ies
of God are a deal more tender than those of men. I could thank God
with all my heart to know that He had them safe."

"There are bad enough folk about," the policeman assented, "but your
children are over young to get led astray."

"I pray the Almighty that He'll grant them a merciful death rather
than they should fall into bad hands," Mrs. McDougall said, wearily,
as she rose to go. "Better for them to die of cold than to be
murdered by violence, or made to lie and steal."

"You're taking an over gloomy view of the matter, good wife," the man
said, cheerfully; "and perhaps you'll be getting them back safe and
sound before nightfall."

But that was not to be. The description of the children was, truly
enough, sent to every town or village that could boast a
police-station, and was eagerly discussed that very nightfall in many
a remote cottage. Had the children wandered farther, to even the
first village on their road, they must have been found, but they were
safely hidden from the outer world in the least suspected place of
any--the miserable hovel of one of those wretched tillers of the
land, too poor to deserve the name of farmer, with which some parts
of Scotland abound. The man was listless, and apathetic with hunger
and poverty, a miserable, degraded creature, who would have
sacrificed anything or anybody for the sake of the few pounds that
would pay his rent or sow his tiny bit of unproductive land.

He was the very last sort of person to hear rumours of the lost
children. On that day when he and his wretched beast had toiled the
distance of twenty miles to fetch a load of fish refuse from the
nearest fishing village in order to enrich his bit of barren land,
the bills about the children were not yet distributed. Even had they
been, he was little likely to have heard about them, for he was too
dull and dejected to talk with his neighbours. When he met them on
the road, the idea of giving them a lift would not have penetrated
his mind had not Elsie herself requested it. Yet the man was no worse
than his fellows, and had an element of unselfish kindness in him,
which was shown by his giving them the old sack to sit upon. Under
happier auspices he would probably have been a very decent sort of
person, but the hopeless hardship of his existence had gradually
wiped out every ambition and hope, till at last he had sunk into
something scarcely better than an animal.

And, children, let me tell you that there