amentable little mouthfuls of
peas-pudding, greens, and potatoes at a halfpenny each. Pale children
in corners supped on penny basins of soup, and looked with hungry
admiration at their enviable neighbours who could afford to buy stewed
eels for twopence. Everywhere there was the same noble resignation to
their hard fate, in old and young alike. No impatience, no complaints.
In this wretched place, the language of true gratitude was still to be
heard, thanking the good-natured cook for a little spoonful of
gravy thrown in for nothing--and here, humble mercy that had its one
superfluous halfpenny to spare gave that halfpenny to utter destitution,
and gave it with right good-will. Amelius spent all his shillings and
sixpences, in doubling and trebling the poor little pennyworths of
food--and left the place with tears in his eyes.

He was near the end of the street by this time. The sight of the misery
about him, and the sense of his own utter inability to remedy it,
weighed heavily on his spirits. He thought of the peaceful and
prosperous life at Tadmor. Were his happy brethren of the Community and
these miserable people about him creatures of the same all-merciful God?
The terrible doubts which come to all thinking men--the doubts which are
not to be stifled by crying "Oh, fie!" in a pulpit--rose darkly in his
mind. He quickened his pace. "Let me let out of it," he said to himself,
"let me get out of it!"

BOOK THE SIXTH. FILIA DOLOROSA

CHAPTER 1

Amelius found it no easy matter to pass quickly through the people
loitering and gossiping about him. There was greater freedom for a rapid
walker in the road. He was on the point of stepping off the pavement,
when a voice behind him--a sweet soft voice, though it spoke very
faintly--said, "Are you good-natured, sir?"

He turned, and found himself face to face with one of the saddest
sisterhood on earth--the sisterhood of the streets.

His heart ached as he looked at her, she was so poor and so young. The
lost creature had, to all appearance, barely passed the boundary between
childhood and girlhood--she could hardly be more than fifteen or sixteen
years old. Her eyes, of the purest and loveliest blue, rested on Amelius
with a vacantly patient look, like the eyes of a suffering child. The
soft oval outline of her face would have been perfect if the cheeks
had been filled out; they were wasted and hollow, and sadly pale. Her
delicate lips had none of the rosy c