Rich Enough | Page 8

world, with its glorious firmament. I think we
have before us two excellent prototypes of our wives:--while the clear,
peaceful lake represents yours, this happy, joyous, busy little stream
may be likened to my Charlotte, who goes on her way rejoicing, and
diffusing life and animation wherever she bends her course."
"I wish Frances had a little more of her gayety," said Mr. Draper.
"Depend upon it," said Howard, "they will operate favorably on each
other. I perceive already a mingling of character. I will venture to
predict, Charlotte will have a boat with its gay streamers winding the

shore before long, and persuade her sister to become the 'Lady of the
Lake.'"
The matter was soon decided; the sisters visited the place, and were
enchanted with it; and Howard was authorized by his brother to make
the purchase.
The house had been built many years. It was irregular in its form, and
certainly belonged to no particular order of architecture. There was a
large dining-room, and doors that opened upon the green, and plenty of
small rooms; in short, it was just such a house as Frances fancied; it
was picturesque, and looked, she said, "as if it had grown and shot out
here and there like the old oaks around it."
Charlotte begged that on herself might devolve the care of furnishing it.
"I know better than you," said she, "what will save trouble. Banish
brass and mahogany; admit nothing that requires daily labor to make it
fine and showy. I do not despair of setting you up a dairy, and teaching
you to churn your own butter." She truly loved and honored her
sister-in- law, and trembled for her life, which she was persuaded she
held by a frail tenure. She was eager to prevent her returning to the city
during the warm season, and readily undertook to go herself and make
all necessary arrangements. Frances furnished her with a list, and left
much discretionary power to her agent.
In the course of a few days she returned.--"We must be at Clyde Farm
to- morrow," said she, "to receive the goods and chattels of which I am
only the precursor. Your husband enters warmly into the furnishing of
your country residence, and therefore we must let him have a voice in it.
His taste is not so simple as ours, so we must admit some of the finery
of the town house; pier and chimney glasses are to be sent from it. I did
not make much opposition to this, for they will not only reflect our
rustic figures within, but the trees and grass without. How I long to
have haying-time come! You must ride from the fields with your
children, as I do, on a load of hay, when the work of the day is over,
and look down upon all the world. O Frances," added she, "if we could
only persuade your husband to turn farmer, our victory would be
complete."

"It will never be," said Frances.
"I don't know that," replied Charlotte; "he seemed to set very little
value on the city residence, and would fain have stripped his elegant
rooms to dignify your rustic retreat; but I would not consent to the
migration of a particle of gilding or damask, but told him he might send
the marble slabs, with the mirrors,--and I speak for one of the slabs for
the dairy. But I have been more thoughtful for you than you have for
yourself: look at this list of books that I have ordered."
Frances was surprised; she had never seen Charlotte with a book in her
hand, and she candidly expressed her astonishment that, amidst all her
hurry, she had remembered books.
"Where do you think I acquired all my knowledge," said Charlotte, "if I
never open a book? But you are half right; I certainly do not patronize
book-making; and yet all summer I am reading the book of Nature. I
open it with the first snow-drop and crocus which peeps from under her
white robe; and then, when she puts on her green mantle, strewed with
'The yellow cowslip and the pale primrose,'
I study the lilies of the field. Depend upon it, there is more wisdom
without doors than we can find within,--more wisdom there than in
books."
"I believe it," said Frances; "all nature speaks of the Creator,--of the
one great Mind which formed this endless variety, and can give life to
the most insignificant flower that grows by the way-side."
"I should like to know what flower you call insignificant," said
Charlotte; "not this little houstonia, I hope; that has a perfection of
organization in which many of your splendid green-house flowers are
deficient. But that is the way with us: we call those things sublime
which