“Where is the broom, Mrs. Elder?” inquired the busy little one, coming now to the bedside of the invalid.
“Never mind the broom, dear; Betsy will sweep up the floor when she comes in,” said Mrs. Elder. “Thank you for a kind, good little girl. You’ve put a smile on every thing in the room. What a grand housekeeper you are going to make!”
Aggy’s heart bounded with a new emotion. Her young cheeks glowed, and her blue eyes sparkled. If the pleasure she felt lacked any thing of pure delight, a single glance at her mother’s face made all complete.
“When did you hear from your daughter?” asked Mrs. Markland.
There was a change of countenance and a sigh.
“Oh! ma’am, if Lotty were only here, I would be happy, even in sickness and suffering. It’s very hard to be separated from my child.”
“She is in Charleston?”
“Yes, ma’am,”
“Is her husband doing well?”
“I can’t say that he is. He isn’t a very thrifty man, though steady enough.”
“Why did they go to Charleston?”
“He thought he would do better there than here; but they haven’t done as well, and Lotty is very unhappy.”
“Do they talk of returning?”
“Yes, ma’am; they’re both sick enough of their new home. But then it costs a heap of money to move about with a family, and they haven’t saved any thing. And, more than this, it isn’t just certain that James could get work right away if he came back. Foolish fellow that he was, not to keep a good situation when he had it! But it’s the way of the world, Mrs. Markland, this ever seeking, through change, for something better than Heaven awards in the present.”
“Truly spoken, Mrs. Elder. How few of us possess contentment; how few extract from the present that good with which it is ever supplied! We read the fable of the dog and the shadow, and smile at the folly of the poor animal; while, though instructed by reason, we cast aside the substance of to-day in our efforts to grasp the shadowy future. We are always looking for the blessing to come; but when the time of arrival is at hand, what seemed so beautiful in the hazy distance is shorn of its chief attraction, or dwarfed into nothingness through contrast with some greater good looming grandly against the far horizon.”
Mrs. Markland uttered the closing sentence half in reverie; for her thoughts were away from the sick woman and the humble apartment in which she was seated. There was an abstracted silence of a few moments, and she said:
“Speaking of your daughter and her husband, Mrs. Elder; they are poor, as I understand you?”
“Oh yes, ma’am; it is hand-to-mouth with them all the time. James is kind enough to Lotty, and industrious in his way; but his work never turns to very good account.”
“What business does he follow?”
“He’s a cooper by trade; but doesn’t stick to any thing very long. I call him the rolling stone that gathers no moss.”
“What is he doing in Charleston?”
“He went there as agent for a man in New York, who filled his head with large ideas. He was to have a share in the profits of a business just commenced, and expected to make a fortune in a year or two; but before six months closed, he found himself in a strange city, out of employment, and in debt. As you said, a little while ago, he dropped the present substance in grasping at a shadow in the future.”
“The way of the world,” said Mrs. Markland.
“Yes, yes; ever looking for the good time coming that never comes,” sighed Mrs. Elder. “Ah, me,” she added, “I only wish Lotty was with me again.”
“How many children has she?”
“Four.”
“One a baby?”
“Yes, and but three months old.”
“She has her hands full.”
“You may well say that, ma’am; full enough.”
“Her presence, would not, I fear, add much to your comfort, Mrs. Elder. With her own hands full, as you say, and, I doubt not, her heart full, also, she would not have it in her power to make much smoother the pillow on which your head is lying. Is she of a happy temper, naturally?”
“Well, no; I can’t say that she is, ma’am. She is too much like her mother: ever looking for a brighter day in the future.”
“And so unconscious of the few gleams of sunshine that play warmly about her feet—”
“Yes, yes; all very true; very true;” said Mrs. Elder, despondingly.
“The days that look so bright in the future, never come.”
“They have never come to me.” And the sick woman shook her head mournfully. “Long, long ago, I ceased to expect them.” And yet, in almost the next breath, Mrs. Elder said:
