day to day. Fred was her patient, unwearied nurse, and
neighbors--never wanting in such kindnesses as they can
understand--supplied her few wants. The child never wanted for food, and
the mantle shelf was filled with infallible specifics, each one of which
was able, according to the showing, to insure perfect recovery in every
case whatever; and yet, strange to tell, she still declined. At last,
one still autumn morning, Fred awoke, and started at the icy coldness of
the hand clasped in his own. He looked in his mother's face; it was
sweet and calm as that of a sleeping infant, but he knew in his heart
that she was dead.

PART II.

Months afterwards, a cold December day found Fred turned loose in the
streets of Cincinnati. Since his mother's death he had driven on the
canal boat; but now the boat was to lie by for winter, and the hands of
course turned loose to find employment till spring. Fred was told that
he must look up a place; every body was busy about their own affairs,
and he must shift for himself; and so with half his wages in his pocket,
and promises for the rest, he started to seek his fortune.

It was a cold, cheerless, gray-eyed day, with an air that pinched
fingers and toes, and seemed to penetrate one's clothes like snow
water--such a day as it needs the brightest fire and the happiest heart
to get along at all with; and, unluckily, Fred had neither. Christmas
was approaching, and all the shops had put on their holiday dresses; the
confectioners' windows were glittering with sparkling pyramids of candy,
with frosted cake, and unfading fruits and flowers of the very best of
sugar. There, too, was Santa Claus, large as life, with queer, wrinkled
visage, and back bowed with the weight of all desirable knickknacks,
going down chimney, in sight of all the children of Cincinnati, who
gathered around the shop with constantly-renewed acclamations. On all
sides might be seen the little people, thronging, gazing, chattering,
while anxious papas and mammas in the shops were gravely discussing tin
trumpets, dolls, spades, wheelbarrows, and toy wagons.

Fred never had heard of the man who said, "How sad a thing it is to look
into happiness through another man's eyes!" but he felt something very
like it as he moved through the gay and bustling streets, where every
body seemed to be finding what they wanted but himself.

He had determined to keep up a stout heart; but in spite of himself, all
this bustling show