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Show BETWEEN THE LUPIN AND THE LAUREL Canoes and tents and camp-kit? "That will all be provided: it is well not to be anxious concerning these sublunary things." Mosquitoes? "Concerning this, also, thee must learn to put thy trust in Providence; yet there is a happy interval, as it were, between the fading of the hepatica and the blooming of the mosquito, when the woods of South Jersey are habitable for man, and it would be most prudent to choose this season for the exercise of providential trust regarding mosquitoes." Examination papers? Duty? "Surely thee must do what thee thinks will do most good, and follow the inward voice. And if it calls thee to stay with the examination papers, or if it calls thee to go with us, whichever way, thee will be resigned to obey." Fortunately, there was no doubt about the inward voice; it was echoing the robins; it was calling me to go out like Elijah and dwell under a juniper-tree I replied to the Friends in the words of one of their own prea<:!hers: "I am resigned to go, or resigned to stay, but most resigned to go"; and we went. The statue of William Penn seemed to look benignantly down upon us as we passed, bag and 148 BETWEEN THE LUPIN AND THE LAUREL bundle in hand, along the regular Philadelphia shortcut which leads through the bowels of the Courthouse, from the Broad Street station to John Wanamaker's store. Philadelphians always have the air of doing something very modern, hurried, and timesaving when they lead you through that short-cut. But we were not really in a hurry; we had all the time there is; we could afford to gape a little in the shop-windows. The spasmodic Market Street trolley- car and the deliberate Camden ferry-boat were rapid enough for us. The gait of the train on the Great Sandy and Oceanic Railway was neither too fast nor too slow. Even the deserted condition of Hummingtown, where we disembarked about eleven o'clock in the morning, and found that the entire population had apparently gone to a Decoration Day ball-game, leaving post-office, telegraph station, fruit store, bakery, all closed-even this failure to meet our expectations did not put us out of humour with the universe, or call forth rude words on the degenern<:! y of modern times. Our good temper was imperturbable; for had we not all ·• escaped as a bird from the hand of the 149 |