as to make him laugh, he stopped Ethel, as she was going upstairs, by saying, 'I do not know whether this letter is intended for Richard, or for me. At any rate, it concerns you most.'
The envelope was addressed to the Reverend Richard May, D. D., Market Stoneborough, and the letter began, 'Reverend Sir.' So far Ethel saw, and exclaimed, with amusement, then, with a long-drawn 'Ah!' and an interjection, 'My poor dear Una!' she became absorbed, the large tears--yes, Ethel's reluctant tears gathering slowly and dropping.
The letter was from a clergyman far away in the north of England, who said he could not, though a stranger, resist the desire to send to Dr. May an account of a poor girl, who seemed to have received great benefits from him, or from some of his family, especially as she had shown great eagerness on his proposing to write.
He said it was nearly a year since there had come into his parish a troop of railwaymen and their families. For the most part, they were completely wild and rude, unused to any pastoral care; but, even on the first Sunday, he had noticed a keen-looking, freckled, ragged, unmistakably Irish girl, creeping into church with a Prayer-book in her hand, and had afterwards found her hanging about the door of the school. 'I never saw a more engaging, though droll, wild expression, than that with which she looked up to me.' (Ethel's cry of delight was at that sentence--she knew that look too well, and had yearned after it so often!) 'I found her far better instructed than her appearance had led me to expect, and more truly impressed with the spirit of what she had learned than it has often been my lot to find children. She was perfect in the New Testament history'--('Ah! that she was not, when she went away!')--'and was in the habit of constantly attending church, and using morning and evening prayers.' ('Oh! how I longed, when she went away, to beg her to keep them up! Dear Una.') 'On my questions, as to how she had been taught, she always replied, 'Mr. Richard May,' or 'Miss Athel.' You must excuse me if I have not correctly caught the name from her Irish pronunciation.' ('I am afraid he thinks my name is Athaliah! But oh! this dear girl! How I have wished to hear of her!') 'Everything was answered with 'Mr. Richard,' or 'Miss Athel'; and, if I inquired further, her face would light up with a beam of gratitude, and she would run on, as long as I could listen, with instances of their kindness. It was the same with her mother, a wild, rude specimen of an Irishwoman, whom I never could bring to church herself, but who ran on loudly with their praises, usually ending with 'Heavens be their bed,' and saying that Una had been quite a different girl since the young ladies and gentleman found her out, and put them parables in her head.
'For my own part, I can testify that, in the seven months that she attended my school, I never had a serious fault to find with her, but far more often to admire the earnestness and devout spirit, as well as the kindness and generosity apparent in all her conduct. Bad living, and an unwholesome locality, have occasioned a typhus fever among the poor strangers in this place, and Una was one of the first victims. Her mother, almost from the first, gave her up, saying she knew she was one marked for glory; and Una has been lying, day after day, in a sort of half-delirious state, constantly repeating hymns and psalms, and generally, apparently very happy, except when one distress occurred again and again, whether delirious or sensible, namely, that she had never gone to wish Miss May good-bye, and thank her; and that maybe she and Mr. Richard thought her ungrateful; and she would sometimes beg, in her phraseology, to go on her bare knees to Stoneborough, only to see Miss Athel again.
'Her mother, I should say, told me the girl had been half mad at not being allowed to go and take leave of Miss May; and she had been sorry herself, but her husband had come home suddenly from the search for work, and, having made his arrangements, removed them at once, early the next morning--too early to go to the young lady; though, she said, Una did--as they passed through Stoneborough--run down the street before she was aware, and she found her sobbing, fit to break her heart, before the house.' ('Oh, why, why was I not up, and at the window! Oh, my Una! to think of that!') 'When I spoke of writing to let Miss May hear how it was, the poor girl caught at the idea with the utmost delight. Her weakness was too great to allow her to utter many words distinctly, when I asked her what she would have me say, but these were as well as I could understand:--'The blessing of one, that they have brought peace unto. Tell them I pray, and will pray, that they may walk in the robe of glory--and tell Mr. Richard that I mind what he said to me, of taking hold on the sure hope. God crown all their crosses unto them, and fulfil all their desires unto everlasting life.' I feel that I am not rendering her words with all their fervour and beauty of Irish expression, but I would that I could fully retain and transmit them, for those who have so led her must, indeed, be able to feel them precious. I never saw a more peaceful frame of penitence and joy. She died last night, sleeping herself away, without more apparent suffering, and will be committed to the earth on Sunday next, all her fellow-scholars attending; and, I hope, profiting by the example she has left.
'I have only to add my most earnest congratulations to those whose labour of love has borne such blessed fruit; and, hoping you will pardon the liberty, etc.'
Etheldred finished the letter through blinding tears, while rising sobs almost choked her. She ran away to her own room, bolted the door, and threw herself on her knees, beside her bed--now confusedly giving thanks for such results--now weeping bitterly over her own unworthiness. Oh! what was she in the sight of Heaven, compared with what this poor girl had deemed her--with what this clergyman thought her? She, the teacher, taught, trained, and guarded, from her infancy, by her wise mother, and by such a father! She, to have given way all day to pride, jealousy, anger, selfish love of her own will; when this poor girl had embraced, and held fast, the blessed hope, from the very crumbs they had brought her! Nothing could have so humbled the distrustful spirit that had been working in Ethel, which had been scotched into silence--not killed--when she endured the bazaar, and now had been indemnifying itself by repining at every stumbling-block. Her own scholar's blessing was the rebuke that went most home to her heart, for having doubted whether good could be worked in any way, save her own.
She was interrupted by Mary trying to open the door, and, admitting her, heard her wonder at the traces of her tears, and ask what there was about Una. Ethel gave her the letter, and Mary's tears showered very fast--they always came readily. 'Oh, Ethel, how glad Richard will be!'
'Yes; it is all Richard's doing. So much more good, and wise, and humble, as he is. No wonder his teaching--' and Ethel sat down and cried again.
Mary pondered. ' It makes me very glad,' she said; 'and yet I don't know why one cries. Ethel, do you think'-- she came near, and whispered--'that Una has met dear mamma there?'
Ethel kissed her. It was almost the first time Mary had spoken of her mother; and she answered, 'Dear Mary, we cannot tell--we may think. It is all one communion, you know.'
Mary was silent, and, next time she spoke, it was to hope that Ethel would tell the Cocksmoor children about Una.
Ethel was obliged to dress, and go downstairs to tea. Her father seemed to have been watching for her, with his study door open, for he came to meet her, took her hand, and said, in a low voice, 'My dear child, I wish you joy. This will be a pleasant message, to bid poor Ritchie good speed for his ordination, will it not?'
'That it will, papa--'
'Why, Ethel, have you been crying over it all this time?' said he, struck by the sadness of her voice.
'Many other things, papa. I am so unworthy--but it was not our doing--but the grace--'
'No, but thankful you may be, to have been the means of awakening the grace!'
Ethel's lips trembled. 'And oh, papa! coming to-day, when I have been behaving so ill to you, and Miss Bracy, and Flora, and all.
'Have you? I did not know you had behaved ill to me.'
'About Miss Bracy--I thought wrong things, if I did not say them. To her, I believe, I said what was true, though it was harsh of me to say it, and--'
'What? about pride and temper? It was true, and I hope it will do her good. Cure a piping turkey with a peppercorn sometimes. I have spoken to her, and told her to pluck up a little spirit; not fancy affronts, and not to pester you with them. Poor child! you have been sadly victimised to-day and yesterday. No wonder you were bored past patience, with that absurd rabble of women!'
'It was all my own selfish, distrustful temper, wanting to have Cocksmoor taken care of in my own way, and angry at being interfered with. I see it now--and here this poor girl, that I thought thrown away--'
'Ay, Ethel, you will often see the like. The main object may fail or fall short, but the earnest painstaking will always be blessed some way or other, and where we thought it most wasted, some fresh green shoot will spring up, to show it is not we that give the increase. I suppose you will write to Richard with this?'
'That I shall.'
'Then you may send this with it. Tell him my arm is tired and stiff to-day, or I would have said more. He must answer the clergyman's letter.'
Dr. May gave Ethel his sheet not folded. His written words were now so few as to be cherished amongst his
