"Yes, my child, I will," Mrs. Travilla responded with feeling, "we will unite our prayers, and he will know whom we mean, though I am ignorant of it; He whose precious promise is, 'If two of you shall agree on earth as touching anything that they shall ask it shall be done of them of my Father which is in heaven.'"
"It is a precious promise," Mildred said, tears springing to her eyes. "And there are others—O, Mrs. Travilla, can you not guess whom? that I want to plead it for. Some that I love, who are very kind to me, but seem to care nothing at all about this Friend, and to have no thought or concern for anything beyond this life."
"Yes, I know," Mrs. Travilla said, pressing the girl's hand tenderly in hers, "and you may well believe that I have not known them all these years without often asking my dear Lord to reveal himself to them in all his loveliness; and now I am very, very glad to have a helper in this."
They sat silent then for some minutes, when the adornments of the room attracting Mildred's eye, reminded her of a question she had been longing to ask.
Beginning with an account of her visit to Mrs. Landreth and the talk between them, in which Mrs. Travilla seemed interested, she went on to say, with a smiling glance around the tasteful apartment, "I feel sure that you do not think as she does, and that she is not right in her views or practice either; and yet I confess I am at a loss to know how to refute her arguments. So I have wanted to ask an explanation of your views. Do you think Mrs. Landreth a really good Christian woman?"
"Yes, my dear, I do," Mrs. Travilla said "She is beyond question very self-denying and benevolent; but I think she forgets that we are to 'adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour in all things;' and so fails to recommend it as she might to others; particularly her husband and his nephew.
"I quite agree with your mother that it is a wife's duty to study the comfort and happiness of her husband in everything that she can without violating the plain commands of God.
"Mrs. Landreth and I take different views on the question of the best way to help the poor. She gives money, I let them earn it, paying them liberally for their work; this plan encourages industry and honest pride of independence; while the other teaches them to be willing to be idle pensioners on the bounty of their richer neighbors.
"Mine certainly seems the more self-indulgent way," she added with a smile, "for my house is thus filled with pretty things while Mrs. Landreth's is left very bare of ornament; and yet I think it is the better plan."
"I am sure it is," Mildred responded with an energy and positiveness that brought a musical laugh from the lips of her friend.