Page:Maud Howe - Atlanta in the South.djvu/40

 the suffering that had gone before. Margaret loved her profession and her father, the only two things given her to love, with all the strength of her young heart. The two passions were so blended that the serving of the one meant for her the service of the other. There was none of that strife between love and work which vexes so many a woman's life, making the work seem at times a sin, and the love too great a sacrifice.

On a certain soft February afternoon, when the air which stirred the roses outside the studio door was cool and brilliantly pure, Margaret sat at her work while her father, sitting near her, read aloud. The girl had abandoned the bas-relief she had been modelling, and was moulding a bird's nest, to the delight of a small negro child seated at her feet.

"How many eggs, General?" whispered Margaret. The child, a son of the cook, had been baptized General Jackson.

"Three, missy," said the baby, holding up the requisite number of fat black fingers.

When Angelo heard of the proposed alterations in his plans.'—are you paying attention, Margaret?"

"Yes, papa." (Sotto voce) "That 's the mother bird, General." Inarticulate admiration from General Jackson.