little daughter had done something to be proud
of.

It seems that in the village there was an old woman frightfully
disfigured by fire, and not quite sane as the people thought. She was
harmless, but never showed herself by day, and only came out at night to
work in her garden or take the air. Many of the ignorant peasants feared
her, however; for the country abounds in fairy legends, and strange
tales of ghosts and goblins. But the more charitable left bread at her
door, and took in return the hose she knit or the thread she spun.

During the drought it was observed that _her_ garden, though the
steepest and stoniest, was never dry; _her_ cabbages flourished when her
neighbours' withered, and _her_ onions stood up green and tall as if
some special rain-spirit watched over them. People wondered and shook
their heads, but could not explain it, for Mother Lobineau was too
infirm to carry much water up the steep path, and who would help her
unless some of her own goblin friends did it?

This idea was suggested by the story of a peasant returning late at
night, who had seen something white flitting to and fro in the
garden-patch, and when he called to it saw it vanish most mysteriously.
This made quite a stir in the town; others watched also, saw the white
phantom in the starlight, and could not tell where it went when it
vanished behind the chestnut trees on the hill, till one man, braver
than the rest, hid himself behind these trees and discovered the
mystery. The sprite was Marie, in her little shift, who stepped out of
the window of the loft where she slept on to a bough of the tree, and
thence to the hill, for the house was built so close against the bank
that it was 'but a step from garret to garden,' as they say in Morlaix.

In trying to escape from this inquisitive neighbour, Marie hurt her
foot, but was caught, and confessed that it was she who went at night to
water poor Mother Lobineau's cabbages; because if they failed the old
woman might starve, and no one else remembered her destitute and
helpless state.

The good-hearted people were much touched by this silent sermon on
loving one's neighbour as one's self, and Marie was called the 'little
saint,' and tended carefully by all the good women. Just as the story
ended, she woke up, and at first seemed inclined to hide under the
bedclothes. But we had her out in a minute, and presently she was
laughing over her good deed, with a true child's enjoyment of a bi