work of a moment; and, to his delight, he finds that he has succeeded
in stopping the flow of the water.

This was all very well for a little while, and the child thought only
of the success of his device. But the night was closing in, and with
the night came the cold. The little boy looked around in vain. No one
came. He shouted--he called loudly--no one answered. He resolved to
stay there all night; but, alas! the cold was becoming every moment
more biting, and the poor finger fixed in the hole began to feel
benumbed, and the numbness soon extended to the hand, and thence
throughout the whole arm. The pain became still greater, still harder
to bear; but still the boy moved not. Tears rolled down his cheeks as
he thought of his father, of his mother, of his little bed, where he
might now be sleeping so soundly; but still the little fellow stirred
not, for he knew that did he remove the small slender finger which he
had opposed to the escape of the water, not only would he himself be
drowned, but his father, his brothers, his neighbors--nay, the whole
village. We know not what faltering of purpose, what momentary
failures of courage, there might have been during that long and
terrible night; but certain it is, that, at day-break, he was found in
the same painful position by a clergyman returning from attendance on
a death-bed, who, as he advanced, thought he heard groans, and,
bending over the dyke, discovered a child seated on a stone, writhing
from pain, and with pale face and tearful eyes.

"Boy," he exclaimed, "what are you doing there?"

"I am hindering the water from running out," was the answer, in
perfect simplicity, of the child, who, during the whole night, had
been evincing such heroic fortitude and undaunted courage.