"She is such a gentle-looking little woman, in trailing widow's weeds; a pink and white complexion, china blue eyes, and masses of flaxen hair elaborately puffed and crimped. She never knows her own mind, for five minutes at a time; is never quite sure on any point, or able to give you a straightforward yes or no. And yet, in some respects, she is the most obstinate person I ever came across. My old donkey, Jeshurun, isn't in it with Mrs. Mallory, when once she puts her dainty foot down, and refuses to budge. Jeshurun waxed fat and kicked, and did everything he shouldn't; but always yielded to the seduction of a carrot. But it is no good waving carrots at Mrs. Mallory. She won't look at them! She reminds me of the deaf adder who stoppeth her ears, lest she should hear the voice of the charmer. And always about such silly little things, that they are not worth a battle.
"But the greatest trial of all is, that she has a morbid conscience.
"Oh, David! Did you ever have to live with a person who had a morbid conscience?
"Now—if it won't bore you—may I just give you an instance of the working of Mrs. Mallory's morbid conscience, and perhaps you will help me, by making a clear pronouncement on the matter. Remember, I only have her here because she is a missionary's widow, left badly off; and not strong enough to undertake school teaching, or any arduous post involving long hours. I have tried to make her feel at home here, and she seems happy. Sometimes she is a really charming companion.
"The first evening she was here, she told me she had always been 'a great Bible student.' She spends much time over a very large Bible, which she marks in various coloured inks, and with extraordinary criss-cross lines, which she calls 'railways'. She explained the system to me one day, and showed me a new 'line' she had just made. You started at the top of a page at the word little. Then you followed down a blue line, which brought you to a second mention of the word little. From there you zigzagged off, still on blue, right across to the opposite page; and there found little, again. This was a junction! If you started down a further blue line you arrived at yet a fourth little, but if you adventured along a red line, you found less.
"I had hoped to learn a lot from Mrs. Mallory, when she said she was a great Bible student, because I am so new at Bible study, and have no one to help me. But I confess these railway excursions from little to little, and from little to less, appear to me somewhat futile! None of the littles had any connection with one another; that is, until Mrs. Mallory's blue railway connected them. She is now making a study of all the Marys of the Bible. She has a system by which she is going to prove that they were all one and the same person. I suggested that this would be an infinite pity; as they all have such beautiful individual characters, and such beautiful individual histories.
"'Truth before beauty, my dear Mrs. Rivers,' said Mrs. Mallory.
"'Cannot truth and beauty go together?' I inquired.
"'No, indeed,' pronounced Mrs. Mallory, firmly. 'Truth is a narrow line; beauty is a snare.'
"According to which method of reasoning, my dear David, I ought to have serious misgivings as to whether your Christmas-eve sermon, which changed my whole outlook on life, was true—seeing that it most certainly was beautiful!