The next day Mrs. Melville came home.  In a short time the little household had adjusted itself, and settled down into its routine of living.  When, in a few days, the great car-load of the Millers’ furniture arrived, Capt.  Melville insisted upon its all going to the auction-rooms excepting the kitchen furniture, and a few things for which Jane had especial attachment.  It brought two hundred dollars, which, in addition to the price of the farm, and the store and its stock, gave Reuben just nineteen hundred dollars to put in the Savings Bank.

“And I am to be counted at least two thousand more, father dear, so you are not such a very poor man after all,” said Draxy, laughing and dancing around him.

Now Draxy Miller’s real life began.  In after years she used to say, “I was born first in my native town; second, in the Atlantic Ocean!” The effect of the strong sea air upon her was something indescribable; joy seemed to radiate from her whole being.  She smiled whenever she saw the sea.  She walked on the beach; she sat on the rocks; she learned to swim in one lesson, and swam so far out that her uncle dared not follow, and called to her in imploring terror to return.  Her beauty grew more and more radiant every day.  This the sea gave to her body.  But there was a far subtler new life than the physical, a far finer new birth than the birth of beauty,—­which came to Draxy here.  This, books gave to her soul.  Only a few years before, a free library had been founded in this town, by a rich and benevolent man.  Every week hundreds of volumes circulated among the families where books were prized, and could not be owned.  When Draxy’s uncle first took her into this library, and explained to her its purpose and regulations, she stood motionless for a few moments, looking at him—­and at the books:  then, with tears in her eyes, and saying, “Don’t follow me, uncle dear; don’t mind me, I can’t bear it,” she ran swiftly into the street, and never stopped until she had reached home and found her father.  An hour later she entered the library again, leading her father by the hand.  She had told him the story on the way.  Reuben’s thin cheeks were flushed.  It was almost more than he too could bear.  Silently the father and daughter walked up and down the room, looking into the alcoves.  Then they sat down together, and studied the catalogue.  Then they rose and went out, hand in hand as they had entered, speaking no word, taking no book.  For one day the consciousness of this wealth filled their hearts beyond the possibility of one added desire.  After that, Draxy and her father were to be seen every night seated at the long table in the reading-room.  They read always together, Draxy’s arm being over the back of her father’s chair.  Many a man and many a woman stopped and looked long at the picture.  But neither Draxy nor her father knew it.