blue mist rising up round about it. Heaven
forgive me!--I was punished for meddling with what Providence had sent
for some better purpose than to be carried home by an old woman like me,
whom it has pleased heaven to afflict with the loss of one leg, and the
pain, ixpinse, and inconvenience of a wooden one. Well--I _was_
punished; covetousness had its reward; for, presently, the violet light
got very pale, and then went out; and when I reached home, still holding
in both hands all I had gathered up, and when I took it to the candle,
it had turned into the red shell of a lobsky's head, and its two black
eyes poked up at me with a long stare--and I may say, a strong smell
too--enough to knock a poor body down."

Great applause, and no little laughter, followed the conclusion of old
Peggy's story, but she did not join in the merriment. She said it was
all very well for young people to laugh, but at her age she had enough
to do to pray; and she had never said so many prayers, nor with so much
fervency, as she had done since she received the blessed sight of the
blue star on the dust-heap, and the chastising rod of the lobster's
head at home.

Little Jem's turn now came; the poor lad was, however, so excited by the
recollection of what his companions called "Jem's Ghost," that he was
unable to describe it in any coherent language. To his imagination it
had been a lovely vision--the one "bright consummate flower" of his
life, which he treasured up as the most sacred image in his heart. He
endeavored, in wild and hasty words, to set forth, how that he had been
bred a chimney-sweep; that one Sunday afternoon he had left a set of
companions, most on 'em sweeps, who were all playing at marbles in the
church-yard, and he had wandered to the dust-heap, where he had fallen
asleep; that he was awoke by a sweet voice in the air, which said
something about some one having lost her way!--that he, being now wide
awake, looked up, and saw with his own eyes a young angel, with fair
hair and rosy cheeks, and large white wings at her shoulders, floating
about like bright clouds, rise out of the dust! She had on a garment of
shining crimson, which changed as he looked upon her to shining gold,
then to purple and gold. She then exclaimed, with a joyful smile, "I see
the right way!" and the next moment the angel was gone.

As the sun was just now very bright and warm for the time of the year,
and shining full upon the dust-heap in its setting