She is as dear to me as my own flesh and blood." After we had gleaned all the evidence of truth from the chaff to which we are sometimes treated, a lively member of the company remarked ruefully: "I declare, all that I have just heard makes me positively ashamed that I did not have a step-mother, or that there is no prospect as far as I can see into the dim future, of my ever becoming one." There is something to be said on both sides, and we may as well face the facts without prejudice.

No woman, however tender, can really take an own mother's place.

Her step-children may think that she does, and this is one of the instances where ignorance is such genuine bliss that it would be cruel folly to enlighten it.

It would not be natural if actual mother-love could be felt by a woman toward any children save those for whom she has braved the danger of death and the mightiest pain mortal can know.

With this suffering comes a love far greater than the anguish, a passionate devotion which, we are certain, must reach beyond the grave itself.