owing to a sudden remembrance of some words which Mrs. Fairchild had said
during their few minutes' conversation, which, as I told you, had been
principally about Bridget.

'Yes,' Celestina's mother had replied in answer to a remark of the
rector's wife, 'I can see that she must be a child who needs careful
management. Firmness of course--but also the greatest, the very greatest
gentleness, so as never to crush or repress any deeper feeling whenever
it comes.'

And the words had stayed in Biddy's mother's mind. Ah, children, _how_
much we may do for good, and, alas, for bad, by our simplest words
sometimes!

So in spite of still feeling irritated and sore against cross-grained
Biddy, her mother crushed down her own vexation and met the child's
better mind more than half-way.

A queer feeling came over the little girl; a sort of choke in her
throat, which she had never felt before.

'If mamma was always like that _how_ good I would be,' thought Biddy, as
she walked on quietly, her hand still on her mother's arm.

Suddenly she withdrew it with a little cry, and ran on a few steps. Some
way before them a small figure stood out dark against the sky, from time
to time stooping as if picking up something. Bridget had excellent eyes
when she chose to use them.

'It's Celestina, mamma,' she exclaimed, running back to her mother and