"'Marianne Morris, aged seventy-three.' I dare say she had plenty to bear, off and on, in her life, and I dare say it doesn't seem very much to her now where she is gone. And 'Susan Willis, aged ninety'; she had long enough of it. But it's all over with them. You can't give them a helping hand in the land where they are now. It's to be hoped they don't need it.
"If all those nice texts are not put out of politeness, Old Maxham has had a lot of uncommonly good people. And here's a nice little grave, just like that of yours. 'Posie, aged three.' Little dear, she had no long fight. But there are thousands of children, like Posie and your little niece, who are in the battle still, and in danger of going down under water, just for want of a helping hand to keep them up. Thousands of little ones who want looking after. Little ones that our dear Lord would like you to help take care of for Him. Don't you see?"
Mildred's eyes were wet with soft tears. "Are there—here?" she asked. "Not in Old Maxham."
"Not thousands in Maxham, not even hundreds, I suppose. It isn't a big place. But I'm certain there must be some. Old Maxham isn't Heaven, by any manner of means."
"I don't know the people, and they don't know me."
"That's easily cured."
"And I don't belong to them, or they to me."
"You've told me that three times in these few minutes, do you know? And I think you are wrong, if you'll forgive such plain speaking. Lots of people belong to you, and you can't get out of it. 'All children of one Father.' Doesn't that make us all brothers and sisters? You know the lines—
"'No distance breaks the tie of blood,
Brothers are brothers evermore.'
"If I were you, I would begin to look upon other folks as brothers and sisters, and to treat them so. Never you mind if some of them are cantankerous. Perhaps they have had a good deal to make them cantankerous. Anyway, it doesn't un-brother or un-sister them. It only makes them a trouble and worry instead of a pleasure, and we all have troubles and worries of some sort to bear. You can do them good just the same, even if you can't exactly enjoy being with them. He who died for you died for them too, and He is their Brother just as He is yours. That makes a very close tie, eh?"