not the capacity themselves to do. Milly had the knowledge but not the capacity to communicate it. She had an undefined consciousness, a dim foreshadowing of the beauty and glory of that guarded sacredness of life which is reserved for those who drink of the cup from which Jesus drank; so ethereal that no outward eye can form any conception of its grandeur, so intensely spiritual that no outward sense can comprehend or explain its celestial attributes.
Such a person could not be satisfied with an ordinary life, and she was one not likely to lead any other than an ordinary life. No stern "I will" ruled that gentle nature;—no indomitable persistency of purpose revealed those strong points of character which, if they display greater faults, press through every obstacle to achieve a triumph all its own.
Had she suffered like Amelia, or committed some great error, which demanded an expiation, all the latent forces of her soul might have gathered in a single heart-throb, and, bursting from the effect of the pressure, startled the world from its slumber to set the seal of condemnation upon some foul wrong which, perpetuated from generation to generation, hoary-headed with age, had obtained the reverence of mankind. Had she known how her mother had suffered, how day by day she toiled her life away to obtain the pittance that was to secure a home for herself and child together, she might have denounced in terms of righteous indignation the oppression that still threatens the chastity of thousands of defenceless women who, in stifled attics and damp basements,
