the huckster-woman saw the child gazing upon her with a look so earnest, that she was quite startled by it. She also caught a glance at the empty basket, and her little brown eyes twinkled at the promise of a new customer.

"Well, my dear, what do you want this morning?" she said, smoothing her apron with a pair of plump, little hands, and casting a well satisfied look over her stall, and then at the girl, who grew pale at her notice, and began to tremble visibly—"all sorts of vegetables, you see—flowers—strawberries—radishes—what will you have, child?"

The little girl crept round to where the woman stood, and speaking in a low, frightened voice, said—

"Please, ma'm, I want you to trust me!"

"Trust you!" said the woman, with a soft laugh that shook her double chin, and dimpled her cheeks. "Why, I don't know you, little one—what on earth do you want trust for? Lost the market money, hey, and afraid of a scolding—is that it?"

"No, no, I haven't lost any money," said the child eagerly; "please ma'm, just stoop down one minute, while I tell you!"

The little girl in her earnestness took hold of the woman's apron, and she, kind soul, sunk back to her stool: it was the most comfortable way of listening.

"I—I live with grandfather and grandmother, ma'm; they are old and poor—you don't know how poor; for he, grandpa, has been sick, and—it seems strange—I eat as much as any of them. Well, ma'm, I tried to get something to do, but you see how little I am; nobody will think me strong enough, even to tend baby; so we have all been without anything to eat, since day before yesterday."

"Poor thing!" muttered the huckster-woman, "poor thing!"

"Well, ma'm, I must do something. I can bear anything better than seeing them hungry. I did not sleep a wink all last night, but kept thinking what I should do. I never begged in my life; they never did; and it made me feel sick to think of it; but I could have done it rather than see them sit and look at each other another day. Did you ever see an old man cry for hunger, ma'm?"

"No, no, God forbid!" answered the dame, brushing a plump hand across her eyes.

"I have," said the child, with a sob, "and it was this that made me think that begging, after all, was not so very, very mean. So, this morning, I asked them to let me go out; but grandpa said he might go himself, if he were strong enough; but I never should—never—never!"

"Nice old man—nice old man!" said the huckster-woman.

"I did not ask again," resumed the child, "for an idea had come into my head in the night. I have seen little girls, no older than I am, selling radishes and strawberries, and things."

"Yes—yes, I understand!" said the old woman, and her eyes began to twinkle the more brightly that they were wet before.

"But I had no strawberries to sell, nor a cent of money to buy them with!"

"Well! well!"

"Not even a basket!"

"Poor thing!"

"But I was determined to do something. So I went to a grocery, where grandpa used to buy things when he had money, and they trusted me with this basket."

"That was very kind of them!"

"Wasn't it very kind?" said the child, her eyes brightening, "especially as I told them it was all myself—that grandpa knew nothing about it. See what a nice new basket it is—you can't think how much courage it gave me. When I came into the market it seemed as if I shouldn't be afraid to ask anybody about trusting me a little."

"And yet you came clear to this side without stopping to ask anybody?"

"I was looking into their faces to see if it would do," answered the child, with meek simplicity, "but there was something in every face that sent the words back into my throat again."

"So you stopped here because it was almost the last stand."

"No, no, I did not think of that," said the child eagerly. "I stopped because something seemed to tell me that this was the place. I thought if you would not trust me, you would, any way, be patient and listen."

The old huckster-woman laughed—a low, soft laugh—and the little girl began to smile through her tears. There was something mellow and comfortable in that chuckle, that warmed her to the heart.

"So you were sure that I would trust you—hey, quite sure?"

"I thought if you wouldn't, there was no chance for me anywhere else," replied the child, lifting her soft eyes to the face of the matron.

Again the old woman laughed.

"Well, well, let us see how many strawberries will set you up in business for the day. Six, ten—a dozen baskets—your little arms will break down with more than that. I will let you have them at cost, only be sure to come back at night with the money. I would not for fifty dollars have you fail."

"But I may not sell them all!" said the child, anxiously.

"I should not wonder, poor thing. That sweet voice of yours will hardly make itself heard at first; but never mind, run down into the areas and look through the windows—people can't help but look at your face, God bless it!"

As the good woman spoke, she was busy selecting the best and most tempting strawberries from the pile of little baskets that stood at her elbow. These she arranged in the orphan's basket, first sprinkling a layer of damp, fresh grass in the bottom, and interspersing the whole with young grape leaves, intended both as an embellishment, and to keep the fruit fresh and cool. When all was arranged to her satisfaction, she laid a bouquet of white and crimson moss rose-buds at each end of the basket, and interspersed little tufts of violets along the side, till the crimson berries were wreathed in with flowers.

"There," said the old woman, lifting up the basket with a sigh of satisfaction, "between the fruit and flowers you must make out. Sell the berries for sixpence a basket, and the roses for all you can get. People who love flowers well enough to buy them, never cavil about the price; just let them pay what they like."

The little girl took the basket on her arm; her pretty mouth grew tremulous and bright as the moss rose-bud that blushed against her hand; her eyes filled with tears.

"Oh, ma'm, I want to thank you so much, only I don't know how," she said, in a voice that went to the good woman's heart.

"There, there!—never mind—be punctual, that's a good girl. Now, my dear, what is your name?"

"Julia—Julia Warren, ma'm!"

"A pretty name—very well—stop a moment, I had forgotten."

The child sat her basket down upon the stool which the huckster-woman hastily vacated, and waited patiently while the good dame disappeared in some unknown region of the market, eager to accomplish an object that had just presented itself to her mind.

"Here," she said, coming back with her face all in a glow, a small tin pail in one hand, and her apron gathered up in the other. "Just leave the strawberries, and run home with these. It will be a long time for the old folks to wait, and you will go about the day's work with a lighter heart, when you know that they have had a breakfast, to say nothing of yourself, poor thing! There, run along, and be back in no time."

Julia took the little tin pail and the rolls that her kind friend hastily twisted up in a sheet of brown paper.

"Oh! they will be so glad," broke from her, and with a sob of joy she sprang away with her precious burden.

"Well now, Mrs. Gray, you are a strange creature, trusting people like that, and absolutely laying out money too; I only wonder how you ever got along at all!" said a little, shrewish woman from a neighboring stand, who had been watching this scene from behind a heap of vegetables.

"Poh! it's my way; and I can afford it," answered the