Mildreds Inheritance | Page 2

of an English clergyman, the walls of the rectory garden had been the boundary of her little world. She could not remember her mother, but with her father for teacher, playmate, and constant companion, her life had been complete in its happiness.
If the violets blooming within the protecting walls of the old rectory garden had suddenly been torn up by the roots and thrown into the street, the change in their surroundings could have been no greater than that which came to Mildred in the first shock of her father's death. She had been like one in a confused dream ever since. Some one had answered the letter from her mother's brother in America, offering her a home. Some one had engaged her passage, and an old friend of her father's had taken her to Liverpool and put her on board the steamer. Here she sat for the first three days, staring out at the sea, with eyes which saw nothing of its changing beauty, but always only a daisy-covered mound in a little churchyard. All the happiness and hope that her life had, ended in that.
"Who is the pretty little English girl?" people asked when they passed her. "She doesn't seem to have an acquaintance on board."
"I never saw such a sad, hopeless face!" exclaimed one of the college girls whom the others called "Muffit." "If she were an American girl I'd ask her to walk with us. But English girls are so reserved and shy, and I am afraid it would frighten her."
If Muffit could have known, that cold, reserved manner hid a heart hungry for one friendly word. It was the third day out before any one spoke to her. She had been warned against making the acquaintance of strangers, but one look at the gentle-voiced, white-haired lady who took the chair next her own, disarmed every suspicion. The lady was dressed in deep mourning, like herself, and she had a sweet, motherly face that drew Mildred irresistibly to her. Before the day was over the two were talking together like old friends. When she saw how the girl grieved for her father, she tried to draw her away from her sorrow by questioning her about her future.
[Illustration: "BEFORE THE DAY WAS OVER THE TWO WERE TALKING TOGETHER LIKE OLD FRIENDS."]
Mildred answered with a shiver. "Oh, I try not to think about that at all. I have never seen Uncle Joe or any of his family, and everything must be so strange and queer in America. Now, if they lived in India I would not dread going half so much; for there would be something homelike in feeling that I was still under the protection of our queen. I cannot bear to think of leaving the ship, for it will be like leaving the last bit of home, to step from under the dear old Union Jack. 'A stranger in a strange land,'" she added, her lips quivering.
"No, dear, not as strange as you think," added the lady, with a motherly hand-clasp. "Don't you know that one corner of our country is called New England, in loving remembrance of the old; that your blood flows in our veins regardless of dividing seas, and gives us the same heritage of that proud past which you hold dear? Don't you know that thousands of us go back every year, like children of the old homestead, drawn by all those countless threads of song and story, of common interests and aims and relationships that have kept the two nations woven together in the woof of one great family?
"Let me tell you a bit of personal sentiment that links me to the old town of Chester on the River Dee. There is a house there that, until recently, was in the possession of my husband's family for nobody knows how many generations. Thousands of travellers go every year to see the inscription over its door. Once, over two hundred years ago, an awful plague swept the town, and every family in it lost one or more of its household. Only this one house was spared, and in grateful memory of its escape there was carved over the door the inscription:
"'GOD'S PROVIDENCE IS MINE INHERITANCE.'
"That became the family motto, and it is engraved here in my wedding-ring. The beautiful thought has helped me over many times of perplexity and sorrow, and has become the inspiration of my life. Because we can trace it back to that place, I have grown to love every stone in the quaint old streets of Chester."
She sat twisting the plain gold circlet on her finger for a moment, and then added thoughtfully: "In the light of her history America might well set that inscription over her own door: 'God's providence is mine inheritance.' It would be none