his blue eyes to
his father's face he said, "And what did you do to the boy?"

"I first tried to relieve a little his pressing bodily wants; to take
from him, at least for one day, the temptation to commit a theft. But I
knew that the temptation would recur again, and as long as he continued
in blind ignorance, there could be small hope that he would even wish to
resist it. I remembered that my watchmaker had given me the direction of
a Ragged School at which his daughter taught; spending her time and
energies as so many do now, in this noblest labour of love. This school
was not very far off, and I resolved to take this opportunity of paying
it a long-intended visit. I took the poor little fellow with me, and
spoke to the superintendent, who readily agreed to receive him. He will
there learn some way to earn his bread honestly; he will be taught to
know right from wrong; he will hear, perhaps for the first time, the
voice of kindness; and he may yet live to be respectable, useful, and
happy."

"Oh! papa, do you think that after once being a thief he is ever likely
to turn out good for anything!"

"The experiment has been tried over and over again, Neddy, and many
times it has been mercifully attended with success. The idle _have_
become industrious, the thieves honest, the vicious been reclaimed, the
lost found and saved! I will tell you a striking occurrence which really
took place in a reformatory for thieves. Not one of the inmates there
but had broken the laws of his country, and committed the crime of
theft. But mercy was giving them a chance to redeem the characters which
they had lost, and they were learning various trades, by which to
support themselves in honest independence. A subscription, as you may
remember, was raised at the time of the war with Russia, to help the
widows and orphans of our gallant soldiers. From the Sovereign on her
throne, to the labourer in the field, from rich and poor, high and low,
contributions to the Patriotic Fund poured in.

"The thieves in the reformatory heard of the subscription; they longed
to aid it, but what could they do? they had no money, they owed their
very bread to charity, for they had not yet acquired sufficient skill in
the trades which they were learning, to pay even their necessary
expenses."

"They could not give what they had not got, papa, if they wished to be
generous ever so much."

"Where there is a will there is a way, Neddy. These poor fellows we