lived long enough to be baptized," he added hastily.

"No, your Eminence, no. That's just what I said to that Smith girl last
spring, when, being a heavy sleeper, I happened to overlie her brat and
woke up to find it flat and blue. When she saw it she took on, bellowing
like a heifer that has lost its first calf, and I said to her, 'Mary,
this isn't me; it's Heaven. Mary, you should be very thankful, since my
burden has rid you of your burden, and you can bury such a tiny one for
next to nothing. Mary, cry a little if you like, for that's natural with
the first, but don't come here flying in the face of Heaven with your
railings, and gates, and posts--especially the rails, for Heaven hates
'em.'"

"Ah!" asked the Abbot, with mild interest, "and pray what did Mary do
then?"

"Do, the graceless wench? Why, she said, 'Is it rails you're talking of,
you pig-smothering old sow? Then here's a rail for you,' and she pulled
the top bar off my own fence--for we were talking by the door--oak it
was, and three by two--and knocked me flat--here's the scar of it on my
head--singing out, 'Is that enough, or will you have the gate and the
posts too?' Oh! If there's one thing I hate, it is railing, 'specially
if made of hard oak and held edgeways."

So the wicked old hag babbled on, after her hideous fashion, while the
Abbot stared at the ceiling.

"Enough of these sad stories of vice and violence. Such mischances will
happen, and of course you were not to blame. Now, good Mistress Megges,
will you undertake this case, which cannot be left to ignorant nuns?
Though times are hard here, since of late many losses have fallen on our
house, your skill shall be well paid."

The woman shuffled her big feet and stared at the floor, then looked up
suddenly with a glance that seemed to bore to his heart like a bradawl,
and asked--

"And if perchance the blessed babe should fly to heaven through my
fingers, as in my time I have known dozens of them do, should I still
get that pay?"

"Then," the Abbot answered, with a smile--a somewhat sickly smile--"then
I think, mistress, you should have double pay, to console you for your
sorrow and for any doubts that might be thrown upon your skill."

"Now that's noble trading," she replied, with an evil leer, "such as
one might hope for from an Abbot. But, my Lord, they say the Nunnery is
haunted, and I can't face ghosts. Man or woman, with rails or without
'em, Mother Flounder doesn't mind, but