Page:Don-bosco-pine.djvu/47

 demanded of her, escaped her lips; but in a moment, calm and resolute and brushing away the tears, she said simply: "My son, Joseph and the children do not need me; but you do. If you think such a step will be pleasing to our Lord I am ready to go with you to Turin."

And she went, the brave woman, and never flinched or failed Don Bosco during the ten years that she lived in dire poverty, in toils and sacrifices, the extent of which even Don Bosco's passionate love did not suspect—she was too skillful in hiding her sufferings. Five hundred children, think of it! Margaret washed and ironed for them, made and repaired their clothes, cooked, swept and did the menial work of the house, besides cultivating a vegetable garden and keeping a poultry yard. She was never idle and no religious was ever poorer. Mamma Margaret, as she was called, was so beloved that she had a host of little self-constituted helpers who took delight in relieving her. Other kind women, too, came to her assistance in the sewing and laundry work, or she would have fainted under her burden. And, amid all these activities, she was leading the most beautiful interior life of union with God, with the Divine Sufferer on Calvary, and with His Blessed Mother, her model from childhood.

You will think I have said much in praise of this heroic mother; but the present Archbishop of Bologna, Monsignor Gusmini, lately raised to the Sacred College of Cardinals by his Holiness,