Year: 1879

The davS were long and lonesome after
the ,ods were heapcd over mothers face
Such sense of utter loss and vacancy
clun. TO everything, often used TO 20
up To the churchyayd and lie down on her
grave and tell her all about it. and it al
way>.ccmed that she heard me. and COM
for,cd mt, In a strange, silent way. The
peace In earth and sky and air would steal
into my soul, and il was as if her hand
had touched me with blessing.


In those days of childish sorrow John
Earle was the tuc,t, kindeSt friend | had.
He understood me as no one else did. He
never tried TO comfort me by trying to
forget what had lost; lie always spoke
of mother as one jus; out Of sight, but,
knowing. as of old, every trouble and
gricf that came TO us, and that thought
was iueXprcssibly sweet with comfort to
me.


DO YOU know Ruth. he said. one day
Il always fancy she Is looking a me out
Of d pansy-blossom; She loved pansies
YOU know. My mother loved no other
blossom as well as lilacs, and in hlac-time
am always happy, for can't help fan
ewing she Is near me then, and that in
some strange way her soul and the lilac>
are 50 mach alike that | can't tell the
difference between them, and often /
catch myself talking 90 the blossoms as
If they could understand Perhaps they
do. Every time a breath OF their fra
GRANGE comes in at at the window, nights
or morning, think mother has tender
thought for me. wish hlacS lasted the
year round.


The next morning. when Robbie and
went TO mother grave, there was great
bunch of panSies growing there, and /
knew where they came from. When |
bent down and kissed them, as if Were
kissing mothers face, | tancicd something
whispered 20 me that had a sound in it
like her voice. But It might have been
the wind


Robbie and | woke up, one day, to the
fact that We were children no longer. We
had grown out of our own childhood un-
awareS.


You are = man now, ," l said TO him.
A man, DQyou comprehend what that
means, my BROTHER


Il hope So," he answered. Il mean
70 be man that YOU viii be proud Of,
Ruth.


As if be could ever be anything else
No one can know how | loved my broth
er. 1t had seemed TO me, after mother
died and left Us alone that all the love |
had TO give ought 10 be given to him. To
me me WAS more than the world; beside
him I had few friends. With him TO
love | wanted no one else.


Looking back now to the days when
We drifted down the river from childhood
to man and womauhood, only one other
face looks viyidly out of memory by the
side of his, and that IS John Earle's. II
Is blent with all my remembrances of
those happy days, for Robbie and John
were always together used to feel
pang Of jealousy, often, when Robbie
would come back from some walk with
John, or some row on the river, full of
enthusiastic, boyish demonstrations of his
friendship for him. kept my love for
my brother, and l wanted him to keep
his all for me.


have thought it all over since, and
believe my passionate love was wrong,
because of It's selhShness and intensity.
1t kept me from giving to others that
which they had a right to expect from
me. The blossom in the meadow may
have one bee that it cares for most of all,
and keep its sweets for him; but because
Of that, it does not close its cup to every
other.


do not know how came to find out
that John Earle loved me- l think from
some hint of RobbieS, certainly not from
any words of his own. When ! did find