as she turned from the breakfast-table, walked to the window and looked out upon the gardens and fields where everything was dripping with wet, "will the storm never end? No hope of visitors to-day, or of setting out to see anybody. I shall be literally eaten up with ennui."
"Here's Mildred," remarked Mr. Dinsmore, "I have always found her good company."
"Humph! she has no time to waste upon me."
"I am quite at your service, Aunt," said our heroine pleasantly.
"Indeed! what's to become of your all-important studies?"
"They have already had two hours devoted to them this morning, besides two last night; so I think I have fairly earned the pleasure of your society for so much of the day as you care to have mine," returned the girl, in a sprightly tone.
Mrs. Dinsmore looked languidly surprised and pleased.
"You are an odd girl to rise so early when you might just as well indulge in a morning nap," she said.
"I don't find it difficult if I have gotten to bed in good season the night before," said Mildred gayly, "I have been trained to it from childhood; my father being a firm believer in the old adage,
"Early to bed and early to rise,
Makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise,"
and it is really very pleasant after one is fairly up and dressed."
"Yes; and I dare say we would all be the better for it if we would follow your example," said Mr. Dinsmore.
"You are altogether mistaken as far as I am concerned," remarked his wife pettishly, "my best sleep is in the morning."
"I suppose people differ about that as well as in the amount of sleep they require," observed Mildred, "some needing eight hours, while others can do quite as well with only four."
"Yes," admitted her uncle, "constitutions differ, and I have no idea of asking my wife to give up her morning nap. There is a possibility of carrying the thing to an extreme. Remember that, Miss Milly," he added, playfully, "and don't let that sensitive conscience of yours force you up at unchristian hours."
"And how am I to decide what are such, sir?" she asked, laughing.
Mildred laid herself out that day for her aunt's entertainment, and with a success that restored her almost entirely to favor; at least, for the time being.
The following day there was a slight abatement in the storm, and some gentlemen called.
One, a young man who had been her escort on several occasions, and whom Mildred liked very much as a friend, inquired particularly for her.
He had come with an invitation to a public ball to be given a week later by a military club of which he was a member, and to ask that he might be her escort thither.
Mildred declined with thanks.
He seemed much disappointed, and pressed for her reasons.
"I have several, Mr. Landreth," she said, coloring slightly, but meeting his eye unflinchingly; "I find that late hours injure my health; that is one; another is that I have been brought up to consider it wrong to attend balls."
"Why more so than going to the theatre?" he asked.
"I do not know that it is."
"Excuse me, but you go there."
"It is true; I have been several times, but that was very wrong in me, and I do not intend to go again," Mildred said, humbly, yet firmly, though the color deepened on her cheek and her voice trembled slightly.
The words had cost her no small effort, but she was glad when they were spoken; it seemed to lift a load from her heart and conscience.
Mr. Landreth looked full of regret and surprise.
"I am sorry," he said, "will it be taking too great a liberty to ask why you think it wrong?"
It seemed a difficult and trying thing to undertake. Mildred hesitated a moment, her eyes cast down, her cheeks burning; but remembering the words of the Master, "Whosoever, therefore, shall confess me before men, him will I confess also before my father which is in heaven. But whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my father which is in heaven," she answered.
"Because I profess to be a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ, and as such, to take his word as my rule of faith and practice. That word bids us 'whether, therefore, ye eat or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God,' and I find it impossible to obey that command in attending such places of worldly amusement.'"
"You are very young to give up all pleasure," he said, with an involuntary sigh, "one ought to have some happiness, some enjoyment in youth. I should say it would be quite time enough to resign all these things when we arrive at middle age."
"Ah, you quite mistake me, Mr. Landreth," she answered, looking up brightly, "I only resign a few miserable unsatisfying pleasures for those that are infinitely higher and more enduring."
He gazed at her incredulously.
"Religion has always seemed to me a very gloomy thing," he said, "very good and valuable on a deathbed, no doubt, but—I should rather do without it till then, I must confess."
"I would not," she answered earnestly, "I want it to sweeten my life all the way through. Mr. Landreth, believe me, it does do that as nothing else can. I have found it so in my own limited experience, and I know that my parents have in theirs, which has extended over so many more years.
"I have seen them wonderfully sustained by it under sore trials, and have noticed that in times of happiness and prosperity it more than doubled their joy and gladness. 'Godliness with contentment is great gain!'"
"Well, Miss Keith," he said, after a moment's pause, "I think you deserve that it should be gain to you in some way, since you sacrifice so much for its sake."
"Ah, you are determined to consider it a sacrifice, I see," she returned smiling. "And I deserve that you should," she added sorrowfully.
"Excuse me," he said, "I do not doubt your sincerity, but the Christians with whom I am most intimately acquainted, seem to me anything but happy; if I may judge from their countenances and the gloomy austerity of their lives."
"Ah, if I could only show you my mother!" exclaimed Mildred, "if you could know her as I do, you would tell a different story."
Mildred afterward repeated this last remark of Mr. Landreth's to her aunt.
"Yes," said Mrs. Dinsmore with an expressive shrug of the shoulders, "I know all about that, and you will understand it too, when you have seen his aunt—or rather his uncle's wife—Mrs. James Landreth, and her house. By the way, we must call there; she called on me one day not long since, when we were out."
"What is she like?" asked Mildred.
"Don't ask; wait till you see her; no description could do her justice. At least none that I could give," Mrs. Dinsmore answered, a little impatiently.
Mildred's curiosity was excited and she was eager to make the
