shook up the cushion of a rocking chair for Mr. Redwood, and made a thousand apologies for the confusion and dirt of her house, which had the usual if not the intended effect of calling forth abundance of compliments on its perfect order and neatness. "And now, Peggy," she said, as soon as they were all quietly seated, "take the pitcher and bring some cold water from the spring, that's what the poor have, thank God, as good as the rich, and it is all we have to offer." The little girl obeyed, and as soon as she was out of hearing, the woman turned to Westall. "It was your wish, Sir, to know what ailed the child; the poor thing has just got the use of her eyesight, and she has been expecting some one that she loves better than all the world; and when she saw this young lady with you, she thought it was her friend-though to be sure she is shorter than this lady; but then Peggy, poor thing, does not see quite right yet, and

then when she is puzzled she just lies down to the ground as you saw her, for that was her way to listen, and she knows Miss Ellen's step, for as light as it is, when my poor ear can't hear a sound."

"How did she become blind, my good woman, and how did she recover her sight?" asked Westall.

"It is a long story, Sir: when she was one year old, she laid in the measles, and her mother dying at the same time, and I sick of a fever, and the child, God forgive me, was neglected, and there came a blind over her eyes, and shut them up in darkness." "Not all darkness," said the little heroine of the story, who reentered with the water, you know, aunt Betty, I could see a glimmer of sunshine." 66 Yes, and that it was that gave the doctor hopes of her." "No, no," interrupted the child, "it was Miss Ellen that gave the doctor hopes."

66

"Lord bless her," continued the woman, smiling, "Peggy thinks there's

nothing good done in the world, but Miss Ellen does it, and to be sure she has been an angel to Peggy."

"And how," asked Mr. Redwood, whose interest in Peggy's history seemed much augmented since the mention of Miss Ellen, "how came Miss Bruce to know your child ?"

"God brought them together, Sir; it was his own work; but the child is not mine, her poor mother lies in the graveyard there in the village, far from all her own people, for we are from old England, Sir. My sister, poor Fanny, was a wild thing, the youngest of ten of us, and I the oldest. My mother died and left her a baby in my arms; and she was like my own, and we all, and father more than all, petted her, and when she was sixteen, she had just her own way, and married a young soldier lad of our village, and my father turned her from his door, and would not hear to forgiving her. But I, Lord help me! I had no

right not to forgive her; and so I came over to Canada with her when her husband's regiment was ordered there. I had a little money of my own, and we paid our own way, but when that was gone, our distresses and hardships threw her in the consumption. Her husband got into bad company, deserted and came off to the States; we followed-she with the baby-Peggy that is-in her arms. We persuaded her husband to take this bit of a place, but he soon left us, and, as I told you before, Fanny died, and left me alone in the world, as you may say, with Peggy and she blind; but, Sir, I have always been of a contented disposition, and I meant to be resigned to whatever it pleased the Lord to send upon me; but I must own, when I found Peggy was blind, and the doctors told me nothing could be done for her, I had my match. It was the bitterest sorrow I ever felt when life was spared, but I thought to myself, what can't be cured

must be endured; so I went to work. The Lord has blessed us, and Peggy and I have lived these six years as comfortable and as contented may be as those that are richer, and seem to be happier."

"No doubt, no doubt, my good woman," said Mr. Redwood, struck with admiration of the simple creature's prac tical philosophy; "but you have told us so much of your story that you must give us the rest."

“do,

"Yes, yes," said little Peggy, aunt Betty, tell them about Miss Ellen, they'll like to hear that best of all: now don't go away," said she, turning to Caroline, who had risen from her chair, and was walking towards the door.

"I am not going away, child," she answered, pettishly, "I prefer standing at the door."

"It is five weeks to-morrow," continued the narrator, "since I first saw Miss Ellen; it was the very morning after young Mr. Allen's funeral. I saw her