Mrs. Penton, poor Mrs. Penton was sitting by the fire on a low chair. There was not light enough to work by, and yet there was too much light to ask for the lamp. It was a welcome moment of rest from all the labors that were her heritage. She liked it perhaps all the better that her husband and the older ones, who would talk or make demands upon her to be talked to, were out and she was quite free. To be alone now and then for a moment is sweet to a hard-worked woman who never is alone. Indeed, she was not alone now. Two of the little ones were on the rug by her feet. But they made no demands upon their mother, they played with each other, keeping up a babble of little voices, within reach of her hand to be patted on the head, within reach of her dress to cling to, should a wild beast suddenly appear or an ogre or a naughty giant. Thus, though they said nothing to each other, they were a mutual comfort and support, the mother to the children and the children to the mother. And if we could unveil the subtle chain of thinking from about that tired and silent woman’s heart, the reader would wonder to see the lovely things that were there. But she was scarcely aware that she was thinking, and what she thought was not half definite enough to be put into words. A world of gentle musings, one linked into another, none of them separable from the rest, was about her in the firelight, in the darkness, the quiet and not ungrateful fatigue. She was not thinking at all she would have said. It was as though something revolved silently before her, gleaming out here and there a recollection or realization. The warmth, the dimness, the quiet, lulled her in the midst of all her cares. She had thought of Osy till her head ached. How this dreadful misfortune could be averted; how he could be kept on at Marlborough; until, in the impossibility of finding any expedient, and the weariness of all things, her active thoughts had dropped. They dropped as her hands dropped, as she gave up working, and for that moment of stillness drew her chair to the fire. There was nothing delightful to dwell upon in all that was around and about her. But God, whom in her voiceless way she trusted deeply, delivered the tired mother from her cares for the moment, and fed her with angels’ food as she sat without anything to say for herself, content by the fire.