Mammy protested against this idolatry; but Drusilla answered her:
“It is not idolatry, nurse; because I do not place the gift before the Giver. There is not an instant in my life that I am not conscious of fervent gratitude to the Lord for giving me this child, a gift forever and ever; a gift for time and eternity; oh, nurse, a gift, of which nothing on earth or in Heaven can deprive me!”
“Don’t say that, ma’am; the Lord might take the child,” said mammy, solemnly.
“I know that, nurse. The Lord might take him to Heaven, to save him from the evil in this world; but he would be safe there, for the Lord would take care of him for me, and give him back to me when I myself should reach the Blessed Land,” she answered, reverently.
And mammy had nothing more to say.
How closely the young mother watched the tiny growth of her child, and the faint development of his intelligence. She could see progress where no one else could perceive the slightest sign of it. She discovered that “he” “took notice,” long before any one could be brought to acknowledge that such a prodigy was possible. Her delight when her boy first smiled in his sleep, or when she fancied he did, was something almost ludicrous. She was kneeling by his cradle, watching his slumbers as usual, when she suddenly cried out, though in a hushed voice:
“Oh, Anna! Cousin Anna! look! look! he is laughing, he is indeed! See how he is laughing!”
Miss Lyon came and bent over the cradle. So did mammy, who drew back again, saying:
“Lor! why that ain’t no laugh, ma’am; that’s wind—leastways, it is a grimace caused by wind on the stomach, and I must give him some catnip when he wakes.”
Now, if Drusilla’s sweet face had been capable of expressing withering contempt mammy would have been shrivelled up to a mummy: but as it was she could only appeal from the nurse to Miss Lyon.