The following sketch has been pronounced by a talented Boston editor, to be the finest and sweetest article Fanny Fern ever penned. The very thought might well have served as inspiration. What roof-tree where the tears have not fallen? What household that counts not part of its number by tomb-stones?
"TWO IN HEAVEN.--'You have two children,' said I.
"'I have four,' was the reply; 'two on earth, two in heaven.'
"There spoke the mother! Still hers! only 'gone before!' Still remembered, loved and cherished, by the hearth and at the board; their places not yet filled; even though their successors draw life from the same faithful breast where _their_ dying heads were pillowed.
"Safely housed from storm and tempest; no sickness there; nor drooping head, nor fading eye, nor weary feet. By the green pastures; tended by the Good Shepherd, linger the little lambs of the heavenly fold.
"Earth less attractive! Eternity nearer! Invisible cords, drawing the maternal soul upwards. 'Still small' voices, ever whispering _come_! to the world-weary spirit.
"Mother of angels! Walk softly! holy eyes watch thy footsteps! cherub forms bend to listen! Keep thy spirit free from earth-taint; so shalt thou 'go to them,' though they may not 'return to thee.'"
THE PRIVATE HISTORY OF DIDYMUS DAISY, ESQ.--BY FANNY FERN.
Mrs. Daisy styled herself a _pattern wife_; a bright and shining light in the matrimonial firmament. She had inscribed on her girdle these words, from John Milton, or Mother Goose, I forget which: '_He_ for God only, _she_ for God in _him_.'
"She never laced her boots without asking her husband's advice, and the length of her boddice, or the depth of her flounces, were dependent upon his final decision. She went into strong convulsions at sight of a 'Bloomer,' and rolled up the whites of her eyes, like a duck in a thunderstorm, at the mention of the 'Woman's Rights' Convention,' and considered any woman who persisted in loving _white_ bread, when her husband ate _brown_, as only fit for the place where----air-tight stoves and furnaces are unnecessary! Her voice was soft and oily; she never spoke above her breath, and her motions were slow, funereal and perpendicular.
"And now I suppose you imagine Didymus was master of his own house! _Deuce a bit of it!_ There was a look in the corner of his wife's eye that was as good as a loaded musket, and he fetched and carried accordingly, like a trained spaniel, tiptoeing through life on a chalk-mark, and _precious careful_ at _that_; confining his observation of the world to the latitude and longitude of her apron-strings. But it was always 'husband,' and 'dear Daisy,' even when he knew his life wasn't worth two cents if he abated one jot or tittle of his matrimonial loyalty.