ld man,
whom she called Mr. Dick, who was a relative of hers, and who did
nothing all day but fly big kites and write petitions to the king, which
he began every morning and never finished. All the neighbors thought
Miss Betsy Trotwood a most queer old woman, but those who knew her best
knew that she had a very kind heart under her grim appearance.

When David reached the house Miss Betsy was digging at some flowers in
the garden. All she saw was a ragged, dirty little boy, and she called
out, without even turning her head: "Go away; no boys here!"

But David was so wretched that he went right in at the gate and went up
behind her and said: "If you please, aunt, I'm your nephew."

His aunt was so startled at his looks and at what he said, that she sat
down plump on the ground; and David, his misery getting all at once the
better of him, sobbed out all the pitiful tale of his wrongs and sorrows
since his mother had died.

Miss Betsy Trotwood's heart was touched. She seized David by the collar,
led him into the house, made him drink something and then made him lie
down on the sofa while she fed him hot broth. Then she had a warm bath
prepared, and at last, very tired and comfortable, and wrapped up in a
big shawl, David fell asleep on the sofa.

That night he was put to bed in a clean room, and before he slept he
prayed that he might never be homeless and friendless again.

II

LITTLE EM'LY

Good fortune was with David now. His aunt wrote to Mr. Murdstone, and he
and his sister came, fully expecting to take the boy back with them,
but, instead, Miss Betsy told Mr. Murdstone plainly that he was a
stony-hearted hypocrite, who had broken his wife's heart and tortured
her son, and she ordered him and his sister from the house. David was so
delighted at this that he threw his arms around her neck and kissed her,
and from that moment Miss Betsy Trotwood began to love him as if he had
been her own son.

David loved her in return. He drove out with her and helped Mr. Dick fly
his kites and was very grateful. And at length his aunt placed him in a
school in Dover and found him pleasant lodgings there in the house of
her lawyer, Mr. Wickfield.

It was a different sort of school from what his first had been. His
teacher was a Doctor Strong, and the school-boys were not the
frightened, ill-treated lot he had known at Mr. Creakle's house. He was
happy there, but his happiest hours of all were those spent, after
school w