rangers could speak
little or no English, and for a time their appearance only appealed to
the kindly feelings of the multitude. I had pressed in close to the
strong man, who was still bearing the little child in the same
position in which it rested when he passed me at the door of the
hotel. The same fixed look of independence was in his face and his
position. There was much of sternness on the face of the woman, but it
was marked by pain, referable perhaps to her situation, and to the
marks of recent grief. Something was to be done, but what I could not
yet determine. As I pressed nearer to the man the company crowded
closer.

"You need help," said I to the strange man.

He intimated plainly that he could not understand me.

"You want _bread_," said I.

"_Das brod_," exclaimed he, shaking his head. "_Nein--das grab!_"

And he threw the clothes from the face of the child on his arm, and
the pale, quiet features of the little one were cold in death.

One low, agonizing cry went up from the depth of the woman's heart.
One proud look around was given by the father, but that look was
exchanged for one of anguish as he turned his eye downward toward the
burthen which his arm sustained.

The company had come up, not to solicit charity, that they might eat
and drink before they should die--but that they might obtain a
burying-place for the little one of their flock, whom death had
released from its parents' troubles.

It was a pretty child; the blue eyes were visible beneath the half
divided lids, and the long lashes hung over them like gentle palls,
defending them from the rudeness of earth's winds. The fine light hair
lay smoothly over the marble forehead, and a few white teeth shone out
from between the lips that were shrinking away from each other in the
coldness of death.

It was a _grave_ the parents needed.

The contributions were liberal, and a grave was provided. It would
seem that in the wilderness of unreclaimed lands which lie along the
public works of Pennsylvania, there might be found a resting-place for
an infant stranger, without the eleemosynary aid which had been
sought--but, alas! who does not desire when they "bury their dead out
of their sight," that it may be in a place which memory may cherish.

We cannot comprehend the unconsciousness of the grave. We hedge it
about, we make the last house as if comforts were to be enjoyed
therein, and we love to place our dead side by side with others, a