THE YOUNG GIRL FAITH. 169 



lives were peaceful, let the wise man make himself known, 

 and I alone with my own hands will build him a temple 

 where men shall worship his memory for ages to come. 

 1 know that the spirits who inhabit the universe of their 

 Maker and Master are around us. I know that they sug- 

 gest thoughts, whisper memories and hopes, talk to us, 

 but, alas ! not with us. I ask them and they answer not. 

 I beseech them, and they make no reply. I talk to them. 

 They talk to me. But there is no question and response. 

 I question the shadows as well as the sunlight, the storm 

 as well as the evening breath of balm, but until I put off 

 this clothing of the earth that is so earthy, I have no hope 

 for spiritual converse. 



But Faith lies sleeping in the thicket, and I get on but 

 slowly with her story. How old she would be now if she 

 had lived ! More than a hundred years, if I remember 

 the date aright. It was, I think, 1772 or thereabouts. 

 That was when Jonathan Trumbull was Governor of Con- 

 necticut. They were stirring times, and the farmers along 

 the coast knew something of the vicissitudes of war. For 

 the French and Spanish quarrel had brought trouble and 

 sorrow, with some loss, into the Connecticut homes. One 

 can hardly imagine how people lived here in those times. 

 The farmer's family, over yonder in the heart of the coun- 

 try, had but little communication with the world. New 

 York was weeks away, Boston as far, and neither New 

 York nor Boston was of special account as a place of 

 news in those days. New London was a much more im- 

 portant port to the people hereabouts than any city on 

 this side of the Atlantic. Old London was months dis- 

 tant. The government was far off, but it began to be felt 

 about this time. I wonder whether the farmer's daughter 

 wasted much time in thinking of the queen, if there was a 



