honour the judge either. Well, 'twas just such a rage she was in with
this 'ere child the first time I saw her; and the _second_ time she'd
just turned her out o' doors."

"Ah, yes, I remember the she-bear. I shouldn't suppose she'd be any too
gentle to her own child, much less a stranger's; but what are you going
to do with the foundling, Flint?"

"Do with her?--Keep her, to be sure, and take care on her."

Cooper laughed rather sarcastically.

"Well, now, I s'pose, neighbour, you think it's rather freakish in me to
be adoptin' a child at my time o' life; and pr'haps it is; but I'll
explain. She'd a died that night I tell yer on, if I hadn't brought her
home with me; and many times since, what's more, if I, with the help o'
your darter, hadn't took good care on her. Well, she took on so in her
sleep, the first night ever she came, and cried out to me all as if she
never had a friend afore (and probably she never had), that I resolved
then she should stay, at any rate, and I'd take care on her, and share
my last crust with the wee thing, come what might. The Lord's been very
marciful to me, Mr. Cooper, very marciful! He's raised me up friends in
my deep distress. I knew, when I was a little shaver, what a lonesome
thing it was to be fatherless and motherless; and when I see this little
sufferin' human bein' I felt as if, all friendless as she seemed, she
was more specially the Lord's, and as if I could not sarve Him more, and
ought not to sarve Him less, than to share with her the blessings He had
bestowed on me. You look round, neighbour, as if you thought 'twan't
much to share with any one; and 'tan't much there is here, to be sure;
but it's a _home_,--yes, a _home_; and that's a great thing to her that
never had one. I've got my hands yet, and a stout heart, and a willin'
mind. With God's help, I'll be a father to the child; and the time may
come when she'll be God's embodied blessin' to me."

Mr. Cooper shook his head doubtfully, and muttered something about
children, even one's own, not being apt to prove blessings.

Trueman added, "Oh, neighbour Cooper, if I had not made up my mind the
night Gerty came here, I wouldn't have sent her away after the next day;
for the Lord, I think, spoke to me by the mouth of one of his holy
angels, and bade me persevere in my resolution. You've seen Miss
Graham. She goes to your church regular, with the fine old gentleman her
father. I was at their house shovelling snow, aft