floors to be whitened," replied Isabella, sharply. "An' one year like
another, till the year comes ye're buried. I look for Bel to marry a
minister, or maybe even better."

"Ye'd a chance at a minister yersel', then, my girl," replied the wise
John, "an' ye did not take it." At which memory the wife laughed, and
the two loyal hearts were merry together for a moment, and young again.

Little Bel had, indeed, even before the Charlottetown schooling, had a
far better chance than her mother; for in her mother's day there was no
free school in the island, and in families of ten and twelve it was only
a turn and turn about that the children had at school. Since the free
schools had been established many a grown man and woman had sighed
curiously at the better luck of the youngsters under the new regime. No
excuse now for the poorest man's children not knowing how to read and
write and more; and if they chose to keep on, nothing to hinder their
dipping into studies of which their parents never heard so much as the
names.

And this was not the only better chance which Little Bel had had. John
McDonald's farm joined the lands of the manse; his house was a short
mile from the manse itself; and by a bit of good fortune for Little Bel
it happened that just as she was growing into girlhood there came a new
minister to the manse,--a young man from Halifax, with a young bride,
the daughter of an officer in the Halifax garrison,--gentlefolks, both
of them, but single-hearted and full of fervor in their work for the
souls of the plain farming-people given into their charge. And both Mr.
Allan and Mrs. Allan had caught sight of Little Bel's face on their
first Sunday in church, and Mrs. Allan had traced to her a flute-like
voice she had detected in the Sunday-school singing; and before long, to