“‘Thank God!’ said the cobbler.
“‘And father, don’t you think it’s a little blessing to live near the sea? and to have the beautiful beach to walk upon, and see the waves come tumbling in, and smell the fresh wind? We used to go so often, and maybe by and by we shall again. Don’t you think it is a great deal pleasanter than it would be if Beachhead was away off in the country, out of sight of the water?’
“‘Ah, Sue,’ said her father,—‘I don’t know;—I’ve lived a good piece of my life in one of those in-shore places, and I didn’t want to hear the sea roar then-a-days, and I could get along without the smell of salt water. No,—you don’t know what you are talking about exactly; every sort of place that the Lord has made has its own prettiness and pleasantness; and so the sea has; but I love the green pasture-fields as well as I do the green field of water, to this day.’
“‘But one might be in a place where there wasn’t the sea nor the pasture-fields either, father.’
“‘So one might,’ said the cobbler. ‘Yes, there are plenty such places. The sea is a blessing. I was thinking of my old home in Connecticut; but the world isn’t all green hills and sea-shore,—there’s something else in it—something else. Yes, dear, I love those big waves, too.’
“‘And then, father,’ said Sue, laying her hand on his breast, ‘we come back to the best things,—that you were beginning with.’
“‘Ay,’ said the cobbler, clasping his arm round her; and for a little space they sat silent and looked into the fire,—and then he went on.
“‘Poor as we sit here, and weak and dying as we know we are, we know that we have a tabernacle on high,—a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. It won’t matter much, Sue, when we get there—’
“What would not matter the cobbler did not say; there was something came in his throat that stopped him.