r the father must
allays hev him in our sight--that we must."

She stroked Aaron's brown head, and thought it must do Master Marner
good to see such a "pictur of a child". But Marner, on the other side
of the hearth, saw the neat-featured rosy face as a mere dim round,
with two dark spots in it.

"And he's got a voice like a bird--you wouldn't think," Dolly went on;
"he can sing a Christmas carril as his father's taught him; and I take
it for a token as he'll come to good, as he can learn the good tunes so
quick. Come, Aaron, stan' up and sing the carril to Master Marner,
come."

Aaron replied by rubbing his forehead against his mother's shoulder.

"Oh, that's naughty," said Dolly, gently. "Stan' up, when mother tells
you, and let me hold the cake till you've done."

Aaron was not indisposed to display his talents, even to an ogre, under
protecting circumstances; and after a few more signs of coyness,
consisting chiefly in rubbing the backs of his hands over his eyes, and
then peeping between them at Master Marner, to see if he looked anxious
for the "carril", he at length allowed his head to be duly adjusted,
and standing behind the table, which let him appear above it only as
far as his broad frill, so that he looked like a cherubic head
untroubled with a body, he began with a clear chirp, and in a melody
that had the rhythm of an industrious hammer

"God rest you, merry gentlemen,
Let nothing you dismay,
For Jesus Christ our Savior
Was born on Christmas-day."

Dolly listened with a devout look, glancing at Marner in some
confidence that this strain would help to allure him to church.

"That's Christmas music," she said, when Aaron had ended, and had
secured his piece of cake again. "There's no other music equil to the
Christmas music--"Hark the erol angils sing." And you may judge what
it is at church, Master Marner, with the bassoon and the voices, as you
can't help thinking you've got to a better place a'ready--for I
wouldn't speak ill o' this world, seeing as Them put us in it as knows
best--but what wi' the drink, and the quarrelling, and the bad
illnesses, and the hard dying, as I've seen times and times, one's
thankful to hear of a better. The boy sings pretty, don't he, Master
Marner?"

"Yes," said Silas, absently, "very pretty."

The Christmas carol, with its hammer-like rhythm, had fallen on his
ears as strange music, quite unlike a hymn, and could have none of the
effect Dolly