essing it upon her until she could take no more.

"Now, then," she said, when the tray had been removed, "one can always
talk better on a full stomach. So tell me what you want, and what you
expect me to do. But sit over there, where I can see you better; and
don't get excited. I shall not eat you; at least, not to-night."

She wanted Bessie in a good light, where she could see her face, from
which she never took her eyes, as the girl repeated in substance what
she had said at first, making some additions to her story, and speaking
of the ship in which she had come, but not of Miss Lucy or Grey.

"Where did you get the money? It costs something to cross the ocean,"
Miss Betsey asked, a little sharply, and Bessie replied:

"It did not cost me much, for I came out as a steerage passenger. I had
just enough for that and my ticket here."

"You came in the steerage?" and in her surprise Miss Betsey arose from
her chair and walked once or twice across the floor, while Bessie looked
at her wistfully, wondering if she, too, were ashamed like Neil.

But shame had no part in Miss Betsey's feelings, which were stirred by a
far different emotion. Resuming her seat after a moment, she said:

"And you have come here to work--to earn money? What can you do?"

"I thought I might teach French, perhaps; and German, I am a pretty good
scholar in both," Bessie replied, and her aunt rejoined:

"French and German! Fiddlesticks! There are more fools teaching those
languages now than there are idiots to learn them. Why, my washerwoman's
daughter is teaching French at twenty-five cents a lesson, though she
can no more speak it than a jackdaw. French, indeed! You must try
something else, or you will never earn that two hundred and fifty-five
pounds."

This was not very encouraging, and Bessie felt the color dyeing her
face, and her heart sinking, as she said:

"I might sew. I am handy with my needle, I have made all my own dresses,
and Dorothy's, too."

"Yes, you might sew, and twist your spine all out of shape, and get the
liver complaint," Miss Betsey interposed; and then, poor Bessie, fearing
that everything was slipping from her, said, with a choking sob:

"I might be a housemaid to some one. Surely there are such situations to
be had, and I would try so hard to please, and even work for less than
other girls of more experience. Oh, Aunt Betsey, you must know of some
place for me! You will help me to find one! You do not know ho