y, as
Lucy had told it to her, and had come down to see her. She stood by,
putting her thin hand on hers, and looking up wonderingly in her face,
exciting Nelly's compassion and interest by her sweet, delicate look.
"She's more like an angel than Miss Stella, though I used to think her
like one," thought Nelly.

Amy asked many questions about Nelly and the "poor man," and begged
Lucy to take her when she went to see them. But so long a walk was out
of the question for Amy, nor would her mother have consented to let
either her or Stella go to such a quarter of the city. Even Lucy's
going was a matter for some consideration, but she begged hard to be
allowed to fulfil her promise. At last Edwin good-naturedly said he
"didn't mind going with Lucy, to see that she wasn't carried off for
her clothes, like the little girl in the story-books;" and they made
the expedition together, her cousin waiting outside while Lucy paid
her most welcome visit.

They found the place a very quiet one, and the street, though poor,
not at all disreputable. Edwin gave the best account of it he could,
that Lucy might be able in future, without his escort, to visit Nelly,
as she occasionally did, accompanied by her friend Mary Eastwood, who
sometimes spent the Saturday afternoon with her at Mr. Brooke's. Their
visits and little gifts of money were very timely, for the poor
organ-grinder was growing less and less able to persevere in his
uncertain calling; and though Nelly was practising plain sewing, that
she might be able to earn something herself, it was not likely that
her exertions could bring in much.

In these visits to Nelly the two friends soon found out other poor
people in the same locality, even more urgently needing a kind word
and a helping hand. In work of this kind, as in most other things, "it
is only the first step which costs." One has only to make a beginning,
and straightway one case leads to another, and that interest grows
with the work, until to some happy and highly-privileged people it
really becomes their meat and drink thus to do their Father's
business.

This new kind of work was a great interest to Lucy, and in planning
how best to aid the poor in whom she was interested, and in diligent
and happy study, the autumn months passed rapidly away.

XV.

_The Flower Fadeth._

"And yet His words mean more than they,
And yet He owns their praise;
Why should we think He turns away
From inf