Alice's eyes gleamed with radiant delight.
She had been thinking for some time that she must let her husband into her secret. It had begun to wear upon her. And now the time had come as by providential interposition.
She got up and went away to her cabinet, and when she came back she brought a little book in her hand.
"Albert!" said she, "lets you and I buy the cottage."
Albert looked at her in amazement; and directly it flashed upon him that there was too much solemnity in her look and tone for badinage. Something that he had noticed during the past few months came back to him, and he trembled with the weight of suspense that fell upon him.
Alice then showed her book—that she had more than eight hundred dollars in the bank. The ice was broken—she told her story in glowing words. She told how she had saved up little by little, and how she had at length found herself able to purchase a fifty-dollar bond. And then she told how her uncle in the banking-house had taken charge of her investment; and how, under his management, the interest had accrued in amazing volume.
But the grand result was not the chief thing. The chief thing was the beginning—was the very little which had been religiously saved until the second little could be added to it.
And now, as a result of his wife's careful and tireless working, Albert found something upon which his ambition could take a fair start. He never could himself, from so small a commencement, have reared the pile; but with the structure started, and its proportions all blocked out, he could help on the work. He could see how it was done—and not only that, but the demonstration was before him that the thing could be done.
One year has elapsed since Albert Moore received the lesson from his wife, and joining hands with her, and bending his energies in the same direction, he has accomplished during the twelve months what would have seemed to him a marvel in the earlier time. He has laid by more than fifty cents a day; and the cigars, and the beer, and the other condiments of life which he has surrendered to the work, are not missed—rather, he holds they are so many enemies conquered. And Albert can improve his home with cheerful heart, and he can set out new trees and vines in his garden with bright promises, because he sees, day by day, the pretty cottage growing more and more his own. The end approaches a little at a time—little by little it approaches, but surely, nevertheless; and there is a great and satisfying joy even in the labor and in the anticipation.
| O deem not they are blest alone Whose lives a peaceful tenor keep; For God, who pities man, hath shown A blessing for the eyes that weep. The light of smiles shall fill again The lids that overflow with tears, And weary hours of woe and pain Are promises of happier years. For God has marked each sorrowing day, And numbered every secret tear, And heaven's long age of bliss shall pay For all his children suffer here. |
| —William Cullen Bryant. |