pon having my bonnet, I reached Bridget's
door in safety.

There they were, all in a heap, as usual,--Michael and Johnny, and
Sammy and Pat, and Fanny and Katy, and Mike and the baby. Bridget's
face shone like a new milk-pan, when I opened the door (she knows I
pity her); she flew round and got me a wooden chair, scrubbed the
baby's face with her apron, put one hand on Mike's hair to make it lie
down, sent Snip, the dog, yelping under the bed, and asked me how I
did; while Jim knocked the ashes out of his pipe, twitched a lock of
hair that hung over his forehead, and scraped out his hind foot, by way
of a bow.

Presently Johnny began to whisper to Sammy, and Sammy whispered to
Mike, and Mike whispered to his mother; and then his mother got up and
gave them something out of the closet, which they came and laid in my
lap, with their eyes shining like a cat's in the dark. And when I held
it up to the light, it turned out to be two new jackets, one for Sammy
and one for Johnny, that their good, thrifty mother had made out of an
old coat that somebody had given her.

Of course, I admired them; and of course, I buttoned the little boys up
in them; and of course, they strutted round, as smart as little
corporals; and Sammy shook his red head, and said he would "like to
hear Brian Doherty call him a beggar _now_!"

Bridget smiled, and said, "It takes so little to make the poor lads
happy;" and then, Johnny pulled at my gown again, and pointed up in the
corner, and right between the windows, where nearly every pane of glass
was broken out, stood a brand new cooking stove, with all its shining
pots and pans and kettles, set in order on the top, as if the most
magnificent dinner that ever was dreamed of, was hissing and stewing
and broiling and baking and roasting inside.

As to Sammy, he lifted up all the lids, and poked his nose in, as if he
could already smell the dinner. Mike spread out his little blue hands,
as if _some time or other_ they would get warm over it; Johnny
shouldered the poker and showed me how they were going to rattle the
coal out when somebody should give mother work enough to earn money to
buy it, and the baby got well enough to let her do it. Then Sammy held
the light, and we all walked in a procession, round and round the
stove, and voted it a most magnificent affair.

But how did they get it? That's what I wanted to know. Stoves cost
money. Sammy saw I was dying to know, so he whispered in my ear,