along with her, and offered it in part of payment of the debt, but the
schoolmistress would not receive the goat. She said that she could afford
to wait for her money till Mary was able to pay it; that she knew her to
be an honest, industrious little girl, and she would trust her with more
than a guinea. Mary thanked her; and she was glad to take the goat home
again, as she was very fond of it.

Being now settled in their house, they went every day regularly to work;
Maud spun nine cuts a day, besides doing all that was to be done in the
house; Edmund got fourpence a day by his work; and Peggy and Annie earned
twopence apiece at the paper-mills near Navan, where they were employed
to sort rags, and to cut them into small pieces.

When they had done work one day, Annie went to the master of the paper-
mill and asked him if she might have two sheets of large white paper
which were lying on the press. She offered a penny for the paper; but
the master would not take anything from her, but gave her the paper when
he found that she wanted it to make a garland for her mother's grave.
Annie and Peggy cut out the garland, and Mary, when it was finished, went
along with them and Edmund to put it up. It was just a month after their
mother's death.

It happened, at the time the orphans were putting up this garland, that
two young ladies, who were returning home after their evening walk,
stopped at the gate of the churchyard to look at the red light which the
setting sun cast upon the window of the church. As the ladies were
standing at the gate, they heard a voice near them crying, "O, mother!
mother! are you gone for ever?" They could not see anyone, so they
walked softly round to the other side of the church, and there they saw
Mary kneeling beside a grave, on which her brothers and sisters were