e friends with my little boy and
girl. Look after him well, Martha,' she said, as she turned to leave
the room, 'and give him plenty to eat.'

'I'll see to him, marm,' said the servant, who was a rough girl, but
good-nature itself. She proceeded to heap his plate with food, and
poured him out a cup of nice hot coffee, which smelt delicious to the
hungry boy. She was very proud of her hot buckwheat cakes, and Jack
did ample justice to them, smothered as they were in butter and syrup.

When he had finished, he pleased Martha very much by helping her to
wash up the breakfast-things, and she was surprised and delighted to
find how careful he was in drying and putting by the cups and saucers
tidily in the cupboards.

He carried her in some buckets of water from the creek, and cleaned the
knives.

'Is there anything else for me to do?' he asked presently.

'Can you work a bucksaw?' she said dubiously.

'Yes, I can,' returned Jack. 'I cut all my uncle's wood at Longview
with one.'

'Well, I'd be glad enough for a few logs,' she said, 'for the boys are
so busy this morning, they've quite forgot it's baking day, and I want
plenty o' wood.'

'I'll cut it,' cried Jack, delighted to be of use, and hastened off to
the wood pile. Here he found the bucksaw, and cut off a number of
short lengths of wood. He was proceeding to split them with an axe,
when he found himself being surveyed by a little boy and girl who were
standing in front of him hand-in-hand. The boy was about six, and the
girl a year younger, and they gazed at Jack with admiring eyes.

'Are you Jack?' asked the boy shyly.

'Yes, I am,' answered Jack, smiling at him.

'Well, I'm Teddy Stuart,' answered the new arrival, evidently anxious
to converse, 'and this is Rita. She's my sister. Have you a sister?'

'No, I haven't,' returned Jack, 'but I've got a mother, though,' he
added, not to be outdone.

'I know that,' said Teddy approvingly, 'and you've come _hundreds_ of
miles to find her. I'd go a _million_ to see my mother if she went
away.'

'No, you wouldn't, Teddy,' broke in Rita, speaking for the first time,
'cos you're too little. You're ever so much littler than Jack. Jack,'
she went on, with a funny grave look in her face, 'my daddy says you're
a little hero, so I want to shake hands wiv you.'

She held out a small hand, and shook Jack's brown paw very solemnly, as
if it was an important ceremony. Teddy, not to be behindhand, shook
ha