Rachel Gray

"[...]needle and thread twice as fast as before. "Thank Heaven!" she piously thought, "I am not lazy, nor sickly, and I can't see much difference between the two-that I can't." Rachel's work lay in her lap; she sat looking at the crocuses until she fell in a dream far in the past. For the past is our realm, free to all, high or low, who wish to dwell in it. There we may set aside the bitterness and the sorrow; there we may choose none but the pleasing visions, the bright, sunny spots where it is sweet to linger. The Future, fair as Hope may make it, is a dream, we claim it in vain. The Present, harsh or[...]".