"Not so, dear mistress. The babe drinks in good or evil with its first food. Evil is an almost certain heritage, and passes from generation to generation, despite of pains and care. I would have you be even more particular as to what the parents have been than what the child is now, if you think of taking one."
"But dear, dear! It will be like the rearing of a cuckoo in a hedge-sparrow's nest. I cannot make up my mind to it, though I dare not advise you against trying, for Miss Margery's sake. You know the old rhyme—"
"The bird can have no peace or rest
That rears a cuckoo in his nest;
The cuckoo lodger makes a rout,
And flings the sparrow's fledglings out.
The cuckoo thrives and soon can fly,
The sparrow's younglings fall and die."
Mrs. Austin could hardly refrain from smiling as Barbara quoted the village rhyme that had been familiar to them both as children, and which was equally so to Newthorpe youngsters still.
"I have not found my young cuckoo yet, Barbara," she said. "If I do succeed, you will be good to the child, for Margery's sake and mine."
"I will do my best for any child, mistress dear, and in any place. First of all, because, be it gentle or simple, the same great Creator breathed into it the breath of life, that gave me 'life and breath and all things.' An immortal soul is God's trust to those who have to train it, or help in nursing it for Him. Next, a child's helplessness, its pretty ways, even if they be contradictious and wayward at times, speak to me with such a strong pleading voice that I can never close my ears against it. So here are two reasons for promising. Beside, if I had only my darling Miss Margery and you, dear mistress, to think about, should I not do my best for the child who was to be as my nursling's sister and friend? My earnest prayer is that God will guide your choice."
"Amen!" responded Mrs. Austin. "As yet, I know not where to look, or whom to ask."
She stayed a little longer, talking with Barbara about other matters, and then left the nursery.
On the following morning a great surprise awaited her, which seemed, indeed, little short of a miracle.
The letters reached Monks Lea early, and were always carried to Mrs. Austin's room by Barbara, as the lady herself did not often rise until after breakfast. She could not have told why she selected one letter in an unfamiliar hand to be read first of all, unless it was, that judging it to be like some others of a business character, she chose to glance over them and then linger over those from friends and kinsfolk.