what the minister told
you, and he knows, for he's had a good chance to try it, preachin' all
the time without half enough pay, and a donation now and then. Any way,
it will be all the same a hundred years hence. There's the vittals I've
been gettin ready, and now this young woman's come to sit by you, I'll
run home and look after Tommy. Expect he's in the cistern by this time.
If you want me, you can send Ruth, you know. Good night."

"Good night, and thank you, Mrs. Deane," said the widow, and then turned
again to Clemence, "They told me you was pretty, Miss," she said, gazing
with pleasure at the pure, sweet face. "My Ruth just loved you from the
first. You don't know how grateful I have felt towards you for being
kind to the little fatherless creature."

"Oh, don't thank me, indeed," said Clemence, "you would not, if you only
knew how I have been reproaching myself for not coming before. Tell me
something I can do for you."

"There is not much more for me in this world," was the reply; "but I
feel burdened with care about the child. I suppose you can't understand
a mother's feelings, young lady, and it is weak in me to give up so, but
I can't die and leave my little helpless girl alone in the world. Oh, if
I could only take her with me?"

"I see how you are situated," said Clemence, "you need a friend to help
you. Have you no relatives to look to?"

"No one in the whole, wide world. Little Ruth and me are alone. You must
have heard how her father died. My poor, misguided husband! He might
have surrounded us with plenty, but evil companions dragged him on to a
dreadful end. He was an only son. His parents died, and left him with a
few hundred dollars. I had always hired out before I was married, for I
had no one to look to, as I was an orphan. I had, however, saved quite a
little sum out of my wages, and this, with what James had, gave us quite
a fair start in life. But he took to drink, and that was the last of our
happiness. I have buried five children, and this girl is the only one
left. Would that God had taken her, too."

"How you must have suffered," said her young listener, down whose face
sympathetic tears had been streaming, during the woman's pathetic
recital. "It cannot be that you will be left to despair in your dying
hour. Try and hope for the best, and be resigned to what may be in store
for you, remembering it is His will."

"I do try," said the woman, meekly; "and you, will you pray for me?"