We found our friends had been in a state of great excitement on our account, having received the telegram, and knowing that we had taken the wrong train; so that our unexpected arrival was greeted with even more than their usual cordiality; and they were specially gratified to see Mrs. Prentiss, who almost without looking, discovered a hundred beauties in and around their lovely home, which it would have taken the eyes of an ordinary guest a week to notice.  The very shortness of our time to stay, intensified our enjoyment while it lasted.  Our half hour was soon over, and we came away with our hands full of flowers and our hearts as full of love.

We arrived in good time and met our husbands waiting for us at the station.  Dear Mrs. Prentiss did not appear to be very much fatigued while recounting in her inimitably pleasant manner the various experiences of the day.  A restful night prepared her for the quiet enjoyments of the next day, which we spent mostly at home, merely making short calls in the morning on my two sisters, and slowly driving, or rather, as I call it, “taking a walk in the buggy,” through the woods, stopping every few minutes to look at, or gather ferns or mosses or budding wild flowers that could not escape her beauty-loving eye.  The afternoon we remained in the house, occupied with our pencils.  She painted a spray of trailing arbutus, talking while she was doing it, as nobody else could, about things beloved and fair.  Our darling Julia was with us, completely charmed with her, and as busy as we, trying with her little hands to make pictures as pretty as ours.

In the evening Dr. P. gave his most interesting lecture on “Recollections of Hurstmonceaux” in our reading-room; but Mrs. Prentiss was not able to go, which I regretted the more because I knew many ladies would be there who came almost as much to see her as to hear him.  They were greatly disappointed, but enjoyed every word of the lecture, as well they might.  The next day was all too short.  It seemed to me that I could not let them go.  But she had more than enough for her ever busy hands and mind and heart to do in preparation for going to her summer home, and we had to say good-bye.

A few short, characteristic, loving notes came from the city, before she left, and I did not hear from her at Dorset till the overwhelming news came of her death.  I could not control my grief.  Little Julia tried to comfort me with her sweet sympathy.  “Dear grandma,” she said, “I am sorry too.  I can not feel so bad as you do, because you loved her so much, and you loved her so long; but I loved her too, and I can think just how she looked when she sat right there by that little table talking, and painting those beautiful flowers.  Oh!  I am very sorry.”  And here the poor child’s tears flowed again with mine.  So will all the children who knew her say, “We remember just how she looked.”  Yes, there was no mistaking or forgetting that kindly, loving “look.”  Julia’s mother had felt its influence from her own early childhood till she left her precious little one to receive it in her stead.  To each of these half-orphaned ones in turn, I had to read “Little Susy’s Six Birthdays,” and both always said to me when I finished, “Please read it again.”