“Thank you, Mamma Vi,” returned the young girl, blushing with pleasure; “it is most kind in you to say that; but if I am thorough in anything, most of the credit belongs to my father, who has never allowed me to content myself with a slovenly performance of my duties.”

“No,” he said, “what is worth doing at all is worth doing well; that is a lesson I have endeavoured to impress upon each one of my children, and one which I think they have all learned pretty thoroughly.”

“And they have always had the teaching of example as well as precept, from their father,” remarked Violet with a look of loving appreciation up into his face; “so that it would be strange indeed if they had not learned it.”

“Indeed that is true, mamma,” said Grace.  “It does seem to me that papa does everything he undertakes as thoroughly well as anyone possibly could.”

“A very good idea for one’s children to cultivate,” laughed the captain.  Then consulting his watch, “But it is high time we were in the schoolroom, daughters.  Elsie and Ned have been there this half hour, and probably have a lesson or two ready to recite.”

“And Eva will not be with us to-day; probably not for many more days,” remarked Lucilla with a slight sigh of disappointment and regret, as she and Grace rose and gave prompt obedience to her father’s implied order.

“Yes,” he said, “I fear so; but her first duty is to her mother.”

So Evelyn herself felt, and nobly she discharged it; neglecting nothing in her power for the relief and enjoyment of the invalid who, though often fretful, exacting, and unreasonable, was yet nearest and dearest to her of all earthly creatures.  The young girl’s loving patience seemed never to fail, and her heart was continually going up in earnest, silent petitions that her beloved parent might be made meet for the inheritance of the saints in light; that she might learn to love Him who had died to redeem her from death and the power of the grave, and to give her an abundant entrance into his kingdom and glory.

The doubt of Laura’s preparation for death and eternity, amounting to almost certainty that it was lacking, made this nursing an even sadder one than had been that of Eric, Evelyn’s father, years ago.  To him talk of things heavenly and divine had ever seemed easy and natural, and with the certainty that he was passing away from earth came the full assurance that he was ready to depart and be with Christ in glory.

But Laura hastily repelled the slightest allusion to eternity and a preparation for it.  Evelyn’s only consolation was in the knowledge that others were uniting their earnest petitions with hers, and that God is the hearer and answerer of prayer.

It was Grandma Elsie who at length succeeded in speaking a word in season to the dying woman.

“Oh, this racking cough!  Shall I never be done with it?” gasped Laura, as she lay panting upon her pillow after an unusually severe and exhausting paroxysm.