behind him.

"What are you doing there?" said the baker's wife to the child, whom she
also had thought to be fairly off. "Don't you like the bread?"

"Oh yes, ma'am!" said the child.

"Well, then, carry it to your mother, my little friend. If you wait any
longer, she will think you are playing by the way, and you will get a
scolding."

The child did not seem to hear. Something else absorbed his attention.

The baker's wife went up to him, and gave him a friendly tap on the
shoulder, "What _are_ you thinking about?" said she.

"Ma'am," said the little boy, "what is it that sings?"

"There is no singing," said she.

"Yes!" cried the little fellow. "Hear it! Queek, queek, queek, queek!"

My friend and the woman both listened, but they could hear nothing,
unless it was the song of the crickets, frequent guests in bakers'
houses.

"It is a little bird," said the dear little fellow; "or perhaps the
bread sings when it bakes, as apples do?"

"No, indeed, little goosey!" said the baker's wife; "those are crickets.
They sing in the bakehouse because we are lighting the oven, and they
like to see the fire."

"Crickets!" said the child; "are they really crickets?"

"Yes, to be sure," said she good-humoredly. The child's face lighted up.

"Ma'am," said he, blushing at the boldness of his request, "I would like
it very much if you would give me a cricket."

"A cricket!" said the baker's wife, smiling; "what in the world would
you do with a cricket, my little friend? I would gladly give you all
there are in the house, to get rid of them, they run about so."

"O ma'am, give me one, only one, if you please!" said the child,
clasping his little thin hands under the big loaf. "They say that
crickets bring good luck into houses; and perhaps if we had one at home,
mother, who has so much trouble, wouldn't cry any more."

"Why does your poor mamma cry?" said my friend, who could no longer help
joining in the conversation.

"On account of her bills, sir," said the little fellow. "Father is dead,
and mother works very hard, but she cannot pay them all."

My friend took the child, and with him the great loaf, into his arms,
and I really believe he kissed them both. Meanwhile the baker's wife,
who did not dare to touch a cricket herself, had gone into the
bakehouse. She made her husband catch four, and put them into a box with
holes in the cover, so that they might breathe. She gave the box to the
child, who went away per