e children breathlessly.

'Not very much,' Nance went on, 'she smiled and told me I was a lucky
girl, and I must think on what I'd been told by the old man in my dream.
And so I did. Before the sun was any height in the sky, long before the
young ladies at the big house would be stirring, I was up at the paddock
again searching for the ring. And granny told me what to do. I was to
put the lucky penny as near as I could guess in the very centre of the
field and then to walk round it in widening circles, always looking
carefully downwards while I said this rhyme to the good people--

Here's my lucky penny, take it an ye will,
But give me back the treasure hidden by you still.

All this I did, and----'

'What? do say quick,' cried the children.

'Before I had made many circles I saw something glittering, and stooping
down there it was--the tiny ring with the blue stone, sparkling in the
morning sunshine. You can fancy how pleased I was, and how I hurried up
to the house with the good news for Miss Hetty, who had just awakened.
The ring was really hanging on a blade of grass, just as she said. Oh,
she _was_ delighted!'

'And how did you get the silver penny back again?' asked Pat. 'You
couldn't have looked for it, for you see you had promised it to the
fairies, hadn't you?'

'Yes, of course, and one must always keep to their bargain with the
fairies,' said Nance. 'No, I didn't look for it, but late that evening
when granny was closing the shutters, she called me to look at something
sparkling in the moonlight on the window-sill. It was my lucky penny.
And from that day to this I've never been without it, and many a time
it's seemed to give me fresh courage and spirit in the midst of
troubles, and one thing is true--all my life through I've never been
brought to such a pass as to have to part with it, though now and then
the need has come very near. But something's always turned up just in
the nick of time to save it; I've always pulled through, though I had an
ailing husband for many a year, and the father of poor Bob there, my
only son, was cut down in the prime of life, he and his young wife,
leaving me another young boy to bring up when I was more fit myself to
be sleeping quiet and peaceful in the old churchyard.'

And old Nance wiped away a gentle tear or two that were struggling down
her brown cheeks.

Little Rosamond stole her hand into Nance's.

'You've got friends now, haven't you? And I'm sure Uncl