Eight years passed away. In Huntsdean churchyard the grass had grown over Helen’s grave, covering up the bare, brown earth, as new interests cover an old sorrow.

Little Nelly had never realized her loss. It contented her to know that her mother had been laid to rest in a sweet place, and would rise again some day when the Lord called her. She always hoped that Helen might rise in the spring, and find the primroses blooming round her pretty grave. She might have fancied that, like Keats, her mother could “feel the flowers growing over her.” Children and poets often have the same fancies.

November had come again; and with it came a new anxiety.

[74]

The small farm, rented by Farmer Farren, had passed into new hands. Squire Derrick was dead, and “another king arose, who knew not Joseph.” The heir was a needy, grasping man. Old tenants were nothing to him, and he was in want of ready money.

He had made up his mind to sell the little farm. It was more than likely, therefore, that the Farrens would be turned out of the old nest. For the young, it is easy to build new homes, and gather new associations around them; but for the old, it is well-nigh impossible. Their very lives are built into the ancient walls. When they leave a familiar dwelling, they long to go straight to “a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.”

John was now bailiff to a rich landowner in Sussex. He had a wife and child; but he was not unmindful of other ties. “Come to me,” he wrote, “if you are turned out of the old place.” But the parents sighed and shook their heads. They had not greatly prospered[75] in Huntsdean, yet no other spot on earth could be so dear to them.

“Whatever the Lord means me to do, I’ll strive to do it willingly,” said the farmer, bravely. “Oftentimes I’m mighty vexed with myself for clinging so hard to these old bricks and mortar, and those few fields yonder. If I leave them, I shan’t leave my Lord behind me; and if I stay with them, He’ll soon be calling me away. But you see, an old man has his whims; and I wanted to step out of this old cottage into my Father’s house.”

In this time of uncertainty, a new duty suddenly called Rhoda from home. Her father’s only sister—a childless widow—lay dying in Norfolk, and sent for her niece to come and nurse her.

It was decided that she must go. Her aunt had no other relatives, and could not be left alone in her need. But it was with a heavy heart that Rhoda said farewell to the three whom she loved best on earth, and set out on her long, solitary journey.

[76]

It was a keen, clear morning when she went away. A brisk wind was blowing; the brown leaves fled before it, as the hosts of the Amorites before the sword of Joshua. In dire confusion they hurried along over soft turf and stony ground. It was a day on which all things seemed to be astir. Crows were cawing, and flying from tree to tree; magpies flashed across the road; flocks of small birds assembled on the sear hedges. And far off could be heard the clamour of foxhounds and shouts of the huntsmen.

Rhoda wondered, with a pang, how it would be when she came back. Do we ever leave any beloved place without fearing that a change may fall upon it in our absence? It is at such times as these that the heart loves to rest itself upon the Immutable. “Lord, Thou hast been our dwelling-place from all generations.” “Thou art the same, and Thy years shall not fail.”

It was a weary sojourn in Norfolk. The widow’s illness was long and trying. But[77] God has a way of making hard work seem easy; and He lightened Rhoda’s labour with good news from home.

Two months passed by, and her aunt still hovered between life and death. Mrs. Farren’s letters had not given any definite reason for hope; and yet hopefulness pervaded every line, and clung to every sentence like a sweet perfume. Rhoda felt its influence and rejoiced. And at last, when January came to an end, the mother spoke out plainly.

The farm was purchased by one Ralph Channell. He was a prosperous man who had come from Australia, and had been settled in England about a year. He was quite alone in the world, and had proposed to take up his abode with the Farrens in the old cottage. The farmer was to manage everything as usual. No change would be made in any of their household ways. Mr. Channell had been acquainted with Robert Clarris in Australia, and it was through Clarris that he had first heard of the Farrens. What he asked of[78] them was a home. They might have the old house rent-free, if they would let him live in it with them.

Thus, a heavy burden was lifted from Rhoda’s heart. Mrs. Farren’s letter was a psalm of thanksgiving from beginning to end. “In the day when I cried, Thou answeredst me, and strengthenedst me with strength in my soul,” she wrote, in her gladness. And Rhoda’s spirit caught up the joyful strain. Yet she once found herself wishing that Mr. Channell had not been one of Robert Clarris’s friends. True, Clarris had long ago re............