village. She had travelled in this manner for some months, when she drew
near her native glen, and the cottage that had been her father's, that
had been her own, stood before her. She had travelled all the day and
sold nothing. Her children were pulling by her tattered gown, weeping
and crying, "Bread, mother, give us bread!" and her own heart was sick
with hunger.

"Oh, wheesht, my darlings, wheesht!" she exclaimed, and she fell upon
her knees and threw her arms round the necks of all the three, "you will
get bread soon; the Almighty will not permit my bairns to perish; no,
no; ye shall have bread."

In despair she hurried to the cottage of her birth. The door was opened
by one who had been a rejected suitor. He gazed upon her intently for a
few seconds; and she was still young, being scarce more than
six-and-twenty, and in the midst of her wretchedness, yet lovely.

"Gude gracious, Tibby Fowler!" he exclaimed, "is that you? Poor
creature! are ye seeking charity? Weel, I think ye'll mind what I said
to you now, that your pride would have a fa'!"

While the heartless owner of the cottage yet spoke, a voice behind her
was heard exclaiming, "It is her! it is her! my ain Tibby and her
bairns!"

At the well-known voice, Tibby uttered a wild scream of joy, and fell
senseless on the earth; but the next moment her husband, William Gordon,
raised her to his breast. Three weeks before he had returned to Britain,
and traced her from village to village, till he found her in the midst
of their children, on the threshold of the place of her nativity. His
story we need not here tell. He had fallen into the hands of the enemy;
he had been retained for months on board of their vessel; and when a
storm had arisen, and hope was gone, he had saved her from being lost
and her crew from perishing. In reward for his services, his own vessel
had been restored to him, and he was returned to his country, after an
absence of eighteen months, richer than when he left, and laden with
honours. The rest is soon told. After Tibby and her husband had wept
upon each other's neck, and he had kissed his children, and again their
mother, with his youngest child on one arm, and his wife resting on the
other, he hastened from the spot that had been the scene of such
bitterness and transport. In a few years more, William Gordon having
obtained a competency, they re-purchased the cottage in the glen, where
Tibby Fowler lived to see her children's childre