On one of those fair knolls I have so often mentioned stood the cottage, beneath trees which stooped as if they yet felt brotherhood with its roof-tree.

Flowers waved, birds fluttered round, all had the sweetness of a happy seclusion; all invited to cry to those who inhabited it, All hail, ye happy ones! But on entrance to those evidently rich in personal beauty, talents, love, and courage, the aspect of things was rather sad.

Sickness had been with them, death, care, and labor; these had not yet blighted them, but had turned their gay smiles grave.

It seemed that hope and joy had given place to resolution.

How much, too, was there in them, worthless in this place, which would have been so valuable elsewhere! Refined graces, cultivated powers, shine in vain before field-laborers, as laborers are in this present world; you might as well cultivate heliotropes to present to an ox.