Bessie's Fortune

Grey was a good deal mixed up in Bessie's thoughts after Neil was gone, and she often found herself thinking: "More than twenty thousand happier because of him! Could any life be nobler than that, and why should not I imitate it?"

And then Bessie began the experiment of trying to make somebody happy every day; and the butcher's boy of whom she bought the meat, and the girl who brought the milk, and the man of whom she bought their bread, and the beggar woman who came to the door for cinders and cold bits, found an added graciousness of manner in the young girl who smiled so sweetly upon them and interested herself so kindly in their welfare, and who, in her limited sphere, was imitating Grey Jerrold, and trying to make a few people happier, even though she could never hope, like him, to number twenty thousand!