Ready, aye ready!

She looked dusty and unhappy, and she spoke disconsolately,—all three things rare with Susan Dunn, for a neater and brighter and more smiling little roundabout of a woman could...

He did not look depressed, though the change in his home and circumstances had been to him, as to Susan, no slight trouble. Dunn was a man of cheerful spirit; and the cheerfulne...

"Nice sort of chap I should be, if I did! Why, it's as clean!—And the dishes as shiny!—It's almost like the old home kitchen, Sue!" Richard Dunn could not resist one sigh. "And...

CHILDREN were bundled promiscuously within cottage doors, and mothers followed them. Handcock stood up at last. He seemed an easy-going sort of individual—indolent perhaps, and...

ANNIE WILMOT, passing quickly indoors at her father's bidding, did not catch the ominous words which had reached his ears. And believing that he wished her not to see the cause...

John Gardiner had not left his bed yet; nor Bess, the elder girl, who earned enough in the factory to clothe herself and pay for her board, and who counted herself at sixteen an...

ARCHIE STUART did not always trouble himself to go to Church on Sunday mornings. His mother commonly stayed in, cooking a hot dinner for him; and she liked Archie to go with her...

"The true-hearted soldier is 'ready, aye ready' to go where bidden, even to death. The true-hearted servant is 'ready, aye ready' to do his master's desire, careless of trouble...

"THAT'S a preacher of the right sort," Dunn said warmly, as they left the Churchyard. "He speaks right from his own heart, and straight to ours. I like your Mr. Wilmot, Stuart;...

IF Archie had been a little less angry, I do not think he would have seriously entertained the idea of going to Woodbine Cottage that afternoon, despite his threat. For it was n...

MRS. STUART felt her loneliness more than she would have liked to say, and very bitter and sorrowful grew her spirit, as time went by and Archie appeared not. She could not read...

Nancy entered shyly, with her usual pretty and modest manner. Annie, used to the bold and rough bearing of too many Littleburgh girls, was taken by Nancy's manner directly. She...

AT half-past eight Archie reached his home, feeling altogether guilty and uncomfortable. Pride had prevented his returning sooner, otherwise he would undoubtedly have found his...

They were treading the brick-fields side by side—not in darkness, but in clear moonlight. It streamed down upon the wide flat expanse, lending weirdness to the long lines of pil...

"NOW," the doctor said, having bound up the crushed member, and ordered complete rest, "who is going to see after you, my good woman? There are to be no attempts at standing abo...

TEN days had gone by, and Mrs. Stuart had her foot up still on a chair, swathed in bandages. She was allowed to hop downstairs once a day, with Archie's aid, but not to stand yet.

MANY weeks had gone by, and Mrs. Stuart was pretty well recovered from her accident. She limped a little, it is true, and was unable to walk any distance; still, on the whole, s...

THINGS were widely different, next door to the Dunns, from what Archie had found in Woodbine Cottage. It is astonishing what a change comes over the scene, if one just passes fr...

Bess hung her head and was silent. She had spoken under a momentary impulse, and now shyness seized upon her. Rough-mannered Bess was by no means wont to suffer from shyness, an...

Annie was slower to perceive the alteration in him than were many. For one thing, he did his best to keep up in her presence, fearing to awake his darling's anxiety. For another...

"WHY, Annie, my child!" the Rector said, raising himself on one elbow, and greeting her with a smile, in which some veiled anxiety might have been detected. "We did not hear you...

"NOW, remember," said Mr. Rawdon authoritatively, having stepped with Annie into the drawing-room, where he stood pulling on his gloves—"remember, Miss Wilmot, the less you dwel...

"My fire's took to smoking like mad; smoked me out, if I didn't want to be turned into a dried herring," said Mrs. Mason. "So I thought I'd just look in here for an hour, and as...

EXACTLY one quarter of an hour after Mrs. Mason's departure, there came a rap at the door. Mrs. Stuart went to open it. Outside stood a respectably dressed young woman, tall and...

There was an almost imperceptible sigh. "I should have been in time, but I was stopped. One of the poor little Handcocks has been terribly scalded. Of course I went at once to s...

Of Annie's grief it is needless to speak. The blow almost crushed her. She felt herself alone in the world, bereft of him who had been father, mother, friend, and companion to h...

"It isn't my way to give in," she said. "I'm not one o' those folks that's for ever chopping and changing. When I says a thing, I mean it, and I keep to it. And I did say I'd ne...