sed to yield her milk without a musical accompaniment. Very soft
and low was the girl's singing, but clear and sweet as that of the
thrush on the thorn bush behind her.

"Give me my little milking pail,
For under the hawthorn in the vale
The cows are gathering one by one,
They know the time by the westering sun.
Troodi, Troodi! come down from the mountain,
Troodi, Troodi! come up from the dale;
Moelen, and Corwen, and Blodwen, and Trodwen!
I'll meet you all with my milking pail."

So sang the girl, and the lilting tune caught the ears of a youth who
was just entering the farmyard. He knew it at once. It was a snatch
of Morva's simple milking song. He stopped to pat Daisy's broad
forehead, and Morva looked up with a smile.

"Make haste," she said, "or tea will be finished. Where have you been
so late?"

"Thou'll be surprised when I tell thee," said the young man; but before
he had time for further conversation, Ann's voice called him from the
kitchen window, and he hurried away unceremoniously.

Morva continued her song, for Daisy wanted nothing new, but was
contented with the old stave which she had known from calfhood.

Will Owens, arriving in the farm kitchen, had evidently been eagerly
awaited. Both Ann and Gwilym Morris came forward to meet him, and
Ebben Owens rubbed his hands nervously over his corduroy knees.

"Well?" said all three together.

"Well!" echoed Will, flinging his hat across to the window-sill. "It's
all right. I met Price the vicar coming down the street, so I touched
my hat to him, and he saw at once that I wanted to speak to him, and
there's kind he was. 'How's your father?' he said, 'and Miss Ann, is
she well? I must come up and see them soon.'"

"Look you there now," said his father.

"'They will be very glad to see you sir,' I said, but I didn't know how
to tell him what I wanted.

"'I am very glad to hear how well you get on with your books,' he said;
'but 'tisn't every young man has Gwilym Morris to help him and to teach
him.' And then, you see, when he made a beginning, 'twas easier for me
to explain."

The preacher's pale face lighted up with a smile of pleasure, and Ann
flushed with gratified pride as Will continued.

"'He is a man in a hundred,' said Mr. Price, 'and 'tis a pity that his
talents are wasted on a Methodist Chapel. I wish I could persuade him
to enter the Church.'

"'Well, you'll never do that,' I said. 'You might as well try