age, about fifty years ago. It will be a good lesson for us
all, to see what God helped one brave little girl to do.

Agnes Green was nine years old, and had five brothers and sisters
younger than herself. Their father was a respectable working man, and
they all lived in a small cottage in a wild valley of the mountains of
Westmoreland. If you take a good map of England, and look in the north
for Westmoreland, you may see Grasmere marked. It is the name of a
beautiful valley and also of a lake and a village in it. Beyond this
is a smaller valley called Easdale, quite surrounded by high hills,
with just one narrow opening into Grasmere. Here, in a lonely cottage,
the Greens lived. In fair weather the older children could go to the
Grasmere school. Their mother did all she could to keep them neat and
comfortable; but she could not afford to have a servant, and so little
Agnes was taught to do many more things than are common at her age.
She was a very good and clever child, and learned to milk the cow,
mend the fire, cook the dinner, nurse the little ones--do all that was
possible for her age and strength. Which of you is at all like her?
You may say, perhaps, that there is no need for _you_ to learn such
things. But you cannot begin too soon to be useful. Had poor Agnes
been as helpless as some of you, she and her brothers and sisters
must have died of cold and hunger in the sad time I am going to tell
you of.

One winter day, Mr. and Mrs. Green had business which made them very
anxious to go to a farm-house at some distance from Easdale. There was
snow on the ground, but the morning was fine; and to save a long road
round by Grasmere, they determined to take a short cut right over the
mountains, which they had sometimes done before. So Mrs. Green made
everything straight for the day, bidding Agnes take good care of the
little ones, and expect her and their father back in the evening
before dark; and then both parents kissed the children, and set out on
the journey, from which they were never to return. They got safe to
the farm, where a number of people were assembled at a sale, did their
business, and said they would go home by the same way, although many
of their friends advised them not to attempt it, for more snow was
evidently coming on.

Evening came, and Agnes made a bright peat fire, which all the
children gathered round, expecting every minute to hear their parents'
voices at the door. But it began to get da