the child compelled her with an angry expression to catch up a piece of crust from the table and thrust it between its irritated gums; the child caught it and began brandishing it about its lips, as if conscious that it held a remedy for its distresses, but was uncertain how to use it. At this moment a little boy with a black beaver hat and a feather strolled in from the next cottage; he was evidently the object of intense pride to some mother or other; he marched immediately up to the infant, and seizing holding of the crust, tore it unceremoniously from its grasp the child immediately screamed, and the woman startled by the cry of anguish, directly levelled a blow at the feathered visitant.

"Be off with you, you little covetous beggar," said she, "you have enough and to spare at home, and you come to grudge my wretched child's crust."

The child dropped the crust, and stared for a moment in surprise; and bursting into tears, rushed away to announce the fact of its discomfiture to its mother; and things went on as before. The knee went up and down to the same tune, the child took up again the same melancholy wail, and Sally went on with her pointless yet mournful tune, as she pursued her work of shreds and patches. Her tale was the tale of hundreds-All the brightness of her life had been cut short by an untimely and wretched marriage. Richard Carter was like too many of our agricultural, labouring men, all of them too wedded to selfishness! The great bulk of his weekly earnings were spent in the evenings at a tap-room. Sally's intreaty and word of warning continually assailing him as he entered the house, and having no restraint

put upon it by either principle or judgment, fairly drove him from his home. But though he could fly from the bitter complaint of his wife and the cry of his half-starved child, taking refuge amongst his companions of the village in the tap-room, or on the bench outside the publican's door, he could not shun the voice of his own conscience, or the reproof of his fellow-parishioners. He often declared he would never return home again, and Sally more than half believed that he meant what he said. He had three times been taken on to work at Mr. Loraine's, and three times lost it by drunkenness. Yet strange to say, amid it all, Sally loved him, with that strange, odd, unconscious love, which lay hidden down in her woman's heart, like a diamond unrefined. And though she worried him with her complaints, and chid him for his starving child, she listened eagerly for his footstep returning home in the cold twilight beyond the hedge, and the colour would rush to her emaciated face if any one accused him of a fault. She had had no bread to-day, except a part of that crust that her baby held.

As she sat on that occasion many voices suddenly rose in the road at the end of the field, and the tramp of many footsteps told that something more than common was taking place. The beat of a drum, told that a recruiting party was in the village. Struck, as if by a thunderbolt, Sally let the work drop from her hand. She listened for half a minute, and gazed with an intense earnestness at the leafless hedge: catching her child to her bosom, she hastily wrapped round it a shawl that she caught up from the table and darted through the field. The party by this time

had passed on, and had reached the public-house. A strange boding occupied her mind, and she mixed with the group of staring, clamorous boys outside the taproom window, eager with curiosity to see what was going on within. Sally pressed forward, unnoticed by the group with which she had mingled, but hers was a gaze of no idle curiosity,-it was the gaze for life or death. She grasped the wooden palings for support. Through the window there was plainly visible a large number of youths, who were gathered round the table and on the benches round the wall; while on their hats that lay around, hung the long, many-coloured streamers of the recruiting sergeant. Amongst them all there was one on whom Sally's eye irresistibly was fixed,— yes, it was he, it was her husband, her bodings were right enough, and worse than widowhood yawned like a chasm before her.

She knew not what she did, she dared not enter, and she dared not leave. She had stared for five minutes in stolid wonder, at the brutal figure of the man, as he repeatedly put the pewter pot to his lips; when at length, as if suddenly called to herself, she turned to a boy, who had been the last few seconds watching her, and said, "Can't you call him out to me just for one minute?" but the boy only laughed, and said the taproom door was locked, it was impossible to get in. She had made her resolution, come what would-however cold the starlight, however piercing might be the wind which blew down that narrow lane: she would stand at that window till he came out. She would keep her baby warm against her breast, and would meet

him face to face, and say, "Richard, why do you leave

me?"

Whether she fell asleep with her eyes open as she leaned against the palings, she did not know, but she got into a half stupified state. For a long time she clearly saw the firelight through the window, the candle on the table, and Richard's figure against the wall, and the constantly replenished pot of beer, but at last it became dimmer like the colours and sounds of a dream; she was conscious of being very cold, and of drawing her thin shawl tighter over her baby's head.

The church clock struck two in the morning, and in her odd dreamy state she imagined it was an angel speaking out of heaven; when at that moment the door burst open, and roaring drunk her husband and his companions reeled out. She had made up her mind exactly what to say, and how to say it, and all; and she had said it over and over again to herself, and fancied how he would look, and she would feel; but somehow or other when it came to the point, it was strangely confused; she did manage to say, "Richard, it's your Sally, don't leave me!" But he was roaring drunk, and was gone beyond her reach before she could touch him.

She went after him in the cold starlight as well as she could, poor thing; but she could not keep up with the company, and at last she went back to her cottage, she did not know how she found her way, but she lay down and slept till she rose with her baby at her breast. She wandered all day tracking his course, and ascertaining from one cottage to another, which way

the recruiting party had gone; she overtook them at last in a town six miles from Brandon, and she met him, met Richard face to face in the street; and he was sober now. He hung his head and looked ashamed, as she pleaded with him.

"Oh, Richard, don't leave me now! I'm Sally you know, not that that matters so much, but here's the baby, you know." And she drew the pallid little one from under her shawl, where it lay sucking, and held it under its father's eye, "why should you leave me now? what am I to do? what have I done to hurt you, Richard? I've kept your house as tidy as I could, Richard, and I've always got you a bit o' meat on Sunday, when you know I've always had none myself; and I couldn't do more, for you never brought the money home. If the house wasn't as tidy as the Parkins's, 'twasn't my fault, Richard. If I've spoken rough sometimes, well, what's the odds? you've provoked me to it. I'm sure I won't do it again, Richard, if you'll just come back; don't leave me! please don't; I've always done the best I can, I've kept your clothes as tidy as I could, and if I don't dress as smart as other girls do on Sunday, why it's not my fault; you don't give me anything to get a bit of a rag with; do come back with me, don't leave me, please!"

But oh, Sally, don't you know those red and blue ribbons, what they mean? Richard's a recruit, and he must leave you.

So somebody said to Sally, I do not know who, it was not Richard, for he never spoke a word, nor lifted up his downcast face.