"
Alice had near her bed, where she could always see it, a beautiful picture
of a shepherd with a lamb upon his bosom. She was very fond of looking at
it, and saying how it made her think of herself. "If you see a flock of
sheep going along the road, and one of them is very weary," she said--one
day when she was very tired, and her feet were very hot, so that she felt
as if they would never be cool again--"you would not like to see them go on
driving it, but would wish to see the shepherd take it in his arms to the
fold." She asked that these works, "My Beloved is mine, and I am His,"
should be put upon her gravestone, saying that it was her favourite text;
and against her name in the family Bible she wished them to write,... "so
He bringeth them unto their desired haven."
When she was almost Home, her father spoke to Alice about the many she had
to love on earth, and the many in heaven; for two little sisters, Constance
and Eva, were already with the Lord. Looking up with a smile, as if she
really saw the One who had been her Friend in life, and from whose love
death could not separate her, she said softly, "Whom have I in heaven but
Thee?"
I think these were her last words; a little before, she had said, "It seems
strange to be going where you can none of you come with me; but He is
there, and that is enough."
If you are like the rest of my young friends, you do not mind having the
Spider's history interrupted, that we might think of this sweet story of
Alice, and how she too "tried the ropes," and found them "all right.
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