Kitabı oku: «Karl Krinken, His Christmas Stocking», sayfa 2

“‘But this man often preferred the lower spring, and would neglect the other when this was full; and if forced to seek the Rock, he was often weary of waiting for his cup to fill, and so drew it away with but a few drops. And he never learned to love the upper spring as he ought, until one year when the very grass by the lower spring was parched, and he fled for his life to the other. And then it happened, Mark,’ said his mother looking down at him with her eyes full of tears, ’that when the water at last began slowly to come into the lower spring, though it was very lovely and sweet and pleasant it never could be loved best again.’

“‘Mother,’ said Mark, ‘I don’t know exactly what you mean, and I do know a little, too.’

“‘Why my dear,’ said his mother, ‘I mean that when we lack anything this world can give, we must fetch the more from heaven.’

“‘You love heaven very much, don’t you mother?’ said Mark, looking up at her quite wonderingly.

“‘More than you love me.’

“Mark thought that was hardly possible; but he didn’t like to contradict his mother, and besides they were now at the church-door, and had to go right in and take their seats. Mark thought the clergyman chose the strangest text that could be for Thanksgiving-day,—it was this,—

“‘There is nothing at all, beside this manna, before our eyes.’

“When church was over, and Mark and his mother were walking home again, they were overtaken by little Tom Crab.

“‘Come,’ said little Tom—‘let’s go sit on the fence and eat apples. We sha’n’t have dinner to-day till ever so late, ’cause it takes so long to get it ready; and I’m so hungry. What are you going to have for dinner?’

“‘I don’t know,’ said Mark.

“‘I know what we’re going to have,’ said Tom, ’only I can’t remember everything. It makes me worse than ever to think of it. Come—let’s go eat apples.’

“‘I haven’t got any,’ said Mark.

“‘Haven’t got any!’ said Tom, letting go of Mark’s elbow and staring at him—for the idea of a boy without apples had never before occurred to any of Mr. Crab’s family. ‘O you mean you’ve eaten up all you had in your pocket?’

“‘No,’ said Mark, ‘we haven’t had any this year. Last year Mr. Smith gave us a basketful.’

“‘Well come along and I’ll give you some,’ said Tom. ‘I’ve got six, and I guess three’ll do me till dinner. O Mark! you ought to see the goose roasting in our kitchen! I’ll tell you what—I guess I may as well give you the whole six, ’cause I can run home and get some more; and I might as well be home, too, for they might have dinner earlier than they meant to.’

“And filling Mark’s pockets out of his own, Tom ran off.

“It so happened,” said Beachamwell turning herself round with a tired air when she got to this point in her story—“it so happened, that Mark having stopped so long to talk with Tommy Crab, did not get home till his mother had her things off and the tablecloth on; and then being in a great hurry to help her, and a rather heedless little boy besides; there being moreover but one table in the room, Mark laid his six apples upon the sill of the window which was open. For it was a soft autumn day—the birds giving another concert in the still air, and the sunshine lying warm and bright upon everything. The apples looked quite brilliant as they lay in the window, and as Mark eat his queer little Thanksgiving dinner of bread and a bit of corned beef, he looked at them from time to time with great pleasure.

“But when it was almost time for the apples to come on table as dessert, Mark suddenly cried out,

“‘Mother! where are my six apples?’

“‘Why on the window-sill,’ said his mother.

“‘There aren’t but five! there aren’t but five!’ said Mark. ‘I must have lost one coming home!—no I didn’t either.’ And running to the window, Mark looked out. There lay the sixth apple on the ground, appropriated as the Thanksgiving dinner of his mother’s two chickens.

“Mark could hardly keep from crying.

“‘It’s too bad!’ he said—‘when I hadn’t but just six! The ugly things!’

“‘You called them beauties this morning,’ said his mother.

“‘But just see my apple!’ said Mark—‘all dirty and pecked to pieces.’

“‘And just see my little boy,’ said his mother—‘all red and angry. Did you suppose, my dear, that if apples rolled off the window-sill they would certainly fall inside?’

“‘I guess I’ll never put anything there any more,’ said Mark, gathering up the five apples in his arms and letting them all fall again. But they fell inside this time, and rolled over the floor.

“‘You had better decide how many apples you will eat just now,’ said Mrs. Penly, ‘and then put the others away in the closet.’

“‘It’s too bad!’ said Mark. ‘I hadn’t but six. And I thought you would have three and I’d have three.’

“‘Well you may have five,’ said his mother smiling—‘the chickens have got my part. And maybe some good will come of that yet, if it only teaches you to be careful.’

“Oddly enough,” said Beachamwell, “some good did come of it. When the chickens pecked the apple to pieces the seeds fell out, and one seed crept under a clover leaf where the chickens could not find it. And when the snow had lain all winter upon the earth, and the spring came, this little seed sprouted and grew, and sent down roots and sent up leaves, and became an apple-tree.”

“How soon?” said Carl.

“O in the course of years—by the time Mark was a big boy. And the tree blossomed and bore fruit; and from that time Mark and his mother never wanted for apples. He called it the ‘Thanksgiving Tree,’ but it was a true Beachamwell, for all that.”

“But say!” exclaimed Carl, catching hold of Beachamwell’s stem in his great interest, “Mark isn’t alive now, is he?”

“No,” said Beachamwell, twisting away from Carl and her stem together. “No, he is not alive now, but the tree is, and it belongs to Mark’s grandson. And the other day he picked a whole wagon-load of us and set off to market; and we three were so tired jolting about that we rolled out and lay by the wayside. That’s where your mother found us.”

“Well that is certainly a very pretty story,” said Carl, “but nevertheless I’m glad my stocking was full. But I will let you Beachamwell and Half-ripe and Knerly lie on the chest and hear the rest of the stories, for I like this one very much.”

Carl was tired sitting still by this time, so he went out and ran about on the beach till dinner; and after dinner he went up to his corner again. The sun came in through the little window, look-askance at Carl’s treasures, and giving a strange, old-fashioned air to purse and book and stocking. The shoes looked new yet, and shone in their blacking, and the apples had evidently but just quitted the tree; while the red cent gleamed away in the fair light, and the old pine cone was brown as ever, and reflected not one ray. Carl handled one thing and another, and then his eye fell on his small portion of money. He might want to spend it!—therefore if the cent could do anything, it must be done at once; and as he thought on the subject, the sun shone in brighter and brighter, and the red cent looked redder and redder. Then the sunbeam fled away, and only a dark little piece of copper lay on the chest by the side of the new shoes.

“Now red cent,” said Carl, “it is your turn. I’ll hear you before the purse, so make haste.”

“Turn me over then,” said the red cent, “for I can’t talk with my back to people.”

So Carl turned him over, and there he lay and stared at the ceiling.

THE STORY OF THE RED CENT

“I cannot begin to relate my history,” said the red cent, “without expressing my astonishment at the small consideration in which I am had. ‘I wouldn’t give a red cent for it—’ ‘It isn’t worth a red cent—’ such are the expressions which we continually hear; and yet truly a man might as well despise the particles of flour that make up his loaf of bread.

“People say it is pride in me—that may be and it may not. But if it be—why shouldn’t a red cent have at least that kind of pride which we call self-respect? I was made to be a red cent, I was wanted to be a red cent, I was never expected to be anything else—therefore why should I be mortified at being only a red cent? I am all that I was intended to be, and a silver dollar can be no more. Pride, indeed! why even Beachamwell here is proud, I dare say, and only because she is not a russeting; while I think– Well, never mind,—but I have bought a good many apples in my day and ought to know something about them. Only a red cent! People can’t bargain so well without me, I can tell you. Just go into the market to buy a cabbage, or into the street to buy a newspaper, and let me stay at home—see how you will fare then. Indeed when there is question of parting with me I am precious enough in some people’s eyes, but it hardly makes up for the abuse I get from other quarters. There is indeed one pretty large class of the community who always think me worth picking up, though they are over ready to part with me. To them alone would I unfold the secrets of my past life. I might have lain in a man’s purse for ever, and rubbed down all the finer parts of my nature against various hard-headed coins; but there is something in the solitude of a boy’s pocket which touches all the sympathies of our nature—even beforehand.

“I am not, however,” continued the red cent, “I am not at all of friend Beachamwell’s temperament,—in fact I never had but one impression made on me in my life. To be sure that was permanent, and such as Time only can efface; though no doubt he will one day soften down my most prominent points, and enable me to move through society with a calm and even exterior. For it happens, oddly enough, that while beneath the pressure of years the ‘human face divine’ grows wrinkled and sometimes sharp, a red cent grows smooth and polished,—a little darker and thinner perhaps than formerly, but with as good business faculties as ever.

“When that time arrives,” said the red cent, “we refuse to tell our age; but until then we are perfectly communicative. I would at once tell you how old I am, but that you can see for yourself.

“I shall not give you a detailed account of my origin, nor of the fire and water through which I passed in order to become a red cent. If when you grow up you are still curious about the matter, you may cross over to England; and there, down in Cornwall, you will find what may be called my birthplace, and can learn with full particulars why I left it. Neither shall I relate how I was pressed and clipped and weighed at the Mint, nor speak of the first few times that I went to market and changed hands. My present history will begin with the pocket of a rich old gentleman, into which I found my way one afternoon along with a large variety of the ‘circulating medium.’”

“You do use such big words!” said Carl.

“Because I have travelled a great deal,” said the red cent. “It is the fashion. But to return to the pocket.

“What a pocket it was!

“At the bottom lay an overfed pocket-book, bursting with bank-bills new and old, while another of like dimensions held more value, snugly stowed away in notes and bonds. The leather purse in which I lay had one end for red cents and the other for gold and silver; but with my usual love of bright company, when the old gentleman slipped me in among a parcel of dingy cents I slipped out again, and ran in among the half-eagles. For I was the only new cent the old gentleman had, and as by right I belonged about half to him and half to the bank, the cashier and he had some words as to which should carry me off. I believe the old gentleman chuckled over me half the way home.

“If this part of my story teaches nothing else,” said the red cent with a moralising air as he stared at the ceiling, “it will at least show the folly of going out of one’s proper place. Had I been content to lodge with the red cents, I should but have been set to do a red cent’s work,—as it was I was made to do the work of an eagle, for which I was totally unfit. It fell out thus.

“The old gentleman walked leisurely home, having very much the air of a man with a pocket full of money,—as I should think from the deliberate and comfortable way in which we were jogged about; and when he rang his own door bell it was already quite dark. A dear little girl opened the door, dressed in a white frock and black apron.

“‘Oh, grandpa,’ she said, ‘I’m so glad you’ve come, because there’s a little boy been waiting here ever so long for ten dollars.’

“‘Well my dear,’ said the old gentleman, ‘ten dollars is worth waiting for.’

“‘But he’s in a great hurry to get home before dark, because he says the children have got no bread for supper till he buys it,’ said the little girl. ‘He brought a pair of boots and shoes for you, grandpa. His father’s very poor, he says.’

“‘Is he?’ said the old gentleman. ‘Then I’m afraid my boots won’t be worth much. However Nanny my dear, you may take him the money for ’em, since they’re here.’

“‘Shall I fetch you a light, grandpa?’ said the child. ‘It’s too dark to see.’

“‘No, no—not a bit of it,—I know how ten dollars feels, well enough. He shall have a gold piece—for the first time in his life, I’ll warrant. It is too dark to read bank-bills.’

“And opening the most precious end of his purse, the old gentleman’s unerring thumb and finger drew forth me, and laid me in the little girl’s open palm. The soft little hand closed upon me, and down she ran to the lower entry.

“‘There—’ she said,—‘here it is. Grandpa says he guesses that’s the first gold piece you ever had. Have you got a great many little brothers and sisters?’

“‘This ain’t gold,’ said the boy, too busy examining me to heed her last question. ‘He’s made a mistake—this is only a red cent.’

“‘O well I’ll take it back to him then,’ said the little messenger. ‘I s’pose he couldn’t see in the dark.’ And away she ran.

“The old gentleman by this time was enjoying his slippers and the newspaper, between a blazing fire and two long candles in tall silver candlesticks.

“‘Grandpa,’ said the child laying her hand on his knee, ‘do you know what you did in the dark? you gave that boy a red cent instead of a gold piece—wasn’t it funny?’

“‘Hey! what?’ said the old gentleman, moving his paper far enough to one side to see the little speaker. ‘Gave him a cent instead of a gold piece? nonsense!’

“‘But you did, grandpa,’ urged the child. ‘See here—he gave it right back to me. It was so dark, you know, and he took it to the window to look; and he said directly it was only a cent.’

“‘Which he had kept in his hand for the purpose, I’ll warrant,’ said the old man. ‘Took it to the window, did he?—yes, to slip it into his pocket. He needn’t think to play off that game upon me.’

“‘But only look at it, grandpa,’ said the child; ’see—it’s only a red cent. I’m sure he didn’t change it.’

“‘I don’t want to look at it,’ said he putting away her hand. ‘All stuff, my dear—it was as good an eagle as ever came out of the Mint. Don’t I know the feel of one? and didn’t I take it out of the gold end of my purse, where I never put copper? Bad boy, no doubt—you mustn’t go back to him. Here, William—’

“‘But he looked good, grandpa,’ said the child, ’and so sorry.’

“‘He’ll look sorry now, I’ll be bound,’ said the old man. ‘I say, William!—take this red cent back to that boy, and tell him to be off with it, and not to show his face here again.’

“The command was strictly obeyed; and my new owner after a vain attempt to move the waiter, carried me into the street and sat down on the next door-step. Never in my life have I felt so grieved at being only a red cent, as then.

“The boy turned me over and over, and looked at me and read my date with a bewildered air, as if he did not know what he was doing; and I alas, who could have testified to his honesty, had no voice to speak.

“At length he seemed to comprehend his loss; for dropping me on the pavement he sank his head on his hands, and the hot tears fell fast down from his face upon mine. Then, in a sudden passion of grief and excitement he caught me up and threw me from him as far as he could; and I, who had been too proud to associate with red cents, now fell to the very bottom of an inglorious heap of mud. As I lay there half smothered, I could hear the steps of the boy, who soon repenting of his rashness now sought me—inasmuch as I was better than nothing; but he sought in vain. He couldn’t see me and I couldn’t see him, especially as there was little but lamplight to see by, and he presently walked away.

“I am not good at reckoning time,” said the red cent, “but I should think I might have lain there about a week—the mud heap having in the mean time changed to one of dust; when a furious shower arose one afternoon, or I should rather say came down; and not only were dust and mud swept away, but the rain even washed my face for me, and left me almost as bright as ever high and dry upon a clean paving-stone.

“I felt so pleased and refreshed with being able to look about once more, that what next would become of me hardly cost a thought; and very wet and shiny I lay there, basking in the late sunshine.”

“I thought you said you were high and dry?” said Carl.

“That is a phrase which we use,” replied the red cent. “I was high and dry in one sense,—quite lifted above the little streams of water that gurgled about among the paving-stones, though the rain-drops were not wiped off my face; and as I lay there I suddenly felt myself picked up by a most careful little finger and thumb, which had no desire to get wet or muddy. They belonged to a little girl about ten years old.

“‘You pretty red cent!’ she said, admiringly,—‘how bright and nice you do look! and how funny it is that I should find you—I never found anything before. I wonder how you came here—I hope some poor child didn’t lose you.’

“While she thus expressed her opinion I was busy making up mine, and truly it was a pleasant one. Her calico frock was of an indescribable brown, formed by the fading together of all the bright colours that had once enlivened it,—water and soap and long wear had done this. But water and soap had also kept it clean, and a very little starch spread it out into some shape, and displayed the peculiar brown to the best advantage. Instead of an old straw bonnet with soiled ribbons she had a neat little sun-bonnet; but this was made of a piece of new pink calico, and made her face look quite rosy. I could not see her feet and pantalettes, for my back was towards them, but I have no doubt they were in nice order—she was too nice a child to have it otherwise. Her hair was brushed quite smooth, only when she stooped to pick me up one lock had fallen down from under the sun-bonnet; and her face was as simple and good as it could be. With what contented eyes did she look at me! She didn’t wish I was an eagle—indeed I thought it doubtful whether she had ever heard of such a thing. But I saw that her cheeks were thin, and that they might have been pale but for the pink sun-bonnet. Whatever she meant by ‘a poor child,’ little Nanny would surely have given the name to her.

“Suddenly she exclaimed,—

“‘Now I can get it!—O I’m so glad! Come little red cent, I must give you away, though I should like to keep you very much, for you’re very pretty; but you are all the money I’ve got in the world.’

“‘Now for the candy-store,’ thought I; for as she turned and began to walk away as fast as she could, I peeped into the little basket that hung on her arm and saw there a small loaf of bread—so I knew I was not to go for that commodity. She did not put me in the basket, but kept me fast in her hand as she tripped along, till we came to a large grocery. There she went in.

“‘Please sir to let me have a cent’s worth of tea?’ she said timidly.

“‘Got sixpence to pay for it?’ said one of the clerks to make the other clerks laugh, in which he succeeded.

“‘No sir, I’ve got this,’ she said, modestly showing me, and giving me a kind glance at the same time. ‘It’s only a cent, but it will get enough for mother, and she’s sick and wanted some tea so much.’

“The young men stopped laughing, and looked at the child as if she had just come out of the museum; and one of them taking down a canister measured out two or three good pinches of tea into a brown paper and folded it up. The child took it with a very glad face, laying me down on the counter with a joyful ‘Thank you, sir!’ which I by no means repeated—I wanted to go home with her and see that tea made. But we red cents can never know the good that our purchases do in the world.

“The clerk took me up and balanced me upon his finger, as if he had half a mind to give the child back her money, and pay the sum of one cent into the store out of his own private purse. But habit prevailed; and dropping me into the till I heard him remark as he closed it,—

“‘I say, Bill, I shouldn’t wonder now if that was a good child.’

“I shouldn’t have wondered, either.

“We were a dull company in the till that night, for most of the money was old; and it is a well-known fact that worn-down coins are not communicative. And some of the pieces were rusty through long keeping, and one disconsolate little sixpence which sat alone in the furthest corner of the till, was in a very sad state of mind; for he had just laid himself out to buy some rice for a poor family and now could do nothing more for them—and he was the last monied friend they had.

“In this inactive kind of life some time passed away, and though some of us were occasionally taken to market yet we never bought anything. But one evening a man came into the grocery and asked for starch, and we hoped for bright visiters; but I had no time to enjoy them, for I was sent to make change. The messenger was a manservant, and with the starch in his hand and me in his pocket he soon left the store and went whistling along the street. Then he put his other hand into the pocket and jingled me against the rest of the change in a most unpleasant manner—picking me up and dropping me again just as if red cents had no feeling. I was glad when he reached home, and ran down the area steps and into the kitchen. He gave the starch to the cook, and then marking down on a little bit of paper what he had bought and what he had spent, he carried it with the change into the parlour. But what was my surprise to find that I was in the very same house whence I had gone forth as a golden eagle!

“The old gentleman was asleep in his chair now, and a pretty-looking lady sat by, reading; while the little girl was playing with her doll on the rug. She jumped up and came to the table, and began to count the change.

“‘Two-and-sixpence, mamma—see, here’s a shilling and two sixpences and a fivepence and a red cent,—mamma, may I have this cent?’

“‘It isn’t mine, Nanny—your grandfather gave James the money.’

“‘Well, but you can pay him again,’ said the child; ‘and besides, he’d let me have it, I know.’

“‘What will you do with it, Nanny?’

“‘Don’t you know, mamma, you said you thought you would give me one cent a month to spend?’

“‘To do what you liked with,’ said her mother. ‘Yes, I remember. But what will you do with this one?’

“‘O I don’t know, mamma—I’ll see if grandpa will let me have it.’

“‘Let you have what?’ said the old gentleman, waking up.

“‘This cent, grandpa.’

“‘To be sure you may have it! Of course!—and fifty more.’

“‘No, she must have but one,’ said the lady, with a smile. ‘I am going to give her an allowance of one cent a-month.’

“‘Fiddle-de-dee!’ said the old gentleman. ‘What can she do with that, I should like to know?—one red cent!—Absurd!’

“‘Why she can do just the fiftieth part of what she could with half-a-dollar,’ said the lady, ‘and that will be money matters enough for such a little head. So you may take the cent, Nanny, and spend it as you like,—only I shall want to be told about it afterwards.’

“Nanny thanked her mother, and holding me fast in one hand she sat down on the rug again by her doll. The old gentleman seemed very much amused.

“‘What will you do with it, Nanny?’ he said, bending down to her.—‘Buy candy?’

“Nanny smiled and shook her head.

“‘No, I guess not, grandpa—I don’t know—I’ll see. Maybe I’ll buy beads.’

“At which the old gentleman leaned back in his chair and laughed very heartily.

“From that time, whenever little Nanny went to walk I went too; and she really seemed to be quite fond of me, for though she often stopped before the candy stores or the toy shops, and once or twice went in to look at the beads, yet she always carried me home again.

“‘Mamma, I don’t know how to spend my red cent,’ she said one day.

“‘Are you tired of taking care of it, Nanny?’

“‘No mamma, but I want to spend it.’

“‘Why?’

“‘Why mamma—I don’t know—money’s meant to spend, isn’t it?’

“‘Yes, it is meant to spend—not to throw away.’

“‘O no,’ said Nanny,—‘I wouldn’t throw away my red cent for anything. It’s a very pretty red cent.’

“‘How many ways are there of throwing away money?’ said her mother.

“‘O mamma—a great many! I couldn’t begin to count. You know I might throw it out of the window, mamma, or drop it in the street—or somebody might steal it,—no, then it would only be lost.’

“‘Or you might shut it up in your box and never spend it.’

“‘Why mamma!’ said Nanny opening her eyes very wide, ‘would it be thrown away then?’

“‘Certainly—you might just as well have none. It would do neither you nor any one else any good.’

“‘But I should have it to look at.’

“‘But that is not what money was made for. Your cent would be more really lost than if you threw it out of the window, for then some poor child might pick it up.’

“‘How surprised she would be!’ said Nanny with a very bright face. ‘Mamma, I think I should like to spend my money so. I could stand behind the window-curtain and watch.’

“Her mother smiled.

“‘Why, mamma? do you think there wouldn’t any poor child come along?’

“‘I should like to see that day, dear Nanny. But your cent might fall into the grass in the courtyard, or into the mud, or a horse might tread it down among the paving-stones; and then no one would be the better for it.’

“‘But it’s only one cent, mamma,’ said Nanny,—‘it don’t matter so much, after all.’

“‘Come here Nanny,’ said her mother, and the child came and stood at her side. The lady opened her purse and took out a little gold dollar.

“‘What is this made of?’ said she.

“‘Why of gold, mamma.’

“‘Think again.’

“So Nanny thought and couldn’t think—and laid her head against her mother, and played with the little gold dollar. Then she laid it upon me to see how much smaller it was, and how much brighter. Then she cried out,—

“‘O I know now, mamma! it’s made of a hundred cents.’

“‘Then if every day you lose ‘only a cent,’ in one year you would have lost more than three dollars and a-half. That might do a great deal of good in the world.’

“‘How funny that is!’ said Nanny. ‘Well I’ll try and not lose my cent, mamma.’

“‘There is another reason for not losing it,’ said her mother. ‘In one sense it would make little difference whether or not I threw this little gold dollar into the fire—you see there are plenty more in my purse. But Nanny they do not belong to me.’ And taking up a Bible she read these words,—

“‘The silver and gold are the Lord’s.’

“‘Do you think, Nanny, that it pleases him to have us waste or spend foolishly what he has given us to do good with?’

“‘No mamma. I won’t get my beads then,’ said Nanny with a little sigh.

“‘That would not be waste,’ said her mother kissing her. ‘It is right to spend some of our money for harmless pleasure, and we will go and buy the beads this very afternoon.’

“So after dinner they set forth.

“It was a very cold day, but Nanny and her mother were well wrapped up, so they did not feel it much. Nanny’s fur tippet kept all the cold wind out of her neck, and her little muff kept one hand warm while the other was given to her mamma. When that got cold Nanny changed about, and put it in the muff and the other out. As for me I was in the muff all the time; and I was just wondering to myself what kind of a person the bead-woman would prove to be, when I heard Nanny say,—

“‘Mamma! did you see that little girl on those brown steps? She had no tippet, mamma, and not even a shawl, and her feet were all tucked up in her petticoat; and–’ and Nanny’s voice faltered—‘I think she was crying. I didn’t look at her much, for it made me feel bad, but I thought so.’

“‘Mamma! did you see that little girl on those brown steps?’”—P. 53.

“‘Yes love,’ said her mother, ‘I saw her. How good God has been to me, that it is not my little daughter who is sitting there.’

“‘O mamma!’

“Nanny walked on in silence for about half a block—then she spoke again.

“‘Mamma—I’m afraid a great many poor children want things more than I want my beads.’

“‘I’m afraid they do, Nanny.’

“‘Mamma, will you please go back with me and let me give that little girl my red cent? wouldn’t she be pleased, mamma? would she know how to spend it?’

“‘Suppose you spend it for her, Nanny. People that are cold are often hungry too—shall we go to the baker’s and buy her something to eat?’

“‘O yes!’ said Nanny. ‘Will you buy it, mamma, or shall I?’

“‘You, darling.’

“And when they reached the shop Nanny looked round once more at her mother, and opening the shop-door with a very pleased and excited little face she marched up to the counter.

“‘If you please, sir,’ she said, laying me down on the counter. ‘I want something for a very poor little girl.’

“The baker was a large fat man, in the whitest of shirt-sleeves and aprons, and the blackest pantaloons and vest, over which hung down a heavy gold watch-chain. He put his hands on his sides and looked at Nanny, and then at me, and then at Nanny again.

“‘What do you want, my dear?’ said he.

“Nanny looked round at her mother to reassure herself, and repeated her request.

“‘I want something for a very poor little girl, if you please, sir. She’s sitting out in the street all alone.’ And Nanny’s lips were trembling at the remembrance. Her mother’s eyes were full too.

“‘What will you have, my dear?’ said the baker.

“Nanny looked up at her mother.