was very hungry. Now they were but
provided with dinner, which was, of course, to be eaten as near twelve
o'clock as might be; and Margaret Hall, in her prudence, asked a
working-man near to tell her what o'clock it was.

"Nay," said he, "I'll ne'er look at clock or watch to-day. I'll not
spoil my pleasure by finding out how fast it's going away. If thou'rt
hungry, eat. I make my own dinner hour, and I have eaten mine an hour
ago."

So they had their veal pies, and then found out it was only about
half-past ten o'clock; by so many pleasurable events had that morning
been marked. But such was their buoyancy of spirits, that they only
enjoyed their mistake, and joined in the general laugh against the man
who had eaten his dinner somewhere about nine. He laughed most heartily
of all, till, suddenly stopping, he said,--

"I must not go on at this rate; laughing gives one such an appetite."

"Oh! if that's all," said a merry-looking man, lying at full length, and
brushing the fresh scent out of the grass, while two or three little
children tumbled over him, and crept about him, as kittens or puppies
frolic with their parents, "if that's all, we'll have a subscription of
eatables for them improvident folk as have eaten their dinner for their
breakfast. Here's a sausage pasty and a handful of nuts for my share.
Bring round a hat, Bob, and see what the company will give."

Bob carried out the joke, much to little Franky's amusement; and no one
was so churlish as to refuse, although the contributions varied from a
peppermint drop up to a veal pie and a sausage pasty.

"It's a thriving trade," said Bob, as he emptied his hatful of
provisions on the grass by Libbie's side. "Besides, it's tiptop, too, to
live on the public. Hark! what is that?"

The laughter and the chat were suddenly hushed, and mothers told their
little ones to listen,--as, far away in the distance, now sinking and
falling, now swelling and clear, came a ringing peal of children's
voices, blended together in one of those psalm tunes which we are all
of us familiar with, and which bring to mind the old, old days, when we,
as wondering children, were first led to worship "Our Father," by those
beloved ones who have since gone to the more perfect worship. Holy was
that distant choral praise, even to the most thoughtless; and when it,
in fact, was ended, in the instant's pause, during which the ear awaits
the repetition of the air, they caught the noontide hu