From India’s coral strand,”
and were dismissed for a little recreation in the grove, where there was a swing, and cool shade, and grassy turf. Just before sunset the children were called together, and again in regular order walked homeward, with faces glowing with enjoyment, and minds and hearts filled with happy thoughts and memories.
Wednesday morning Norman went with his mother to the lake, just after breakfast. The waves were gently kissing the shore, and hours passed swiftly away as they listened to the soothing sound and gathered curious pebbles. They found some small fossils, with the remains of shells and animals in them, and Norman was greatly delighted with one that his mother picked up, that looked as if it had on it a single pearl set in gold. They felt sorry to leave the pleasant beach; but the morning had already gone, and it was time to go to Mr. Henry’s to dinner. On their return they found a kind invitation from Mrs. Harris to take tea at the Institute. There were about forty students at the tea-table, and after tea they had prayers. Instead of the reading of the Scripture, verses were repeated, thus enabling all who wished to participate in the devotional exercises; and noble and comforting promises, and precious truths, were uttered in varying tones. That company of young men were girding on their armor, that they might fight as good soldiers under the Captain of their salvation. They were preparing themselves for their life-work; some of them to sow the “precious seed” over the broad prairies of Illinois, by the rocky bluffs and wood-crowned hills of Wisconsin, and the blue waters of Minnesota; while others were looking to the lands of the East—to Bulgaria, and India, and China. It was pleasant to exchange a few brief words with these young men who, by the eye of faith, could see more abundant harvests than those which reward the Western husbandmen. They had asked the Lord of the harvest to send them as reapers into these fields of promise, looking forward to that blessed time when they shall “return with joy bringing their sheaves with them.”
Mrs. Lester afterward looked upon the portrait of the Christian woman to whose liberality this institution owes its existence. That portrait ought to hang on its walls. There is a queenly look about the fine figure, and the way the head is set on the shoulders, and blended goodness and intelligence in the countenance. In the evening of the same day Mrs. Lester was in the room where Mrs. Garrett died, and she thought of the blissful visions that may have floated about that dying pillow glimpses of refreshing and perennial streams to make the wilderness rejoice and blossom as the rose. Her life was not spent in vain on the earth. Regular and consistent in her daily walks of duty and piety, she has, by the judicious bestowment of ample means, prolonged her usefulness on the earth, linked herself to holy activities through coming time, and set in motion trains of influence, the mighty results of which may only be known in the morning of the resurrection. She made to herself friends of the mammon of unrighteousness, that when she failed they might receive her into everlasting habitations.
CHAPTER IV.
THE QUEEN CITY OF THE LAKE.
“I saw the domes before me rise,
The lake behind me swell;
I thought upon the bygone days,
When nature wore a different phase,
And man a different skin;