urn, did he not?" said the farmer
to Bob.

"He saved me from--" the boy coloured and paused,--

"From want, I suppose," said Grange, ending his sentence for him, and
stroking back Oddity's sleek ears.

"From worse," said Bob, looking down.

"Not from death?"

"Worse than that," murmured the boy.

"Eh?" said the farmer, in surprise.

"But for him what should I have been now! Oh sir!" cried Bob, suddenly
raising his eyes, "I've often thought I should have told you this
before,-- before you took me in here,-- me and my brother too,-- and
treated us so kindly, and trusted us and all. You should have known what
I was before that day when Captain Blake-- bless him for it!-- first
took me into a ragged school."

"My business is with what you are, not what you were," said the farmer,
kindly; but Bob did not seem to hear the interruption, for he continued,
in an agitated voice, the tears rising into and then overflowing his
eyes:-- "He found me a poor, ignorant, miserable creature, not knowing
so much as that it was a sin to take what was not my own. He found me
with no comfort and no hope, going on the broad way which leads to the
prison and the gallows; and worse,-- worse beyond,-- I know that now. He
found me a wretched thief, and he did not hate me, despise me, despair
of me: he gave me a chance, he gave me a friend! Blessings on him!-- he
saved me from ruin!"

Here let me drop the curtain, here let me close my tale. These are
feelings, these are scenes, into which higher beings alone can enter;
they are too solemn for a story like mine.

And here I and my companions divide;-- I to luxuriate for awhile in the
plenty with which rich autumn crowns the fields around; my bold comrade
to return to the city, and there, in new adventures, to display a
sagacity and courage which even the lords of the creation would admire
if belonging to any race but ours; Oddity, in the happy home of his kind
master, remains to share the board and the hearth,-- an instance that
even a rat can show fidelity to man, where man can show mercy to a rat!

Perhaps the human race would despise us less proudly, and persecute us
less severely,-- perhaps even boys would take less pleasure in
torturing, worrying, and hunting us down,-- if our characters and
instincts were better known. Who can say that some truth may not be
learned, some lesson of kindliness gained, even from a narration simple
as mine,-- the history of

THE RAMBLES OF A RAT.