terrible to me; and yet I do not know that I was so very much
happier then than I am now, though I confess I ought to have been. I
had full and plenty of every thing brought into the house by my
husband, and had only to dispense in my family the blessings of God
sent to us. But I let things annoy me then more than they do now."

"But how can you help being worried, Mrs. Partridge? To be away from
my children as you have been away from yours all day would set me
wild. I would be sure some of them would be killed or dreadfully
hurt."

"Children are wonderfully protected," said Mrs. Partridge, in a
confident voice.

"So they are. But to think of four little children, the youngest
eleven months and the oldest not ten years old, left all alone, for
a whole day!"

"It is bad when we think about it, I know," returned Mrs. Partridge.
"It looks very bad! But I try and put that view of it out of my
mind. When I leave them in the morning they say they will be good
children. At dinner time I sometimes find them all fast asleep or
playing about. I never find them crying, or at all unhappy. Jane
loves the younger ones, and keeps them pleased all the time. In the
evening, when I get back from my work, there is generally no one
awake but Jane. She has given them the bread and milk I left for
their suppers, and undressed and put them to bed."

"Dear little girl! What a treasure she must be!" I could not help
saying.