220 



HOME AND FLOWERS 



hodijy an^ it ain't likel}- I'm goin' to begin 

 to^ at my time o' life/' 



Mary sat there in the spotlessly clean 

 kitchen for a long time in silence. She 

 was a little girl^ but a thoughtful one for 

 her years, and she was looking at the fu- 

 ture. She understood that this place was 

 likely to be her home for years to come. 

 Home? Young as she was, she felt the 

 mockery of calling the place by that sacred 

 name. 



"Oh, if she'd only love me — if she'd 

 only love me a little," she sobbed. "Mother 

 thought she would, but I don't believe 

 she will. Oh, mother, mother !" 



Then the poor child buried her face in 

 her hands and cried again. 



Suddenly a voice seemed to whisper to 

 her, "Have you forgotten what your 

 mother told you?" 



She lifted her head and looked about, 

 as if expecting to see someone. 



"I had forgotten," she said, as if in 

 reply to the unseen friend. "Mother told 

 me to tell God about it, when I was in 

 trouble. I'll do it now." 



Then the little girl knelt down by the 

 chair on which she had been sitting, and 

 prayed : 



"Dear God, I'm so lonesome. I want 

 someone to love me. I don't know how 

 to make Aunt Betty like me, but I'd love 

 her if she'd let me. Won't you please help 

 me? Mother said you would, and she 

 knew. Amen." 



Chapter III. 

 Miss Betty, coming from the wood- 

 shed where she had been at work, heard 

 Mary's prayer, and it had a strange effect 

 on her. 



She was not a religious woman. She 

 had never been one, though born and 

 brought up in a religious family. She 

 had not been to church for 3^ears, because, 

 as she expressed it, there were so many 

 hypocrites among the church members. 

 They pretended all sorts of goodness, and 

 practised all sorts of meanness. She was 

 just as good as they were — in fact, she 



was a good deal better, because she didn't 

 make any pretensions, and they did. 



The time had been when she was on 

 friendly terms with many of her neigh- 

 bors, but as the years passed, and she shut 

 herself up more closely in the old farm 

 house, the habit of keeping aloof from 

 them so grew upon her that she found it 

 difficult to be friendly and social with 

 anyone. Uncle Si had the right idea in 

 mind when he compared her to a turtle 

 shut up in its own shell. She was often 

 lonely in the silent old farm house, and 

 felt a vague desire to break loose from 

 her dreary, cheerless way of living, but 

 the chains of habit were stronger than the 

 longing to live the life God intended all 

 of us to lead, she had almost forgotten 

 what was meant by the term friendship. 



There was something in the prayer to 

 which she listened that impressed her 

 strangely. It came from the child's heart. 

 It voiced a want, and a need, and the 

 child that uttered it seemed to feel that 

 the God .she prayed to could hear her 

 petition, and could answer it. She did not 

 understand why it was, but she felt — as 

 she never remembered to have felt before 

 — that this God she had thought so little 

 about all her life was near by, and the 

 thought almost frightened her. It gave 

 her a superstitious feeling. She turned 

 about, and went back into the wood-shed, 

 and stayed there until the strange feeling 

 had worn off to some extent before she 

 felt like coming into the room where Mary 

 was. 



The utterance of that simple prayer re- 

 lieved the child's sorrowful heart, and a 

 sense of trust came over her. God knew 

 all about it, she thought. He must, be- 

 cause her mother had said he did, and 

 she had confidence to believe that her 

 mother knew. 



Children have keener perceptions — or 

 would it be better to call them intuitions ? 

 — than we give them credit for. In the 

 short time she had been under the same 

 roof with her aunt, Mary had formed a 

 vague idea of what sort of a woman she 



