and without misgiving, caring nothing for the hard judgments of which she herself imbibed the bitterness. Then Jane, with the child already striving to be free, leaving the new house at night, knowing without being told what door was open to her of all the doors in the country, and what place she would henceforth take. She saw the girl again, seated by the fire in the Infirmary ward, with that strange division between herself and all living, removed, as it were, to a distance which could not be bridged. Then Jane was no more to be found. There was the boy-child instead, who knew nothing except his desire to be kept alive; who met all reservations and pity by a determination to be fed. Throughout the whole evening, Anne had been struck by the fact that the other women scarcely thought of Jane any more than the baby did. It remained to them a very simple matter. There was a baby to feed and bring up. Being a boy, other things would soon be forgotten. It was too late, she knew, to do anything for Jane. The only thing that seemed possible to her in her simple reasoning, was to prevent such catastrophes for the future. It was not that pity was misplaced when shipwreck came, nor that charity ever failed. She understood, without being conscious of it, the ironic severity of Jesus, who would have no sudden pity and heart-searching on account of His poor. He had come into the world for righteousness and for judgment, and the judgment and righteousness both declared, not at the time of disaster or human appeal, nor with sudden loud outcries, but, "The poor always ye have with you, and _whensoever ye will_, ye may do them good." The baby stirred. Anne lit the candle, and set it on the stairs. She stepped over the dog, and took a warm flannel from the oven door. Tucking it in at the feet of the child, she lifted the clothes-basket and carried it upstairs. The dog raised his head and watched her. She returned, covered the fire, and set an earthenware pot of milk on the hob. The dog laid his nose between his paws again. Anne, taking the candle and leaving the room in darkness, closed the staircase door and went upstairs. End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Women of the Country, by Gertrude Bone