stayed the water. Meanwhile the night was growing darker and he was
far from home. But the brave little man would not leave his post. He
called at the top of his voice, but there was no one to answer, and
his only hope was that some of the dykemen going their rounds might
hear his voice and come to his relief. But no one came. Hours passed
away and still he was alone, and still the water was resisted. He was
in terrible pain, however, for in that chill October night the water
was very cold, and his hand and arm and shoulder were so benumbed
that he knew not how he could endure it. Then he thought that if he
did not persevere the waters would come in and drown perhaps his
father and his mother and the neighbours, and he knew not how many
others besides, and so he determined, however great the pain might
be, to bear it, God helping him. Very long and very terrible were
those dark hours of the night, and the poor child cried bitterly with
the pain and the terror, but he did not remove his arm!

At last, in the early morning, he heard what seemed to be the sound
of footsteps, and raising his voice to its highest pitch he soon had
the joy of seeing that some one was approaching. It was a clergyman
who had been spending the night by the bedside of a dying man, and
was returning home with the first gleams of the morning. He was
horrified to see a little child, pale, jacketless, shivering, with
eyes swollen with tears, and a face contorted with pain.

"Why are you here, my boy? What are you doing?" he asked anxiously.

"I am holding back the sea!" said the little hero.

And it was literally true--that child's arm had held back the enemy
that would have come in with a flood, carrying death and terrible
destruction.

"WHISTLING FOR IT."

The "it" was his supper. Dinner had been a movable feast that day,
tea indefinitely postponed, and Patch was beginning to fear that
supper also was fading away beyond his grasp.

"And I may go on whistling till that flute bursts itself before I get
a halfpenny," he remarked to himself in a tone of intense injury,
eyeing the "flute" (which was really a penny whistle) anxiously as he
rubbed it on his wet sleeve with a view to improving the notes. "All
this day and not a----"

"I say, Patch," broke in a mournful voice from behind, "couldn't you
lend me twopence just till to-morrow? It's to get some supper; I
haven't sold a single box since morning."

"Supper!" echoed Patch, turn