added that I was very eccentric, and that happening to be on the Chain
Pier that morning, I had insisted upon paying the expenses of the little
funeral.

"A kind, Christian gentlemen," the master said. "I am glad to hear it."

I shall never forget the pitiful sight of that tiny white form laid on
the table alone--quite alone--I could not forget it. The matron had
found a little white dress to wrap it in, and with kindly thought had
laid some white chrysanthemums on the little, innocent breast. Whenever
I see a chrysanthemum now it brings back to my mind the whole scene--the
bare, white walls, the clean wooden floor, the black tressels, and the
table whereon the fair, tender little body lay--all alone.




CHAPTER IV.


Our little life in this world seems of little count. Throw a stone into
the sea--it makes a splash that lasts for one second, then it is all
over; the waves roll on just as though it had not been dropped.

The death of this one little child, whom no one knew and for whom no one
cared, was of less than no account; it made a small paragraph in the
newspapers--it had caused some little commotion on the pier--just a
little hurry at the work-house, and then it was forgotten. What was such
a little waif and stray--such a small, fair, tender little creature to
the gay crowd?