I will come in next week and see what can be done.
Yours truly,
L. M. A.
To Mrs. Bond.
Sunday, Oct. 16, [1887].
Dear Auntie,–As you and I belong to the "Shut-in Society," we may now and then cheer each other by a line. Your note and verse are very good to me to-day, as I sit trying to feel all right in spite of the stiffness that won't walk, the rebel stomach that won't work, and the tired head that won't rest.
My verse lately has been from the little poem found under a good soldier's pillow in the hospital.
I am no longer eager, bold, and strong,–
All that is past;
I am ready not to do
At last–at last.
My half-day's work is done,
And this is all my part.
I give a patient God
My patient heart.
The learning not to do is so hard after being the hub to the family wheel so long. But it is good for the energetic ones to find that the world can get on without them, and to learn to be still, to give up, and wait cheerfully.
As we have "fell into poetry," as Silas Wegg says, I add a bit of my own; for since you are Marmee now, I feel that you won't laugh at my poor attempts any more than she did, even when I burst forth at the ripe age of eight.