"Did he go in a carriage with a coronet on it, and two powdered footmen behind?" asked Maud.
"No, love; but gentle beings, more good and beautiful than those kind ladies of the Castle, bore him away, and will tend him, lovingly."
"I think he will miss nurse Elspeth, and cry for her, and they will have to send him home again," said poor, bewildered little Maud.
"Why, mamma," cried Margaret, "we can't spare baby to the greatest lord on earth!"
"But, my daughter, to the 'Lord of lords' we must spare him. He will 'lead' him as you were led to-day, 'beside the still waters, and cause him to lie down in pleasant pastures,' and our darling will never know pain, nor hunger, nor sorrow."
"O mamma, mamma, I know what you mean now!—baby is dead!"
Then went up the children's united voices, like one sad wail, "Baby is dead!"
"Yes, my children," said their father, in a voice broken by grief, "our precious little Alfred is gone. But, try to say, and try to help us say, 'The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.'"
The poor children could not say it then, for their bitter crying; but, before they went to bed, they sobbed forth the sacred words, as they knelt by the crib where little Ally lay, still, and very pale, dressed in a snowy muslin frock, with his waxen hands clasped on his breast, and holding a tiny white rose-bud, an emblem of his sinless little life.