Nothing but leaves Author:Sarah Doudney Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III. THE RAGGED SCHOOL. Sunday morning Ada went to church with her father and the boys as usual. Aunt Emily stayed at home with Lawrence, and it di... more »d not even occur to her niece to offer her own services as nurse. Her mind was full of her class in the Ragged School. Her scholars should be model scholars; her teaching should be an example for the other teachers to follow. She resolved to throw her whole energy into this new work; unconsciously she trod with a firmer step, and carried herself erect as she formed these resolutions. It was a peaceful autumn morning ; the streets were " swept and garnished," and the bustle of everyday life was stilled. Even on the dingy houses, closely packed together, the Septembersunshine shed a tranquil glow. The shops, covered in with shutters, displayed no gaudy wares to tempt the passers-by; their thresholds were untrodden by busy feet, and buyers and sellers were keeping holy day. Stealing over roofs and chimneys came the voices of the bells, filling the air with their chimes. The doctor, as he walked by his daughter's side, thought of days long past, when the music of Sunday bells had drifted towards him across blackberry hedges and hazel copses, and familiar footsteps had kept time with his along the churchyard lane. Through the straight and narrow way those footsteps had passed safely to the everlasting rest. The path might be rugged, but it was so plain that the wayfaring man could not err therein. Very steadily had the doctor kept to that old path, and the church bells said the same things to him now that they had said in his youth. God's messages to man are never altered, and they are messages that childhood, maturity, and old age can understand. And now, as Dr. Fenway walked along the streets, the bells weretelling h...« less