"There's no use o' bein' gay when everything all right, daughter; that's like turnin' on the light when it's twelve o'clock noon. But when things is breakin' up on you, then's your time to cut up dog a little. I'm a terrible believer in sunshine, Madeline—the home-made kind, in particular. I always tell the croakers that every man should have a sunshine plant inside of him—when the outside kind gives out, why, let him start his little mill inside, an' then he's independent as a pig on ice. An' really, it's kind o' natural—there's nothin' so refreshin' as difficulties, in a certain sense. Leastways, that's the kind of an animal I am—when I'm on the turf, give me a hurdle now an' again to make it interestin'."
"Is this a pretty stiff business hurdle you've got to get over now?" asked Madeline, as she smiled admiringly at the home-bred philosophy.
"Well, it's stiff enough. Of course, I've done pretty good in the foundry—ain't in it for my health. But it's terrible uncertain; you know the Scriptur' says the first shall be last—an' it's often that way in business. We're really not makin' hardly any money these days; of course, if you tell the men that, they—they close one eye," said David, illustrating the process as he spoke. "Where are you off to, Madeline?" he asked abruptly, for his daughter had passed into the hall and was putting on her cloak.
"I'm going for my lesson—I'm taking wood-carving, you know. Pretty soon I'll be able to do it myself; and then I'm going to make lots of pretty things and sell them. My class and I are going to support four India famine children," she said proudly.
"Bully for you! You'll do the carvin', an' they'll do the eatin'—I suppose that's the idea."
Madeline's merry laughter was still pealing as she closed the door behind her. Mrs. Borland turned a rather fretful face to her husband.
"She's taken a class in Sunday-school," she said, lifting her eyebrows to convey some idea of her opinion on the subject. "I did my best to dissuade her, but it was no use."
"What in thunder did you want to prevent her for?" asked David.
"Oh, well, you understand. They're a very ordinary lot, I'm afraid—just the kind of children I've always tried to keep her away from. I never heard one of their names before."
"I think she's a reg'lar brick to tackle them," returned her husband. "It does me good to see Madeline takin' that turn—nearly all the girls her age is jest about as much use as a sofa-tidy, with their teas an' five-o'clocks an' at-homes, an' all them other diseases," David continued scornfully. "It's all right to have girls learned——"