opinion of a "lazy hulk av a girrl that could not heft a washtub without
panting."

Idyl had tried hard to be strong and to please her foster-mother, but
there was, somehow, in her life at the Magwires' something that made
her great far-away eyes grow larger and her poor little wrists more
weak and slender.

She envied the Magwire twins--with all their prickly heat and their
calico-blue eyes--when their mother pressed them lovingly to her bosom.
She even envied the black babies when their great black mammies crooned
them to sleep.

What does it matter, black or white or red, if one is loved?

An embroidered "Darling" upon an old crib-blanket, and a
daguerreotype--a slender youth beside a pale, girlish woman, who clasped
a big-eyed babe--these were her only tokens of past affection.

There was something within her that responded to the daintiness of the
loving stitches in the old blanket--and to a something in the refined
faces in the picture. And they had called their wee daughter "Idyl"--a
little poem.

Yet she, not understanding, hated this name because of Mrs. Magwire,
whose most merciless taunt was, "Sure ye're well named, ye idle
dthreamer."

Mrs. Magwire, a well-meaning woman withal, measured her maternal
kindnesses to the hungry-hearted orphan beneath her roof in generous
bowls of milk and hunks of corn-bread.

Idyl's dreams of propitiating her were all of
abstractions--self-sacrifice, patience, gratitude.

And she was as unconscious as was her material benefactress that she was
an idealist, and why the combination resulted in inharmony.

This evening, as she stood alone upon the levee, listening to the
cannon, a sudden sense of utter desolation and loneliness came to her.
She only of all the plantation was unloved--forgotten--in this hour of
danger.

A desperate longing seized her as she turned and looked back upon the
nest of cabins. If she could only save the plantation! For love, no
sacrifice could be too great.

With the thought came an inspiration. There was reason in the women's
fears. Should the Riffraffs fire upon the fleet, surely guns would
answer, else what was war?

She glanced at her full pail, and then at the row of cannon beside her.

If she could pour water into them! It was too light yet, but to-night--

How great and daring a deed to come to tempt the mind of a timid,
delicate child who had never dared anything--even Mrs. Magwire's
displeasure!

All during the evening, w