e,
without any one's ever knowing of the other--and, indeed, if they had
known, they couldn't have said it was naughty of him--he held out his
hand with the biscuit already in it, and said quite simply, not the
least as if he thought he was doing anything very good, "Him has one,
zank you."

"Honest little man," said mother, and then Baby's face got red, and he
did look pleased. For mother does not praise us often, but when she
does it is for something to be a little proud of, you see, and even Baby
understands that.

And Auntie turned and gave him a kiss.

"You dear little fellow," she said; and then in a minute, she added,
"that reminds me of something I came across the other day."

"What was it? Oh, do tell us, Auntie," we all cried.

Auntie smiled--we are always on the look-out for stories, and she knows
that.

"It was nothing much, dears," she said, "nothing I could make a story
of, but it was pretty, and it touched me."

"Was it a bear," said Baby, "or a woof that touched you?"

"Silly boy," said "Budder"; "how could it be a bear or a woof? Auntie
said it was something pretty."

And when she had left off laughing, she told us.

"It was the other day," she said, "I was walking along one of the
principal streets of Edinburgh, thinking to myself how bitterly cold it
was for May. Spring has been late everywhere this year, but down here in
the south, though you may think you have had something to complain of,
you can have no idea how cold we have had it; and the long light days
seem to make it worse somehow! Well, I was walking along quietly, when I
caught sight of a poor little boy hopping across the road. I say
'hopping,' because it gives you the best idea of the queer way he got
along, for he was terribly crippled, and his only way of moving was by
something between a jerk and a hop on his crutches. And yet he managed
to come so quickly! You would really have been amused to see the kind of
fly he came with, and how cleverly he dodged and darted in and out of
the cabs and carriages, for it was the busiest time of the day. And
fancy, children, his poor little legs and feet from his knees were quite
bare. That is not a very unusual sight in Edinburgh, and not by any
means at all times one to call forth pity. Indeed, I know one merry
family of boys and girls who all make a point of 'casting' shoes and
stockings when they get to the country in summer, and declare they are
much happier without. Their father a