claimed the youngest lady of the group; "still if you saw her, of course, it must be true. But it just horrifies me." With a strong emphasis on the personal pro

noun.

"Yes," said the third one of the mothers, "I was there and I saw her, too. I must say I felt awful sorry for her until I saw her down there in such a place and at such a time and well I was just too disgusted for anything."

"And what on earth do you suppose she had on?" asked the first speaker, "You would never believe it; she actually wore a pink dress!"

"It

All three of the ladies who were talking stopped to recover their breath and to muse in silent horror over the last statement. isn't as if she was a poor woman who couldn't afford to buy a black dress; why she is wealthy! And a black dress is no more to her than a calico would be to you or me. "Are you sure about that?" gently asked the lady of the house, who had hitherto remained silent. "I don't think she is any better off if the truth were known than you or I."

"Well she has always been supposed to own thousands in her own right. Of course, I don't know anything about it, but anyway she is able to afford a black dress to go in mourning for her own child; and not disgrace the whole community by her queer actions."

"Well I could forgive her in not wearing mourning, but to see

her out to a pic-nic and her child not dead three days, not cold in his grave, it made my blood run cold. Such utter heartlessness I

never saw."

"And she don't seem to care one cent about it either; for she told Mrs. Merryweather when she was there that some one had said to her that she was looking unusually cheerful for one who had gone through such a trial, and she calmly replied that there were worse sorrows than death."

"Never!" exclaimed the young mother. "What on earth can she be made of! Worse than death! What can she mean? I can think of nothing worse than to lose my children; I think that would be the worst trial I could ever be visited with. She must be awfully cold-blooded. I can't understand it. It seems too much like heathenism."

the rest of the afternoon and let us have a good old-fashioned visit. Your talk has set me thinking and I am anxious to have this whole matter thoroughly discussed and understood before we part. Now if you will stay all the afternoon, I will go out and have dinner prepared and we will make a day of it. Do stay, for we are going to have strawberries and cream, the first of the season. And I know you will all enjoy them."

To be sure they would, for Mrs. Arnold's dinners were justly celebrated for excellence and her house was the pleasantest in the whole town in which to spend an after

noon.

So after arrangements had been made to send word round to the various homes of the three visiting ladies, the whole number sat down in the quiet restfulness of their various easy chairs to have a genuine good time.

"Now," said the lady of the house, "let us take up this matter of Mrs. Armitage and let me express my opinion as you have told yours. You know that I am no particular friend to her, any more than to you or to anyone else who belongs to our Church; but I know something of her life and character, and I am free to confess that I can't agree in the estimate have evidently you formed of her actions. In the first place, I can't see the least thing out of the way in her going down to the pic-nic. What harm was there in that?"

"Oh," chorused all three of the ladies in a breath, "you are surely joking. Don't you remember that her child had not been dead three days, was in fact but just buried the day before, and she was out to a merrymaking. It was simply horrible."

"Why so? I can't see anything horrible or even out of the way, in such a thing. She had suffered all she could bear, and her nerves were all strained up to their highest pitch and she doubtless thought a change of scene and air would be good for her. I think it was the most sensible thing she could do under the circumstances. If she felt like going out, why should we condemn her?"

"I can't see what she wanted out in such a place at such a time. I should think she would want to stay at home for a few days anyway."

"What for?" asked the lady of the house.

"Oh, to get over her grief a little. And she was actually as cheerful as if nothing had happened to her. I could not see the least difference in her manner or her speech."

"My dear, what difference did you expect to see? Did you suppose that a Woman like Mrs. Armitage would go about with a solemn face and a handkerchief up to her eyes over any kind of grief! grief! I do not. I have known her for some years, and I can truthfully say that I never saw her drag out her private woes for any one to cry over. She undoubtedly

has suffering to bear, else she would not live on this earth, and the look in her face is of one who has borne much and suffered much. That she keeps her troubles to herself is greatly to her credit. As for her going down to the Sunday School pic-nic, I can't see anything at all out of place in that. She has been confined to the house for several months with her sick children, and certainly no one needed to go out more than she. I am sorry that we as Latter-day Saints don't try to practice what we preach and pretend to believe. We are always saying that we do not mourn as the world do, without hope nor do we have any uncertainty as to the future of our dear dead. On the contrary we rejoice in words at least to know that they have finished their mission on this sad earth and have gone home to their rest and glory. At the same time we cling so closely to the traditions of our fathers and of the vain world, that if any one is brave and strong enough to carry out in practice what we believe in words, and not mourn nor grieve in a despairing fashion, we are all ready. to pounce upon that person and call him or her heartless and cruel for his courage and faith. We believe that God orders everything for our good, and yet when this poor soul who I know has suffered very much in this her last sore trial, seeks to shake off her selfish grief and to resume as soon as possible her place in the ward and world witnout a visible moan

or

an assumption of grief, we are horrified and ready to treat her with contempt. Do

you think it would have been better for her to ride out to the grave yard and there spend the day in weeping and mourning?"

"Well I think it would have looked better, and I could have felt really sorry for her if she had showed that she felt bad. As for me that's exactly what I should have wanted to do, for the spot where my dear little babe is buried is the most precious spot on this earth to me.'

"That may be true as to Mrs. Armitage; but because it is the most sacred spot, is that any reason why she or you should go there while your loss is still so fresh as to make you wild and frantic with grief? Oh how can we so misunderstand the gospel of peace and love! To me any

thing that savors of copying after the foolish and vain customs of the world is unworthy of a Saint and should never be countenanced. It is the habit of the world to shut themselves up in their homes after a loss by death, and receive no caller nor even go out anywhere, as if that showed any

was an evidence that God had heard her prayers and those of her friends, and soothed her grief so that it was at least bearable. Why should you pray for God to comfort those who mourn if you do not mean it? Do you want Him to be a year or SO about it? How inconsistent we sometimes are!"

The lady spoke in so gentle and so sweet a way, and she was withal so lovable and kindly a woman that her rebukes sounded like loving arguments and none could be offended with her. But the young mother hastened to defend her previous statements by adding others.

"Yes, but you should have seen her," she continued eagerly, "with a pink dress on, actually a pink dress on! At the funeral she wore a white dress and her little girl was dressed in white, too, without even a black ribbon, that was bad enough; but a pink dress. Well!"

The little woman was too much overcome with the remembrance of it to say more.

"Then what? Do you think people can't feel bad without showing it to all the world by putting on mourning? Why shouldn't we put on mourning at things which are far worse to bear than death? There, I am coming to that in a minute, but let us speak of this black dress and crape business first. Don't you remember that Pres. Brigham Young said in his will that his family were not to wear mourning for him? And

what could be more beautiful than white to express the sorrow, pure, sweet, God-given sorrow of a Saint in the temporary separation from dear and loved ones? The Chinese are wiser than the Christian world: they always wear pure white for their dead. I think I never saw anything more lovely and uplifting to the soul than were the arrangements and decorations at Pres. Daniel H. Wells' funeral. It was like a touch of the heavenly things we are all looking forward to with so much longing. I hope the practice will become universal among our people of having white instead of black to surround our dead. I am reminded of the saying of that great and good man, Henry Ward Beecher to those about his dying bed: 'When I am dead,' he said, 'I wish no one to wear black for me, nor to have anything black about the house. Let everything be light, pure and beautiful. For,' said he, 'I expect and hope to go to Paradise, not to Purgatory.' Isn't there a whole sermon in that? Just think of it when you get home. Here comes Sister Anderson; I hope she will stay all the afternoon, too."

The lady hurried out into the hall to meet her guest.

chosen and she never spoke, her friends said, unless she had something worth speaking about.

"Now I know Nellie will agree with me," said the young mother, "for she put on mourning when her baby died and wore it for a long while."

"Yes, I did, because I felt that I wanted to," chimed in Mrs. Anderson after hearing what was the subject of the conversation. "I had to get a new dress, for my others were all worn out, and my new black dress was such a good one it lasted a long while; but Sister Armitage has plenty of clothes I infer, and if she wants to wear a bright green one, I am sure I shall be perfectly willing, for I suppose her feelings and her clothes are quite as separate and distinct things as some people's are interwoven."

This was unbearable for Nellie Anderson with her keen tongue to join in with the lady of the house; so all three of the visiting ladies. spent at least a quarter of an hour trying to convince the other two that their own ideas on the subject were right and what is more than all, that they were popular and fashionable.

"You folks say you could have felt sorry for Mrs. Armitage if she had behaved herself as other people do," said Sister Anderson. "Well if I know her at all, I should say that she wouldn't give a fig for either your opinion nor your sympathy. She is amply able to get along with a great deal

only thinks she is doing right. If you were to say that she often says foolish things or that she is not nearly so good as she ought to be, that being true would hurt her and make her try and do better. But when you criticise her for doing that which she and every other sensible person would think was right and best, she would simply smile if she were being criticised for it. She believes that we all have to suffer the persecution of unjust criticism even at the hands of our friends for the sake of truth and tor Christ's sake. She would even glory, I strongly suspect, in the fact that her conduct had attracted your eyes and stirred up your minds to think on something else beside your hired girls and your baby's colic. Don't for pity's sake tell her you don't sympathize with her, for she would tell you she was glad of it."

It was too bad, for Nellie Anderson to add her sharp eloquence to that of her riend's gentle remonstrance. But Nellie had got something to say, and she went right on saying it.

"Your talk about Sister Armitage not putting on mourning reminds me of a friend of mine," and the speaker laughed a sarcastic, cutting laugh that was as expressive as it was quiet; "This friend had a dear and intimate friend who was lying very sick, and one evening the doctor said. she could not possibly live till morning. Whereupon this lady