ch Salvator(2) has painted. With some difficulty I
gave him to understand my errand, when he overwhelmed me with thanks,
and joyfully followed me back. He took his seat with us at the
supper-table; and, when we were all gathered around the hearth that cold
autumnal evening, he told us, partly by words and partly by gestures,
the story of his life and misfortunes, amused us with descriptions of
the grape-gatherings and festivals of his sunny clime, edified my mother
with a recipe for making bread of chestnuts; and in the morning, when,
after breakfast, his dark sullen face lighted up and his fierce eye
moistened with grateful emotion as in his own silvery Tuscan accent he
poured out his thanks, we marvelled at the fears which had so nearly
closed our door against him; and, as he departed, we all felt that he
had left with us the blessing of the poor.

(1) Provinces into which the old Kingdom of Naples was
divided.
(2) Salvator Rosa was a Neapolitan by birth, and was said to
have been himself a bandit in his youth; his landscapes often
contain figures drawn from the wild life of the region.

It was not often that, as in the above instance, my mother's prudence
got the better of her charity. The regular "old stragglers" regarded her
as an unfailing friend; and the sight of her plain cap was to them an
assurance of forthcoming creature-comforts. There was indeed a tribe
of lazy strollers, having their place of rendezvous in the town of
Barrington, New Hampshire, whose low vices had placed them beyond even
the pale of her benevolence. They were not unconscious of their evil
reputation; and experience had taught them the necessity of concealing,
under well-contrived disguises, their true character. They came to us
in all shapes and with all appearances save the true one, with most
miserable stories of mishap and sickness and all "the ills which flesh
is heir to." It was particularly vexatious to discover, when too late,
that our sympathies and charities had been expended upon such graceless
vagabonds as the "Barrington beggars." An old withered hag, known by the
appellation of Hopping Pat,--the wise woman of her tribe,--was in the
habit of visiting us, with her hopeful grandson, who had "a gift for
preaching" as well as for many other things not exactly compatible
with holy orders. He sometimes brought with him a tame crow, a shrewd,
knavish-looking bird, who, when in the humor for it, could talk lik