“’Tisn’t a pretty place,” said little Katy, as she looked out the window upon a row of brick walls, dingy sheds, and discolored chimneys; “’tisn’t a pretty place, mother, I want to go home.”

“Home!” Ruth started! the word struck a chord which vibrated—oh how painfully.

“Why don’t we go home, mother?” continued Katy; “won’t papa ever, ever, come and take us away? there is something in my throat which makes me want to cry all the time, mother,” and Katy leaned her curly head wearily on her mother’s shoulder.

Ruth took the child on her lap, and averting her eyes, said with a forced smile:

“Little sister don’t cry, Katy.”

“Because she is a little baby, and don’t know anything,” replied Katy; “she used to stay with Biddy, but papa used to take me to walk, and toss me up to the wall when he came home, and make rabbits with his fingers on the wall after tea, and take me on his knee and tell me about little Red Riding Hood, and—oh, I want papa, I want papa,” said the child, with a fresh burst of tears.

Ruth’s tears fell like rain on Katy’s little up-turned face. Oh, how could she, who so much needed comfort, speak words of cheer? How could her tear-dimmed eyes and palsied hand, ’mid the gloom of so dark a night, see, and arrest a sunbeam?

“Katy, dear, kiss me; you loved papa—it grieved you to see him sick and suffering. Papa has gone to heaven, where there is no more sickness, no more pain. Papa is happy now, Katy.”

“Happy? without me, and you, and Nettie,” said Katy, with a grieved lip?

Oh, far-reaching—questioning childhood, who is sufficient for thee? How can lips, which so stammeringly repeat, ‘thy will be done,’ teach thee the lesson perfect?