"The sad vicissitudes of things."
—Sterne.
"My poor, dear friend, would that I could comfort you!" Mrs. Keith said in tones of deep heartfelt sympathy, folding her arms about Mrs. Chetwood and weeping with her; "but only Jesus can do that in such sorrow as yours."
"And He does, else I should die; for oh my arms are so empty, my heart and home so desolate!" sobbed the bereaved mother.
"I know it, I know it by sad experience; for I too, have wept over the grave of a darling little one."
"You?" Mrs. Chetwood said with a look of surprise; "you have so many."
"Yes; but then I had not all I have now. Eva was between Rupert and Zillah and would be thirteen now. She was five when God took her to himself."
"Ah, you do know how to feel for me!"
"Yes; and let me tell you how I was comforted. I fear I was not quite submissive at first; but a dear old mother in Israel, who had several times passed through the same deep waters, came to me and said 'My dear, the Lord gave you quite a little flock and when He comes and asks you to return him one, and you know He will keep it so safely in his kind arms and on his tender bosom, will you refuse? can you not spare Him one?'
"Then my heart was almost broken to think I had been so churlish toward my beloved Master and I resigned her cheerfully into His care, and by and by grew happy in thinking of her, so safe from all sin and sorrow and pain, so full of joy, at His right hand; and of the time when my work shall be done and I shall go to her."