he bench occupied by the
excitable stranger.

Slowly, slowly, the little light figure went round upon the broad
partition wall of the ring, until it came near, very near, to the place
where Valentine was sitting.

Ah, woeful sight! so lovely, yet so piteous to look on! Shall she never
hear kindly human voices, the song of birds, the pleasant murmur of
the trees again? Are all the sweet sounds that sing of happiness to
childhood, silent for ever to _her?_ From those fresh, rosy lips shall
no glad words pour forth, when she runs and plays in the sunshine? Shall
the clear, laughing tones be hushed always? the young, tender life be
for ever a speechless thing, shut up in dumbness from the free world of
voices? Oh! Angel of judgment! hast thou snatched her hearing and her
speech from this little child, to abandon her in helpless affliction to
such profanation as she now undergoes? Oh, Spirit of mercy! how long thy
white-winged feet have tarried on their way to this innocent sufferer,
to this lost lamb that cannot cry to the fold for help! Lead, ah, lead
her tenderly to such shelter as she has never yet found for herself!
Guide her, pure as she is now, from this tainted place to pleasant
pastures, where the sunshine of human kindness shall be clouded no more,
and Love and Pity shall temper every wind that blows over her with the
gentleness of perpetual spring!

Slowly, slowly, the light figure went round the great circle of gazers,
ministering obediently to their pleasure, waiting patiently till their
curiosity was satisfied. And now, her weary pilgrimage was well nigh
over for the night. She had arrived at the last group of spectators who
had yet to see what she looked like close, and what tricks she could
exhibit with her cards.

She stopped exactly opposite to Valentine; and when she looked up, she
looked on him alone.

Was there something in the eager sympathy of his eyes as they met hers,
which spoke to the little lonely heart in the sole language that could
ever reach it? Did the child, with the quick instinct of the deaf and
dumb, read his compassionate disposition, his pity and longing to help
her, in his expression at that moment? It might have been so. Her pretty
lips smiled on him as they had smiled on no one else that night; and
when she held out some cards to be chosen from, she left unnoticed
the eager hands extended on either side of her, and presented them to
Valentine only.

He saw the small fingers t