IO THE BLESSED BEES. 



and prosperity, and am glad. It was a happy home 

 to me for almost two years. 



Bircham was not a talkative companion, and left 

 me to myself. The station was reached in time, 

 soon the train came up from Jackson, and I was on 

 my homeward way. Once seated and going on as 

 fast as steam v/ould carry me, I had time to think. 

 It seemed certain that my father was in serious 

 danger. Two days before, my mother had written 

 that he was ill of typhoid fever, but had bidden me 

 stay quietly at my studies, for she would send if 

 there was any danger. She had sent. There was 

 danger, danger that in the prime of life my father 

 should go away to return to us no more. The tie 

 by which each member of his family was bound to 

 him was very strong. His clear sense, his sympa- 

 thetic nature, his love of home, had made him a 

 friend and companion to us all. He was sick unto 

 death and I was seventy miles away. It seemed as 

 if no train ever went so slow, that no hours ever 

 were so interminably long. When the brakeman 

 shouted " Portland," it seemed as if we had been all 

 day on the route, but it was only a distance of 

 twenty-six miles from Lansing. I settled down 

 into the corner of the seat, pulled my cap over my 

 eyes, and resolutely tried not to think. To this 

 end I began to repeat in order all the propositions 

 in my text-book in Geometry. But the effort not 



