huckster-woman, rubbing her plump palms together, and twinkling her eyelashes to disperse the moisture that had gathered under them. "I haven't sat in this market fourteen years for nothing. The child is a good child, I'll stake my life on it!"

"I hope you may never see the pail again, that's all," was the terse reply.

"Well, well, I may be wrong—maybe I am—we shall know soon. At any rate I can afford to lose half a dozen pails, that's one comfort."

"Always chuckling over the money she has saved up," muttered the little woman, with a sneer; "for my part I don't believe that she is half as well off as she pretends to be."

The conversation was here cut short by several customers, who crowded up to make their morning purchases. During the next half hour good Mrs. Gray was so fully occupied, that she had no opportunity for thought of her protégé; but just as she obtained a moment's breathing time, up came the little girl panting for breath; her cheeks glowing like June roses; and her eyes sparkling with delight.

"They have had their breakfast; I told them all about it!" she said, in a panting whisper, drawing close up to the huckster-woman, and handing back the empty pail. "I wish you could have seen grandpa when I took off the cover, and let the hot coffee steam into the room. I only wish you could have seen him!"

"And he liked it, did he?"

"Liked it! Oh! if you had been there to see!"

The child's eyes were brimful of tears, and yet they sparkled like diamonds.

Mrs. Gray looked over her stall to see if there was anything else that could be added to the basket. That pretty, grateful look expanded her warm heart so pleasantly, that she felt quite like heaping everything at hand upon the little girl. But the basket was already quite heavy enough for that slender arm, and the addition of a single handful of fruit or tuft of flowers, would have destroyed the symmetry of its arrangement. So with a sigh, half of disappointment, half of that exquisite satisfaction that follows a kind act, she patted little Julia on the head, lifted the basket from the stool, and kindly bade her begone to her day's work.

The child departed with a light tread and a lighter heart, smiling upon every one she met, and looking back, as if she longed to point out her benefactress to the whole world.

Mrs. Gray followed her with moist and sunny eyes; then shaking the empty pail at her cynical neighbor, in the good-humored triumph of her benevolence, she carried it back to the coffee-stand whence it had been borrowed.

"Strawberries!—strawberries!"

Julia Warren turned pale, and looked around like a frightened bird, when this sweet cry first broke from her lips in the open street. Nobody seemed to hear—that was one comfort; so she hurried round a corner, and creeping into the shadow of a house, leaned, all in a tremor, against an iron railing, quite confident, for the moment, that she should never find courage to open her mouth again. But a little reflection gave her strength. Mrs. Gray had told her that the morning was her harvest hour. She could not stand there trembling beneath the weight of her basket. The fruity scent—the fragrant breath of the violets that floated up from it, seemed to reproach her.

"Strawberries!—strawberries!"

The sound rose from those red lips more cheerily now. There was ripeness in the very tones that put you in mind of the fruit itself. The cry was neither loud nor shrill, but somehow people were struck by it, and turned unconsciously to look upon the girl. This gave her fresh courage, for the glances were all kind, and as she became accustomed to her own voice, the novelty of her position began to lose its terror. A woman called to her from the area of a house, and purchased two baskets of the strawberries, without asking any reduction in the price. Poor child, how her heart leaped when the shilling was placed in her hand! How important the whole transaction seemed to her; yet with what indifference the woman paid for the strawberries, and turned to carry them into the basement.

Julia looked through the railings and thanked this important customer. She could not help it; her little heart was full. A muttered reply that she was "welcome," came back; that was all. Notwithstanding the gruff answer, Julia took up her basket with a radiant face.

"Strawberries!—strawberries!"

Now the words came forth from red and smiling lips—nay, once or twice the little girl broke into a laugh, as she went along, for the bright shilling lay in the bottom of her basket. She wandered on unacquainted with the streets, but quite content; for though she found herself down among warehouses only, and in narrow, crowded streets, the gentlemen who hurried by would now and then turn for a bunch of violets, and she kept on bewildered, but happy as a bird.

All at once the strawberry girl found herself among the shipping; and a little terrified at the coarse and barren appearance of the wharves, she paused close by the water, irresolute what direction to pursue. It was now somewhat deep in the morning, and everything was life and bustle in that commercial district; for the child was but a few streets above the Battery, and could detect the cool wave of its trees through a vista in the buildings. The harbor, glowing with sunshine and covered with every species of water craft, lay spread before her gaze. Brooklyn Heights, Jersey City, and the leafy shores of Hoboken, half veiled in the golden haze of a bright June morning, rose before her like soft glimpses of the fairy land she had loved to read about. Never in her life had she been in that portion of the city before; and she forgot everything in the strange beauty of the scene, which few ever looked upon unmoved. The steamboats ploughing the silvery foam of the waters, curving around the Battery, darting in and out from every angle of the shore; the fine national vessels sleeping upon the waters, with their masts pencilled against the sky, and their great, black hulls, so imposing in their motionless strength; the ferry-boats, the pretty barges and smaller kind of water craft shooting with arrowy speed across the waves—all these things had a strange and absorbing effect on the girl.

As she stood gazing upon the scene, there came looming up in the distant horizon, an ocean steamer, riding majestically on the waters, that seemed to have suddenly heaved the monster up into the bright June atmosphere. At first, the vast proportions of this sea monarch were lost in the distance; but it came up with the force and swiftness of some wild steed of the desert, and each moment its vast size became more visible. Up it came, black, swift, and full of majestic strength, ploughing the waters with a sort of haughty power, as if spurning the element which had become its slave. Its great pipes poured forth a whirlwind of black, fleecy smoke, now and then flaked and lurid with fire, that whirled and whirled in the curling vapor, till all its glow went out, rendering the thick volumes of smoke that streamed over the water still more dense and murky.

At first the child gazed upon this imposing object with a sensation of affright. Her large eyes dilated; her cheek grew pale with excitement; she felt a disposition to snatch up her basket, and flee from the water's edge. But curiosity, and something akin to superstitious dread kept her motionless. She had heard of these great steamships, and knew that this must be one; yet it seemed to her like some dangerous monster tortured with black, fiery venom. She turned to an old sailor that stood near, his countenance glowing with enthusiasm, and muttering eagerly to himself—

"Oh! sir, it is only a ship—you are sure of that!" she said, for her childish dread of strangers was lost in wonder at a