And then the Bishop still stood by her looking down on her with a tender smile, and talked of how once our Lord had called a child to Him, and how he was sure His call had come to her to-day, a call to which she was very ready to listen, and he believed she would follow Him to her life's end.
"Yes, I'll try," said Jessie, smiling through her tears.
There was quite a long pause at the end of the service, when the tiny congregation remained kneeling, praying for the child who had so earnestly renewed her baptismal promises.
"Don't carry me back home yet. I want to see the Bishop, and to thank him for coming," whispered Jessie, and the Bishop, bag in hand, came down the church and took her hand in his.
"Mr. Bishop, if I live to be quite an old woman, I won't forget your coming here to-day," she said.
"It's been a happy day for us both, Jessie," was the kind answer. "God have you in His keeping now and evermore," and with that final blessing the Bishop hurried off to his train. After putting him into the cart, Tom and her father returned to carry Jessie back.
"Yes, I'm ready to go now," she said. "I'm very tired, but it has been the happiest day of my life, the grandest, happiest day!"
"And when I'm big I'll be confirmed like Jessie," thought Jack, as he sped home, "but I hope I'll stand on my feet, not lie on a bed as she did."
"It was the loveliest confirmation I have ever been at," said Tom to his sister that night. "I wish you had come to it, Clarissa."
"I was too shy," his sister answered.