gh troubles and tribbylation, which is our lot
in this world, but I've had a many more than most folks.'

'Then you must be quite ready to die?' said Betty, looking at him
thoughtfully.

The old man looked at her; then rubbed his head in a puzzled way.

'I'm no so sure about that, little lassie; I've seen scores brought
into this churchyard and placed in my graves, but there are toimes when
I think o' seeing mysel' let down into a strange grave, and one not cut
half so foine as mine, for I'm up to my trade, and none could do it
better, and I'm thinkin' if that day will wait till I'm ready for it;
well--'twill be a good way off yet!'

Betty knitted her brows in perplexity.

'If you've been through tribulation, you must be very nearly ready for
heaven--the Bible says so.'

'Ay, do it? Let's hear, missy; for sure I've had my lot o' woe, and
the Lord do be marciful!'

For a second time that afternoon Betty repeated the text that was so
occupying her mind and thoughts. The old man listened attentively.

'You see,' said Betty, leaning against an old yew tree and hugging
Prince close to her, 'it's the first part that's so difficult to me,
but it must be quite easy for you. The end of it fits us all, but the
tribulation doesn't fit me.'

'And what be the end of it?' asked the sexton.

'It says, they washed their robes and made them white in the blood of
the Lamb.'

'Ay,' said the old man, after a minute's silence, 'and 'tis the end of
it don't fit me.'

The child looked up, astonishment coming into her blue eyes.

'But that's very easy,' she said, 'that is coming to Jesus and asking
Him to wash our sins away in His blood. I thought everybody did that.
I do it every night, because I'm an awful wicked girl. I'm always
forgetting to be good.'

Again there was silence; the old man looked away over the hills in the
distance. It was just the quietest time in the evening; the birds were
already in their nests for the night,--even the rooks had subsided; and
the stillness and peace around drew his heart and mind upwards. Betty
thought he was looking at the sunset, which was shedding its last
golden rays over the misty blue outlines of the hills across the
horizon. Presently he drew the cuff of his sleeve across his eyes.
'And who be they that the Book says that of?' he asked.

'Why, it's the people in heaven--every one who dies, I s'pose. I like
to think of them there, but I do want dreadfully to join them o