"Why, Belle!" exclaimed Kitty, "how can you talk so? I'm sure I pity that old man dreadfully."

"Lor!" said Belle, "what's the use of pitying? If you are going to begin to pity, you'll have to do it all the time. Look,"—Belle touched her companion's elbow—"there's Willie Sullivan, father's clerk: an't he a beauty? I want to speak to him."

But before she could address a word to him, Willie, who was walking very fast, passed her with a bow, and a pleasant "Good morning, Miss Isabel;" and ere she had recovered from the surprise and disappointment, was some rods down the street.

"Polite!" muttered the pretty Isabel.

"Why, Belle! do see," said Kitty, who was looking back over her shoulder, "he's overtaken the old man and my interesting little girl. Look—look! He's put the old man's other arm through his, and they are all three walking off together. Isn't that quite a coincidence?"

"Nothing very remarkable," replied Belle, who seemed a little annoyed. "I suppose they are persons he's acquainted with. Come, make haste; we shall be late at school."

Reader! Do you wonder who they are, the girl and the old man? or have you already conjectured that they are Gerty and Trueman Flint? True is no longer the brave, strong, sturdy protector of the lonely child. True has had a paralytic stroke. His strength is gone, his power even to walk alone. He sits all day in his arm-chair, or on the old settle, when he is not out walking with Gerty. The blow suddenly struck down the robust man, and left him feeble as a child. And the little orphan girl who, in her weakness, her loneliness, and her poverty, found in him a father and a mother, she now is all the world to him—his staff, his comfort, and his hope. During four or f