her aunt sent her to work in the dairy, and to sleep in
the back garret. All the day she scoured pails, scrubbed dishes, and
washed crockery-ware; but every night she slept in the back garret as
sound as a princess could sleep in her palace.

One day during the harvest season, when this rich farmer's corn had been
all cut down and housed, he invited the neighbors to a harvest supper.
The West Country people came in their holiday clothes, and they were
making merry, when a poor old woman came to the back door, begging for
broken victuals and a night's lodging. Her clothes were coarse and
ragged; her hair was scanty and gray; her back was bent; her teeth were
gone. In short she was the poorest and ugliest old woman that ever came
begging. The first who saw her was the kitchen-maid, and she ordered
her off; but Child Charity, hearing the noise, came out from her seat at
the foot of the lowest table, and asked the old woman to take her share
of the supper, and sleep that night in her bed in the back garret. The
old woman sat down without a word of thanks. Child Charity scraped the
pots for her supper that night, and slept on a sack among the lumber,
while the old woman rested in her warm bed; and next morning, before the
little girl awoke, she was up and gone, without so much as saying thank
you.

Next day, at supper-time, who should come to the back door but the old
woman, again asking for broken victuals and a night's lodging. No one
would listen to her, till Child Charity rose from her seat and kindly
asked her to take her supper, and sleep in her bed. Again the old woman
sat down without a word. Child Charity scraped the pots for her supper,
and slept on the sack. In the morning the old woman was gone; but for
six nights after, as sure as the supper was spread, there was she at the
door, and the little girl regularly asked her in.

Sometimes the old woman said, "Child, why don't you make this bed
softer? and why are your blankets so thin?" But she never gave her a
word of thanks nor a civil good-morning. At last, on the ninth night
from her first coming, her accustomed knock came to the door, and there
she stood with an ugly dog that no herd-boy would keep.

"Good-evening, my little girl," she said, when Child Charity opened the
door. "I will not have your supper and bed to-night--I am going on a
long journey to see a friend; but here is a dog of mine, whom nobody in
all the West Country will keep for me. He is a lit