The matron who alone has stood When not a prop seemed left below, The first lorn hour of widowhood, Yet, cheered and cheering all the while, With sad but unaffected, smile. --CHRISTIAN YEAR

The four months' wife was a widow before she was twenty-one, and there she sat in her loneliness, her maid weeping, seeking in vain for something to say that might comfort her, and struck with fear at seeing her thus composed. It might be said that she had not yet realized her situation, but the truth was, perhaps, that she was in the midst of the true realities. She felt that her Guy was perfectly happy--happy beyond thought or comparison--and she was so accustomed to rejoice with him, that her mind had not yet opened to understand that his joy left her mourning and desolate.

Thus she remained motionless for some minutes, till she was startled by a sound of weeping--those fearful overpowering sobs, so terrible in a strong man forced to give way.

'Philip!' thought she; and withal Guy's words returned--'It will be worse for him than for you. Take care of him.'

'I must go to him,' said she at once.

She took up a purple prayer-book that she had unconsciously brought in her hand from Guy's bed, and walked down-stairs, without pausing to think what she should say or do, or remembering how she would naturally have shrunk from the sight of violent grief.