was capable of so much; how it was, for instance, that, in the dispensing of Mrs. Morgenstern's bounty, she dared to make her way into places where no one but herself thought it could be safe for her to go, but where not even a rude word was ever directed against her or used with regard to her. If she had been as religious as she afterwards became, I should not have wondered thus; for some who do not believe that God is anywhere in these dens of what looks to them all misery, will dare everything to rescue their fellow-creatures from impending fate. But Lucy had no theories to spur or to support her. She never taught them any religion: she was only, without knowing it, a religion to their eyes. I conclude, therefore, that at this time it was just the harmony of which I have spoken that led her, protected her, and, combined with a dim consciousness that she must be doing right in following out the loving impulses of her nature, supported her in the disagreeable circumstances into which she was sometimes brought.

While they were thus busy with the flowers,

Miriam joined them. She had cast her neutral tints, and appeared in a frock of dark red, with a band of gold in her dusky hair, sombrely rich. She was a strange-looking child, one of those whose coming beauty promises all the more that it has as yet reached only the stage of interesting ugliness. Splendid eyes, olive complexion, rounded cheeks, were accompanied by a very unfinished nose, and a large mouth, with thick though finely modelled lips. She would be a glory some day. She flitted into the room, and flew from flower to flower like one of those black and red butterflies that Scotch children call witches. The sight of her brought to Lucy's mind by contrast the pale face and troubled brow of Mattie, and she told Mrs. Morgenstern about her endeavour to persuade the child to come, and how and why she had failed. Mrs. Morgenstern did not laugh much at the story, but she very nearly did something else.

"Oh! do go and bring little Mattie," said Miriam. "I will be very kind to her. I will

give her my doll's-house; for I shall be too big for it next year."

"But I left her taking care of my grandmother," said Lucy, to the truth of whose character it belonged to make no concealment of the simplicity of the household conditions of herself and her grandmother. 66 And," she added, "if she were to come I must stay at home; and besides, she could not come without me."

"But I'll tell you what-couldn't you bring the other—the little Poppie she talks about? I should like to show Mattie that we're not quite so bad as she thinks us. Do you know this Poppie?" said Mrs. Morgenstern.

Then Lucy told her what she knew about Poppie. She had been making inquiries in the neighbourhood, and though she had not traced the child to head-quarters anywhere, everybody in the poor places in which she had sought information knew something about her, though all they knew put together did not come to much. She slept at the top of a stair here, in the bottom of a cupboard there, coiling herself up in

spaces of incredible smallness; but no one could say where her home was, or indeed if she had any home. Nor, if she wanted to find her, was it of much consequence whether she knew her home or not, for that would certainly be the last place where Poppie would be found.

"But," she concluded, "if you would really like to have her, I will go and try if I can find her. I could be back in an hour and a half or so."

"You shall have the brougham."

"No, no," interrupted Lucy. "To go in a brougham to look for Poppie would be like putting salt on a bird's tail. Besides, I should not like the probable consequences of seating her in your carriage. But I should like to see how that wild little savage would do in such a place as this."

"Oh, do go," cried Miriam, clapping her hands. "It will be such fun."

Lucy ran for her bonnet, with great doubts of success, yet willing to do her best to find the child. She did not know that Poppie had fol

lowed her almost to Mrs. Morgenstern's door that very morning.

Now what made Lucy sufficiently hopeful of finding Poppie to start in pursuit of her, was the fact that she had of late seen the child so often between Guild Court and a certain other court in the neighbourhood of Shoreditch. But Lucy did not know that it was because she was there that Poppie was there. She had not for some time, as I have said, paid her usual visits at Mrs. Morgenstern's because of her grandmother's illness; and when she did go out she had gone only to the place I have just mentioned, where the chief part of her work amongst the poor lay. Poppie haunting her as she did, where Lucy was there she saw Poppie. And, indeed, if Poppie had any ties to one place more than a hundred others, that place happened to be Staines Court.

When Lucy came out of Mrs. Morgenstern's, if she had only gone the other way, she would have met Poppie coming round the next corner. After Lucy had vanished Poppie had found a penny in the gutter, had bought a fresh roll