her withered little hands and sobbed. A man rode by just then. It was
the agent on his way to the castle, for this was the morning of Curly
Tom's escape. Instinctively the children drew closer together and
shuddered. They did not know why, but they knew their father feared him.
He passed on, and the little faces seemed to brighten for a moment; the
eldest was but seven. Long ere the dawn their father had started for the
market town, some five miles off, in the vain hope that an old friend
there would help him. Ah, poor children! there they sat from the first
ray of daylight, and the bright sun was now glittering high above their
heads, shining upon their desolation and upon the castle turrets,
wherein dwelt in luxury their oppressor. The events we have described as
taking place at the castle were still in progress, when a female was
seen slowly coming along the road, bearing a basket on her arm that
seemed too heavy for her.

'That is Mary Walters,' said the eldest, 'and she will give us something
to eat--I am sure she will. Jenny, dear, don't cry,' and the urchin
wiped the little face she had struck before, and tenderly took her in
her own spare little arms. The child was not much weight. Gentle Mary
Waters! who that gazed upon thy placid face, as thou earnest on thine
errand of mercy--who that saw thee as thou ministered to the necessities
of those poor desolate children, would not have loved thee--who that had
seen thee in the first blush of thy beauty, when thy foot was as elastic
as the fawn's, and thy countenance radiant with joy and life's young
morning hope--who, who could dream that there existed one who had seen
all this, who had known the tie that bound thee to earth and its
promised happiness, the innocent love that abounded in thy heart--yet
ruthlessly snapped that tie asunder, and buried the love nought could
eradicate, deep in her bosom--a shattered wreck amid the memories of the
past. Gentle Mary Walters! alas for thy experience!