Alas,
there can be for no royal road to a "sweet, cheerful, quiet tone of
mind!"
JANUARY I, 1844.-Mother says Ernest is entirely right in forbidding
my working so hard. I own that I already feel better. I have all the
time I need to read my Bible and to pray now, and the children do not
irritate and annoy me as they did. Who knows but I shall yet become
quite amiable?
Ernest made his father very happy to-day by telling him that ,the
last of those wretched debts is paid. I think that he might have told
me that this deliverance was at hand. I did not know but we had years
of these struggles with poverty before us. What with the relief from
this anxiety, my improved state of health, and father's pleasure, I
am in splendid spirits to-day. Ernest, too, seems wonderfully
cheerful, and we both feel that we may now look forward to a quiet
happiness we have never known. With such a husband and such children
as mine, I ought to be the most grateful creature on earth. And I
have dear mother and James besides. I don't quite know what to think
about James' relation to Lucy. He is so brimful running over with
happiness that he is also full of fun and of love, and after all he
may only like her as a cousin.
FEB. 14.-Father has not been so well of late. It seems as if he kept
up until he was relieved about those debts, and then sunk down.
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