FAITH SEES A STAR.
One day I was introduced by a friend to a very attractive lady
school-teacher, who combined with superior domestic training,
elocutionary and musical accomplishments. She was so sincere and
sympathetic that I found myself almost unconsciously expressing the
same sentiments that I had spoken to another long ago in the city by
the sea.
The love which I supposed had passed on forever to the other world,
seemed to be sent back to me through the opening clouds of evening by
my self-sacrificing spirit bride, to give to another who would love
and cherish the helpless little ones who so needed a mother's care.
I poured forth all my sorrows, troubles, perplexities and needs to a
congenial, sympathetic spirit, and she consented to go to my home and
take up the burdens which the ascended mother had been required by the
angel-world to lay down.
On the arrival of the new housekeeper, order was evolved out of chaos;
the children received the best of care, and the horse a much needed
rest after his arduous labors in carting to and from the depot the
numerous hired women who had been "weighed in the balance and found
wanting." In the following month of roses, Lillian concluded that my
"first glance" attachment was reciprocated; we were married in her
father's house at Allston; we enjoyed a brief tour of the White
Mountains, and then settled down in our cottage to our life work. The
peace of God, which always comes, sooner or later to those who strive
to do their duty, was ours, and the inspiration of Whittier's sweet
poem "My Psalm" brought infinite consolation to our blended lives.
"I mourn no more my vanished years;
Beneath a tender rain,
An April rain of smiles and tears,
My heart is young again.
"All as God wills, who wisely heeds
To give or to withhold,
And knoweth more of all my needs
Than all my prayers have told.
"All the jarring notes of life
Seem blending in a psalm,
And all the angles of its strife
Slow rounding into calm.
"And so the shadows fall apart,
And so the sunbeams play;
And all the windows of my heart
I open to the day."