y his own feelings.

"The poor child!" said she, at length--"the poor, poor child! what
it will have to struggle through and endure! Do you remember Thomas
Wilkins, and the way he threw the registry of his birth and baptism
back in your face? Why, he would not have the situation; he went to
sea and was drowned, rather than present the record of his shame."

"I do remember it all. It has often haunted me. She must strengthen
her child to look to God, rather than to man's opinion. It will be
the discipline, the penance, she has incurred. She must teach it to
be (humanly speaking) self-dependent."

"But after all," said Miss Benson (for she had known and esteemed
poor Thomas Wilkins, and had mourned over his untimely death, and
the recollection thereof softened her)--"after all, it might be
concealed. The very child need never know its illegitimacy."

"How?" asked her brother.

"Why--we know so little about her yet; but in that letter, it said
she had no friends;--now, could she not go into quite a fresh place,
and be passed off as a widow?"

Ah, tempter! unconscious tempter! Here was a way of evading the
trials for the poor little unborn child, of which Mr Benson had never
thought. It was the decision--the pivot, on which the fate of years
moved; and he turned it the wrong way. But it was not for his own
sake. For himself, he was brave enough to tell the truth; for the
little helpless baby, about to enter a cruel, biting world, he was
tempted to evade the difficulty. He forgot what he had just said, of
the discipline and penance to the mother consisting in strengthening
her child to meet, trustfully and bravely, the consequences of her
own weakness. He remembered more clearly the wild fierceness, the
Cain-like look, of Thomas Wilkins, as the obnoxious word in the
baptismal registry told him that he must go forth branded into the
world, with his hand against every man's, and every man's against
him.

"How could it be managed, Faith?"

"Nay, I must know much more, which she alone can tell us, before I
can see how it is to be managed. It is certainly the best plan."

"Perhaps it is," said her brother, thoughtfully, but no longer
clearly or decidedly; and so the conversation dropped.

Ruth moved the bed-curtain aside, in her soft manner, when Miss
Benson re-entered the room; she did not speak, but she looked at her
as if she wished her to come near. Miss Benson went and stood by her.
Ruth took her hand in hers an