A new graft on the family tree

by Pansy

"Mr. Butler's talk to the children was really good, wasn't it?" Carey Martyn said to her; and she had answered heartily—

"Yes, it was; when he talks without having it put on paper, it sounds as though he meant it. I wonder why it makes such a difference to read things off?"

And the minister, just at their elbow, intending to join them for a little talk, turned away with heightened colour, and went home to ponder the question. Perhaps that had somewhat to do with the fact that two Sundays thereafter he talked to the people who gathered in the dreary little church. I do not know that they discussed the sermon much during the week, but I know that one and another said to himself: "I must try to get to prayer-meeting on Wednesday evening; I declare it is a shame to have so small an attendance. We ought to go, if for nothing else than to sustain the minister; he seems really in earnest." Yet he had not preached about the prayer-meeting. Still its evident growth the next Wednesday evening encouraged his heart, and had to do with certain earnest thoughts that he worked up in his next morning's sermon, which was simply "talked" again, not read. Perhaps he would have been discouraged had he known that this wise people, not used to the work of making sermons, did not call these efforts of his, over which he had toiled as he never had over written work, sermons at all. They imagined him to have been belated in his preparations, and simply to have opened his mouth and let the words flow out.

"We haven't had a sermon for two weeks now," said one wise head to another.

And surely the minister who had sat late nearly every night, thinking out and trying to get accustomed to what he meant to try and say, would have been discouraged had he heard it; especially if he had not heard the answer—

"No; but the fact is, I like these talks better than the real sermons. I get better hold of them; and they seem, somehow, to do me more good. I don't care how many times he leaves out the sermon, I'm sure!"

Now this was one of the most thoughtful minds belonging to the little company which gathered once a week in the old church. On the whole, might not the minister have felt somewhat encouraged had he known it all?

But I commenced this chapter with the special intention of telling you about little Nellie Morgan. She has been kept very much in the background of the story; and she was a quiet, old-fashioned sort of a child, who kept herself much out of hearing, at least, though she listened well.

On this particular autumn afternoon of which I write the world was in gloom. The glory which had had possession of the country for the few weeks past seemed to have departed in a night, leaving in its place clouds and wind, and dull, withered leaves flying about, and presently a chill, depressing rain. The Morgan household felt the depression. Mrs. Morgan, senior, knew, when first she opened her eyes on the dreariness, that it was one of her black days—John's birthday. She was sorry that she thought of it; she struggled all day with the memories of the past. She saw John's curly head nestled in her arms; she saw him trotting, a beautiful two-year-old bit of mischief, always at her side; she saw his little shoes—though they were laid away in the bottom of her old trunk in the attic, yet they seemed to stare at her all day, haunting her with the dreams that she had had and that had faded. Every hour in the day her heart grew heavier, and her outward demeanour grew harder. Why could not those about her have realized that she bitterly suffered? Whether the knowledge had helped her or not, it would have made the day easier to them.

Nellie, soon after the early dinner, took refuge in her new sister's room; and drawing the small rocker close to the cheery fire, turned over, for the hundredth time, a volume brightened with many pictures, and maintained silence, leaving Louise to the sadness of her thoughts. They were sad; the atmosphere of the house was growing at times almost too much for her. She did not seem to be gaining on her mother-in-law. Yet she felt that, on Dorothy's account, she would not be elsewhere. Presently Nellie's soft voice broke the silence.