"Poor boy!" she said. "I don't wonder at it; he was more than generous
to us all."

But Joe, afraid that the resolutions he had labored on with so much
diligence would be forgotten, spoke of them again to Ralph.

"Oh, yes," said Ralph, with a wan smile, "oh, yes! here's the
res'lutions. That's the way the breaker boys feel--the way it says in
this paper; an' we want Mrs. Burnham to know."

"I'll take it to her," said the woman, receiving from Ralph's hands
the awkwardly folded and now sadly soiled paper. "You will wait here a
moment, please."

She passed up the broad staircase, by the richly colored window at the
landing, and was lost to sight; while the two boys, sitting in the
spacious hall, gazed, with wondering eyes, upon the beauty which
surrounded them.

The widow of Robert Burnham sat in the morning-room of her desolated
home, talking calmly with her friends.

After the first shock incident upon her husband's death had passed
away, she had made no outcry, she grew quiet and self-possessed, she
was ready for any consultation, gave all necessary orders, spoke
of her dead husband's goodness to her with a smile on her face, and
looked calmly forth into the future. The shock of that terrible
message from the mines, two days ago, had paralyzed her emotional
nature, and left her white-faced and tearless.