Joe was looking very abstractedly into the grate when they came up to the fence, and for a moment they watched his rugged face with the firelight playing upon it. But Benny, who could read his father's face pretty cleverly, declared to himself that "he could make nowt out o' Joe's."

As usual, Joe made room for Benny in his little hut; but to-night he took little Nellie very tenderly on his knee, and stroked her long flaxen hair with his hard rough hand, muttering to himself the while, "Purty little hangel; I reckon she's one o' the Lord's elect."

Benny wondered for a long time when Joe was going to say something that he could understand; but somehow to-night he did not like to disturb him by asking questions. Nelly, on the contrary, was far away again from the cold and dingy streets, and the ceaseless roar of the busy town, and was wandering in imagination through sunny meadows where the turf was soft and the grass was green. She fancied she heard the music of purling streams, and the songs of happy birds in the leafy trees that waved their branches over her. The air was fragrant with the scent of flowers that she had heard of, but never seen, and weariness and cold she felt no more.

The voice of Joe banished the beautiful vision from the glowing grate, and the child wondered if ever it would become a reality-if ever she would dwell amid such scenes in a life that had no ending.

"I've some'at to say to 'e, my dears," was Joe's first exclamation; and the children looked up into his face, and

wondered what was coming next. "I've found a home for 'e, and a reet good 'un, an' ye'r to go to-night."

"Oh, scissors!" shouted Benny; and he ran into the street, and had turned two somersaults ere he knew what

he was doing; then stood on his head for at least five seconds by way of cooling off, and what other performances he might have gone through I cannot say, had not Joe called him into

the hut.

Little Nelly said nothing; she only nestled closer to her

benefactor, and Joe felt great scalding tears dropping upon his hand, and knew that her heart was too full for speech. Then he told them all about their new home, and what would be expected of them, and how he hoped they would be good and kind to the old woman, and always be honest and truthful, and then when they died they might go to the good place.

"Does folks go somewheres when they die?" said Benny, with a look of astonishment.

"Ay, Ben, that they do."

"Oh, beeswax and turpentine !" he ejaculated, "that are a go!"

But Nelly's face grew luminous, and her eyes fairly sparkled, as she faintly grasped the idea that perhaps her dreams might come true after all.

They had no difficulty in finding their way to Tempest Court, or in discovering the house of Betty Barker. The old woman gave them a rough though kindly welcome, and Benny was soon at his ease. Their bed in the warm corner under the stairs was, to use Benny's phrase, “simply sumpshus;" and next morning when they appeared before Joe, it was with faces glowing with gladness and delight.

CHAPTER V.

OH, DEATH! WHAT DOST THOU MEAN?"

To sleep! perchance to dream;-ay, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come,
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause.

HAMLET.

WE must now go back to the morning when Benny and his sister left their home, and pay one more visit to "Addler's Hall.” Dick Bates got up in the morning with a splitting headache, and, if the truth must be told, with an aching heart. His sleep had been disturbed by horrid dreams, the recollection of which haunted him still, and made him feel anything but comfortable. He had dreamt that he had been working near the docks, and in going close to the edge of one of them he saw his two children rise to the surface of the water clasped in each other's arms; and while he looked at them, they opened their glassy eyes and cast upon him one lingering, reproachful glance, then sank to the bottom again. Twice during the night had this dream been repeated, and when he awoke in the morning it was with a vague fear of impending evil. Dick Bates, like many other hardened and cruel men, was at heart a great coward, besides being very superstitious. He listened several times for any movement downstairs, but all was still; and this only increased

his alarm, for he knew his children were in the habit of stirring early, and he saw by the light that the morning was far advanced.

We may judge, therefore, of his alarm when, on coming downstairs, he found the room empty, and he thought, with a terror in his heart that made the perspiration ooze from his forehead, that perhaps his children had been driven by his cruelty to put an end to their existence.

He tried to banish the thought as weak and childish, but he could not; his nerves were completely unstrung to-day, and he did not seem at all himself. When his wife came down he sent her into the neighbours' houses, and into Bowker's Row, to inquire if any one had seen them. But everywhere the same answer was given: no one had either seen them or heard them. His wife characterized his fears as "bosh," and declared "he wur wuss nor any owd woman. The brats 'll turn up agin to-night, never fear," she said; and Dick sincerely hoped in his heart that they would do so. He was too late to get any work that morning, so he spent most of the forenoon in the house, brooding over his fears. And while he sat there on the low stool with his face buried in his hands, memories of other and happier years crowded in upon his brain. His boyhood life in the country seemed to him now, as he looked back at it through a long vista of years, like a happy dream. And he was glad that his old father and mother were dead, and did not know how low he had fallen.

Then he thought of the morning when he had led his first