"You don't say so!" I exclaimed.
She looked at me with some surprise, but concluding that I was only making a little of my mild fun at her expense, she laughed.
"Yes. Isn't it a wonderful fact?" she said.
"It is a fact, my dear, that I feel ready to go on my knees and thank God for. I may be wrong, but I take it as a sign that you are beginning to recover a little. But we mustn't make too much of it, lest I should be mistaken," I added, checking myself, for I feared exciting her too much.
But she lay very still; only the tears rose slowly and lay shimmering in her eyes. After about five minutes, during which we were both silent,—
"O papa!" she said, "to think of ever walking out with you again, and feeling the wind on my face! I can hardly believe it possible."
"It is so mild, I think you might have half that pleasure at once," I answered..
And I opened the window, let the spring air gently move her hair for one moment, and then shut it again. Connie breathed deep, and said after a little pause,—
"I had no idea how delightful it was. To think that I have been in the way of breathing that every moment for so many years and never thought about it!"
"It is not always just like that in this climate. But I ought not to have made that remark when I wanted to make this other: that I suspect we shall find some day that the loss of the human paradise consists chiefly in the closing of the human eyes; that at least far more of it than people think remains about us still, only we are so filled with foolish desires and evil cares, that we cannot see or hear, cannot even smell or taste the pleasant things round about us. We have need to pray in regard to the right receiving of the things of the senses even, 'Lord, open thou our hearts to understand thy word;' for each of these things is as certainly a word of God as Jesus is the Word of God. He has made nothing in vain. All is for our teaching. Shall I tell you what such a breath of fresh air makes me think of?"