sound of little feet, and "Father, come to
dinner"; and a little hand takes hold of you and leads you to the door.
"Are you going to bath me to-night, father?" Or "Here's your napkin,
father." And though there might be only potatoes and milk for dinner,
she would eat as if she were seated at the grandest banquet. "Aren't
potatoes and milk your favourite dish, father?" And she makes faces at
you in the eagerness of her questionings. At night she slept in a box
at the foot of our bed, and when I was lying sleepless, it would often
happen that her light, peaceful breathing filled me too with peace; and
it was as if her little hand took mine and led me on to sleep itself, to
beautiful, divine sleep.

And now, as I come to the thing that happened, I find it a little hard
to write--my hand begins to tremble. But my hope is that there may be
some comfort in it for you too, as there has proved to be for Merle and
me in the end.

Our next neighbours here were a brazier and his wife--poor folks, like
ourselves. Soon after we first came I went over to have a talk with him.
I found him a poor wizened little creature, pottering about with his
acids, and making a living as best as he could, soldering and tinning
kettles and pans. "What do you want?" he asked, looking askance at me;
and as I went out, I heard him bolt the door behind me. Alas! he was
afraid--afraid that I was come to snatch his daily bread from him. His
wife was a big-boned fleshy lump of a woman, insolent enough in her
ways, though she had just been in prison for criminal abetment in the
case of a girl that had got into trouble.

One Sunday morning I was standing looking at some apple trees in bloom
in his garden. One of them grew so close to the fence that the branches
hung over on my side, and I bent one down to smell the blossom. Then
suddenly I heard a cry: "Hi, Tiger! catch him!" and the brazier's great
wolf-dog came bounding down, ready to fly at my throat. I was lucky
enough to get hold of its collar before it could do me any harm, and I
dragged it up to its owner, and told him that if anything of the sort
happened again I'd have the sheriff's officer after him. Then the music
began. He fairly let himself go and told me what he thought of me. "You
hold your jaw, you cursed pauper, coming here taking the bread out
of honest working people's mouths," and so on. He hissed it out,
flourishing his arms about, and at last it seemed to me he was fumbling
about for