A lonely brother, many thousands of miles away, writing, on paper
blotted with tears, that her words had too soon come true, and that
all the treasures in the world would be cheaply bartered for a
sight of her dear face? At length this brother coming nearer home,
with hope of seeing her, and being delayed by illness; and then a
letter, in a strange hand, saying 'he died in hospital, of fever,
such a day, and died in penitence and love of you: his last word
being your name'? Did Louisa see these things? Such things were
to be.
Herself again a wife - a mother - lovingly watchful of her
children, ever careful that they should have a childhood of the
mind no less than a childhood of the body, as knowing it to be even
a more beautiful thing, and a possession, any hoarded scrap of
which, is a blessing and happiness to the wisest? Did Louisa see
this? Such a thing was never to be.
But, happy Sissy's happy children loving her; all children loving
her; she, grown learned in childish lore; thinking no innocent and
pretty fancy ever to be despised; trying hard to know her humbler
fellow-creatures, and to beautify their lives of machinery and
reality with those imaginative graces and delights, without which
the heart of infancy will wither up, the sturdiest physical manhood
will be morally stark death, and the plainest national prosperity
figures can show, will be the Writing on the Wall, - she holding
this course as part of no fantastic vow, or bond, or brotherhood,
or sisterhood, or pledge, or covenant, or fancy dress, or fancy
fair; but simply as a duty to be done, - did Louisa see these
things of herself? These things were to be.
Dear reader! It rests with you and me, whether, in our two fields
of action, similar things shall be or not. Let them be! We shall
sit with lighter bosoms on the hearth, to see the ashes of our
fires turn gray and cold.
The End.
