followed them--"Blessed are the dead. Blessed are the
dead."

"SO-SO."

"Be sure, my child," said the widow to her little daughter, "that you
always do just as you are told."

"Very well, Mother."

"Or at any rate do what will do just as well," said the small
house-dog as he lay blinking at the fire.

"You darling!" cried little Joan, and she sat down on the hearth and
hugged him. But he got up and shook himself, and moved three turns
nearer the oven, to be out of the way; for though her arms were soft
she had kept her doll in them, and that was made of wood, which hurts.

"What a dear, kind house-dog you are!" said little Joan, and she meant
what she said, for it does feel nice to have the sharp edges of one's
duty a little softened off for one.

He was no particular kind of a dog, but he was very smooth to stroke,
and had a nice way of blinking with his eyes, which it was soothing to
see. There had been a difficulty about his name. The name of the
house-dog before him was Faithful, and well it became him, as his
tombstone testified. The one before that was called Wolf. He was very
wild, and ended his days on the gallows, for worrying sheep. The
little house-dog never chased anything, to the widow's knowledge.
There was no reason whatever for giving him a bad name, and she
thought of several good ones, such as Faithful, and Trusty, and
Keeper, which are fine old-fashioned titles, but none of these seemed
quite perfectly to suit him. So he was called So-so; and a very nice
soft name it is.

The widow was only a poor woman, though she contrived by her industry
to keep a decent home together, and to get now one and now another
little comfort for herself and her child.

One day she was going out on business, and she called her little
daughter and said to her, "I am going out for two hours. You are too
young to protect yourself and the house, and So-so is not as strong as
Faithful was. But when I go, shut the house-door and bolt the big
wooden bar, and be sure that you do not open it for any reason
whatever till I return. If strangers come, So-so may bark, which he
can do as well as a bigger dog. Then they will go away. With this
summer's savings I have bought a quilted petticoat for you and a
duffle cloak for myself against the winter, and if I get the work I am
going after to-day, I shall buy enough wool to knit warm stockings for
us both. So be patient till I return, and then we will have the
plumca