CHAPTER VIII.
FINDING ONE’S CALLING.
DURING the days which preceded that social gathering, Ruth found her mind often busy with the wonders of the verse which had been quoted at prayer-meeting. She recognized it as from the chapter which she had read in the morning, and she re-read it, filled with a new sense of its meaning. She sought after and earnestly desired to realize peace with God. How wonderful would it be to be able to say, “And not only so, but we glory in tribulation!” Poor Ruth believed that she understood the meaning of that word, “tribulation.” Would it be possible for her ever to “glory” in it? As she read those verses and thought about them, she seemed to hear again the peculiar ring of triumph that there was in Susan’s voice, as she repeated the words, “She feels it.” Ruth said to herself, “I believe she knows more about these things than I do; I wonder how she came to get the thought in the first place? I read the verse and didn’t take it in. Perhaps she has taken in other things, about which I know nothing, and which would help me?”
Thinking these thoughts, dwelling on them, they culminated in a sudden resolution, which led her to tap at the door of Susan’s room. She was cordially invited to enter. Susan was engaged in dusting the row of books, in dull and somewhat shabby binding, that ornamented the pretty table under the gaslight.
“Have a seat,” she said; “I can’t think how the dust gets at my books so often; I put them in order this morning. They are my good old friends, and I like to take special care of them, but they are fading.”
She fingered the bindings with loving hands, and Ruth, curious to see what they were, drew near enough to read some of the titles, “Cruden’s Concordance,” “A Bible Text-Book,” “Barnes Notes on the Gospels,” and “Bushnell’s Moral Uses of Dark Things.” The others were old and, some of them, obsolete school text-books.
“I haven’t many,” Susan said, in a tender tone, “but they are very useful. They have been my best friends for so long that I think I should be a real mourner over the loss of one of them.”