Page:True stories of girl heroines.djvu/408

362 her! O God help me!—help me! There is nobody else—only me—to do it. All the rest have children, friends, husbands, brothers. I am quite alone. O God help me! Help me!"

The broken words were merged in sobs, as the tears gushed forth, bringing a measure of ease to the overcharged heart. Ursula sat crouched up on the floor of her little cabin, with her face buried in her hands, and her loosened hair falling around her, but the sense of storm and strife was merging in one of a strange and settled peace. Down in the depths of her spiritual being it seemed to her as though a hand had been laid upon her, and as though a voice had spoken in her ear:

"Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these My brethren, ye have done it unto Me."

Ursula Pendrill was a girl of good family who had been left a year or two ago an orphan, and with very narrow means. She was, however, a girl of high spirit and brave heart, and instead of asking a home with any of her kinsfolk, she preferred to supplement her small resources by working in various ways herself.

The field of woman's work in those days was much narrower than it has since become; but Ursula knew a lady who had been a nurse under Miss Nightingale in the Crimean War, and had since then given much of her time to the service of the sick. She was then