Miss McDonald

by Mary Jane Holmes

In her sorrow and loneliness Daisy was fast sinking into an unhealthy, morbid state of mind from which nothing seemed to arouse her.

"Nothing to live for—nothing to do," was her lament until one golden September day, when there came a turning point in her life, and she found there was something to do.

There was no regular service that Sunday in the church where she usually attended, and as the day was fine and she was far too restless to remain at home, she proposed to her mother that they walk to a little chapel about a mile away, where a young Presbyterian clergyman was to preach.

She had heard much of his eloquence, and as his name was McDonald, he might possibly be some distant relative. Inasmuch as her father was of Scotch descent she felt a double interest in him, and with her mother was among the first who entered the little, humble building and took a seat upon one of the hard, uncomfortable benches near the pulpit.

The speaker was young—about Tom's age—and with a look on his florid face and a sound in his voice so like that of the dead man that Daisy half started to her feet when he first took his stand in front of her and announced the opening hymn. His text was: "Why stand ye here all the day idle?" and so well did he handle it, and so forcible were his gestures and eloquent his style of delivery, that Daisy listened to him spellbound, her eyes fixed intently upon his glowing face and her ears drinking in every word he uttered.

After dwelling for a time upon the loiterers in God's vineyard, the idlers from choice, who worked not for lack of an inclination to do so, he spoke next of the class whose whole life was a weariness for want of something to do, and to these he said: "Have you never read how, when the disciples rebuked the grateful woman for wasting upon her Master's head what might have been sold for three hundred pence and given to the poor, Jesus said unto them, 'The poor ye have with you always,' and is it not so, my hearers? Are there no poor at your door to be fed, no hungry little ones to be cared for out of the abundance which God has only loaned you for this purpose? Are there no wretched homes which you can make happier, no aching hearts which a kind word would cheer? Remember there is a blessing pronounced for even the cup of cold water, and how much greater shall be the reward of those who, forgetting themselves, seek the good of others and turn not away from the needy and the desolate. See to it, then, you to whom God has given much. See to it that you sit not down in idle ease, wasting upon yourself alone the goods designed for others, for to whom much is given of him much shall be required."

Attracted, perhaps, by the deep black of Daisy's attire, or the something about her which marked her as different from the mass of his hearers, the speaker had seemed to address the last of his remarks directly to her, and had the dead Tom risen from his grave and spoken with her face to face, she could hardly have been more affected than she was. The resemblance was so striking and the voice so like her cousin's that she felt as if she had received a message direct from him; or, if not from him, she surely had from God, whose almoner she henceforth would be.

That day was the beginning of a new life to her. Thenceforth there must be no more repining; no more idle, listless days, no more wishing for something to do. There was work all around her, and she found it and did it with a will—first, from a sense of duty, and at last for the real pleasure it afforded her to carry joy and gladness to the homes where want and sorrow had sat so long.

Hearing that there were sickness and destitution among the miners in Peru, where her possessions were, she went early in November, and many a wretched heart rejoiced because of her, and many a lip blessed the beautiful lady whose coming among them was productive of so much good. Better dwellings, better wages, a church, a schoolhouse followed in her footsteps, and then, when everything there seemed in good working order, there came over her a longing for her native country, and the next autumn found her in New York, where in a short space of time everybody knew of the beautiful Miss McDonald, who was a millionaire and who owned the fine house and grounds in the upper part of the city not far from the Park.

Here society claimed her again, and Daisy, who had no morbid fancies now, yielded in part to its claims and became, if not a belle, a favorite, whose praises were in every mouth. But chiefly was she known and loved by the poor and the despised whom she daily visited, and to whom her presence was like the presence of an angel.