t hidden away in muffs and coat-pockets, but
were ready for the friendly shake which, with "all the good wishes of
the season," awaited them at every step.

Mrs. Campbell and her little girls, after many a greeting of this kind,
found their way into the town at last; and the children soon forgot
everything in the twelfth-cakes which adorned the pastry-cooks' windows,
till the sixpence, which was tightly clasped in each little hand,
recalled them to their errand, and they joined the busy crowd in the
toy-shop. Who does not know what it is to take a child into these abodes
of Noah's arks, cats, dogs, mice, and dolls, and all that is so
charming? How each toy is seized on in its turn, to be relinquished in a
moment for one more beautiful! It was no easy task that Mrs. Campbell
had undertaken; but at last, in a moment of ecstasy over two blue-eyed
dolls, the sixpences were paid, and the young purchasers drawn away from
further temptation. And we, too, must wish them good-by, with the hope
that the next new year may find them bright and happy still, and that
before many more have passed over them they will have learnt a wiser and
a better way of spending their father's gift; a way in which their
sixpence, though it be but a sixpence, will be returned in tenfold
blessings on their heads.

It is with one of the little pieces of silver which have just rung in
the till that we have to do. It had lain there for about two hours, the
same scenes going on around it which we have witnessed with its owner of
the morning, when a tall moustachioed young man entered the shop, which
was not exclusively devoted to toys, and asked to be shown some gold
pencil-cases. His choice was soon made, the money paid, and our friend
the Sixpence received in change. Ah, Sixpence! what sort of hands have
you fallen into now? We have undertaken to follow your fortunes for a
time, and therefore, uncomfortable as our quarters may be, we must take
up our abode with you in Captain Crawford's waistcoat-pocket, and go
where he pleases to lead us. Up High Street and Smith Street to Grange
Road, where we mount and away from houses and streets and the
fashionable world; among the fields and hedges, just decking themselves
with Daisies and Celandines, and every now and then, at the top of the
many little hills which the road crosses, comes a peep of the bright
blue sea, from which, go where we will, we can never get very far away
in Guernsey. After a short ride,