the pretty girl holding up her
laced petticoats with the air of a princess. The stout German woman
got off in front of her husband's saloon. The Syrians stopped in
front of a store. Carroll rode through to the end of the line, and
there was then nobody left except himself, the two pretty girls, and
the little boy. The girls swept off before him, with a consciousness
of their backs in his sight. Carroll got off, and, to his utter
amazement, the little boy, pressing close to his heels, lifted a
small voice. It was an exceedingly small and polite little voice, as
sweet as a girl's, a thin treble.

"Be you Eddy Carroll's father?" asked the little voice.

Carroll looked down from his height at the small creature beside him.
The little, upturned face looked very far down. The little cap was
pushed back and the fair hair clung to the innocent forehead damply
like a baby's.

"Yes, my little man," said he, affably. "Who are you?"

"I go to school with him," said the little boy.

"Oh!" said Carroll.

"Has he went?" further inquired the little boy, wistfully. He was a
little scholar, but he had not learned as yet the practical
application of English. It was "has gone" in the book and "has went"
on the tongue.

"Yes; this morning," replied Carroll.

"I was in his classes," said the little voice.

"Why, you are younger than he is!" said Carroll.

"I guess I got my lessons better," admitted the little voice, but
with no conceit, rather with a measure of apology.

Carroll laughed. "You must have," said he. The boy had, undoubtedly,
a rather intellectual head, a full forehead, and eyes full of thought
and question.

"You go to school in Banbridge?" said Carroll, walking along the
street by the boy's side.

"Yes. I live here. My papa is dead and my mother dressmakes."

"Oh!" said Carroll. Suddenly, to his utter amazement, the small hand
which was free from the books was slid into his, and he was walking
up the street with the strange small boy clinging to his hand.
Carroll was conscious of a feeling of grotesque amusement, of
annoyance, and at the same time of pleasure and of exquisite
flattery. There was, strangely enough, in the child, nothing which
savored of the presuming or the forward. There was no more offence to
be taken than if an exceedingly small, timidly ingratiating, and
pretty dog had followed one. There was the same subtle compliment
implied, that the dog and the child considered him a man desirable to