e till
I can get some folks to take ye in to keep till ye are of age."

"The priest, sir," said Paul, "promised to call to-day; and as he
already has left us a good sum of money, I know the good man will
provide for us till he writes to my uncle, who would be very sorry to
hear of our going to the poorhouse or the county house, though it may be
a better place."

"My young lad, you will be provided for by law, and don't fail to be
ready by ten o'clock," said the official, sternly, as he left the room.

In a few hours after, the body of the widow O'Clery was deposited in a
rough, unplaned pine coffin, and placed on board a two-horse, open
sleigh. The four orphans were stowed around in the same vehicle, and, in
care of a constable, the _cortege_ drove off at full speed to the
cemetery. By half past eleven, the remains of the widow were consigned
to their kindred earth, the few lumps of hard frozen clay on the surface
her only monument--the sobs, sighs, and prayers of her own dear children
the only requiem uttered over her lowly and soon-to-be-forgotten tomb.
"Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from henceforth now, saith the
Spirit, that they may rest from their labors." (Apoc. xiv. 13.)

CHAPTER IV.

THE POORHOUSE.

When Father O'Shane left for the village of B----, in Vermont, to
administer the rites of Christian unction to a departing soul, the roads
were very hard to travel, and his progress, in company with his faithful
guide, was tedious and slow in the extreme. The call was to a sick woman
named Finmore, who was in the last stage of consumption, and who had
often, during her illness, expressed a desire that she should be
attended by a priest before she would die. Her husband did not oppose
her wish, but was yet either too indifferent on the subject, or too
lazy, to go such a journey as to the city of T---- in search of a
personage of whom he stood in such awe, and knew so little of, as the
Catholic priest. A neighboring Irish farmer, named O'Leary, hearing of
the wish of the dying woman, volunteered to bring the priest, if "there
was one to be found in all America," he said, "provided he got a horse
and wagon from the stable of the rich Yankee." And it was in company
with this simple but brave and faithful man that Father O'Shane set out
on the evening of the widow's death. They had not advanced many miles,
however, when the wind veered round to the north-west, and a most
violent snow storm blew