The curate was silent, and I felt, rather than saw, that the tears
which were wetting my frock had not come from my own eyes, though I
was crying bitterly. I flung my arms round his neck, and hugged him
tight.

"Oh, I am so sorry!" I sobbed; "so very, very sorry!"

We became quieter after a bit; and he lifted up his head and smiled,
and called himself a fool for making me sad, and told me not to tell
any one what he had told me, and what babies we had been, except my
mother.

"Tell her _everything_ always," he said.

I soon cheered up, particularly as he took me over the wall, and into
his workshop, and made a coffin for the poor little blackbirds, which
we lined with cotton-wool and scented with musk, as a mark of respect.
Then he dug a deep hole in the garden and we buried them, and made a
fine high mound of earth, and put the "hen and chicken" plants all
round. And that night, sitting on my mother's knee, I told her
"everything," and shed a few more tears of sorrow and repentance in
her arms.

* * * * *

Many years have passed since then, and many showers of rain have
helped to lay the mound flat with the earth, so that the "hen and
chickens" have run all over it, and made a fine plot. The curate and
his mother have met at last; and I have transplanted many flowers that
he gave me to his grave. I sometimes wonder if, in his perfect