She knew that well! So it was that He took part in her
humble daily life, and became more real to her day by day. Very homely
shadows her life gave of His light, for it was His: homely, because of
her poor way of living, and of the depth to which the heavy foot of the
world had crushed her. Yet they were there all the time, in her cheery
patience, if nothing more. To-night, for instance, how differently the
surging crowd seemed to her from what it did to Knowles! She looked down
on it from her high wood-steps with an eager interest, ready with her
weak, timid laugh to answer every friendly call from below. She had no
power to see them as types of great classes; they were just so many
living people, whom she knew, and who, most of them, had been kind to
her. Whatever good there was in the vilest face, (and there was always
something,) she was sure to see it. The light made her poor eyes strong
for that.
She liked to sit there in the evenings, being alone, yet never growing
lonesome; there was so much that was pleasant to watch and listen to, as
the cool brown twilight came on. If, as Knowles thought, the world was
a dreary discord, she knew nothing of it. People were going from their
work now,--they had time to talk and joke by the way,--stopping, or
walking slowly down the cool shadows of the pavement; while here and
there a lingering red sunbeam burnished a window, or struck athwart the
gray boulder-paved street.
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