is not a hero to his lackey is only because he is seen with a lackey's eyes, —the sight of a low, convention-ridden, narrow, uneducated mind, unable to take a broad enough view to see that a man is a hero because he is a man, because he overleaps the level of his life, and is greater than his race, being one of them? If he were of the heroic race, what virtue in being heroic? it is the assertion of his trivial life that makes his speciality evident,—the shadow that throws out the bas-relief. We chatter endlessly about the immense good of Washington's example: I believe its good would be more than doubled, could we be made, nationally, to see him as a human being, living on 'human nature's daily food,' having mortal and natural wants, tastes, and infirmities, but building with and over all, by the help of God and a good will, the noble and lofty edifice of a patriot manhood, a pure life of duty and devotion, sublime for its very strength and simpleness, heroic because manly and human."
The day had waned, and the sunset lit Josephine's excited eyes with fire: she was not beautiful, but now, if ever, beauty visited her with a transient caress. She looked up and met my eyes fixed on her.
"What is it, Sally?—what do I look like?"
"Very pretty, just now, Jo; your eyes are bright and your cheek flushed: the sunshine suits you. I admire you tonight."
"I am glad," said she, naively. "I often wish to be pretty."
"A waste wish, Jo!—and yet I have entertained it myself."
"It's not so much matter for you, Sarah; for people love you. And besides, you have a certain kind of beauty: your eyes are beautiful,—rather too sad, perhaps, but fine in shape and tint; and you have a good head, and a delicately outlined face. Moreover, you are picturesque: people look at you, and then look again,—and, any way, love you, don't they?"
"People are very good to me, Jo."
"Oh, yes! we all know that people as a mass are kindly, considerate, and unselfish; that they are given to loving and admiring disagreeable and ugly people; in short, that the millennium has come. Sally, my dear, you are a small hypocrite,—or else—But I think we won't establish a mutual- admiration society to-night, as there are only two of us; besides, I am hungry: let us have tea."
The next day, Josephine left me. As we walked together toward the landing of the steamer, Letty Allis emerged from a green lane to say good-bye, and down its vista I discerned the handsome, lazy person of Henry Malden, but I did not inform Letty of my discovery.
A year passed away,—to me with the old monotonous routine; full of work, not wanting in solace; barren, indeed, of household enjoyments and vicissitudes; solitary, sometimes desolate, yet peaceful even in monotony. But this new spring had not come with such serene neglect to the other two of us three. Against advice, remonstrance, and entreaty from her good friends, Letty Allis had married Henry Malden, and, in attire more tasteful, but quite as far from Quakerism as Josephine had predicted, beamed upon the inhabitants of Slepington from the bow-window, or open door, of a cottage very ornée indeed; while the odor of a tolerable cigar served as Mr. Malden's exponent, wherever he abode. And to Josephine had come a loss no annual resurrection should repair: her mother was dead; she, too, was orphaned,—for she had never known her father; her only sister was married far away; and I kept an old promise in going to her for a year's stay at least.
Aunt Boyle's property had consisted chiefly in large cotton mills owned by herself and her twin brother,—who, dying before her, left her all his own share in them. These mills were on a noisy little river in the western part of Massachusetts,—in a valley, narrow, but picturesque, and so far above the level of the sea that the air was keen and pure as among mountains. Mrs. Boyle had removed here from Baltimore, a few years before her own death, that she might be with her brother through his long and fatal illness; and, finding her health improved by change of air, had occupied his house ever since, until one of those typhoid fevers that infest such river-gorges at certain seasons of the year entered the village about the mills, when, in visiting the sick, she took the epidemic herself and died. Josephine still retained the house endeared to her by sad and glad recollections; and it was there I found her, when, after renting the whole of my little tenement at Slepington, I betook myself to Valley Mills at her request.
The cottage where she lived was capacious enough for her wants, and though plain, even to an air of superciliousness, without, was most luxurious within,—made to use and live in; for Mr. Brown, her uncle, was an Englishman, and had never arrived at that height of Transatlantic ton which consists in shrouding and darkening all the pleasant rooms in the house, and skulking through life in the basement and attic. Sunshine, cushions, and flowers were Mr. Brown's personal tastes; and plenty of these characterized the cottage. A green terrace between hill and river spread out before the door for lawn and garden, and a tiny conservatory abutted upon the brink of the terrace slope, from a bay-window in the library, that opened sidewise into this winter-garden.
I found Jo more changed than I had expected: this last year of country life had given strength and elasticity to the tall and slender figure; a steady rose of health burned on either cheek; and sorrow had subdued and calmed her quick spirits.
I was at home directly, and a sweeter summer never glowed and blushed over earth than that which installed me in the Nook Cottage. Out of doors the whole country was beautiful, and attainable; within, I had continual resources in my usual work and in Jo's society: for she was one of those persons who never are uninteresting, never fatiguing; a certain salient charm pervaded her conversation, and a simplicity quite original startled you continually in her manner and ways. I liked to watch her about the house; dainty and fastidious in the extreme about some things, utterly careless about others, you never knew where or when either trait would show itself next. She was scrupulous as to the serving of meals, for instance,—almost to a fault; no carelessness, no slight neglect, was admitted here, and always on the spotless damask laid with quaint china stood a tapered vase of white Venice glass, with one, or two, or three blossoms, sometimes a cluster of leaves, the spray of a wild vine, or the tasselled branch of a larch-tree jewelled with rose-red cones, arranged therein with an artist's taste and skill: but perhaps, while she sharply rebuked the maid for a dim spot on her chocolate-pitcher or a grain of sugar spilt on the salver, her white India shawl lay trailed over the divan half upon the floor, and her gloves fluttered on the doorstep till the wind carried them off to find her parasol hanging in the honeysuckle boughs.
But, happily, it is not one's duty to make other people uncomfortable by perpetually tinkering at that trait in them which most offends our own nature; and I thought it more for my good and hers to learn patience myself than undertake to beat her into order; the result of which was peace and good-will that vindicated my wisdom to myself; and I found her, faults and all, sufficiently fascinating and lovable.
A year passed away serenely; and when spring came again, Josephine refused to let me leave her. Our life was quiet enough, but, with such beautiful Nature, and plenty to do, we were not lonely,—less so because Jo's hands were as open as her heart, and to her all the sick and poor looked, not only for help, but for the rarer consolations of living sympathy and counsel. Her shrewd common sense, her practical capacity, her kindly, cheerful face, her power of appreciating a position of want and perplexity and seeing the best way out of it, and, above all, her deep and fervent religious feeling, made her an invaluable friend to just that class who most needed her.
In the course of this spring we gained an addition to our society, in the person of Mr. Waring, the son of the gentleman who had bought the mills at Mrs. Boyle's death, but who had hitherto conducted them by an overseer. He had recently bought a little island in the middle of the river, just below the dam, and proposed erecting a new mill upon it; but as the Tunxis (the Indian name of our river) was liable to rapid and destructive freshets, the mill required a deep and secure foundation and a lower story of stone.
This implied some skilful engineering, and Mr. Arthur Waring, having studied this subject fully abroad, came on from Boston, and took up his abode in Valley
