GIFTS AND AWARDS.
"Two bonnier babes," said the grey old midwife, bending thoughtfully over them, "I never before assisted into the world."
The mother, lying wan in her bed, smiled happily.
"So bonny are they," said the wrinkled beldame, "that I will give to each of them one of my choicest gifts: something they will still keep hugged to their hearts when they are as close to the gates as you or I."
"And how close is that?" asked the mother, growing whiter.
The wise old midwife turned from the bedside and bent above the infants, mumbling to herself.
Presently the mother started up from a doze. There was no one in the room but her married sister. "I dreamed Death was in the room with me just now," said she. "And he had an old woman with him whom he called his Sister. She seemed to me to be giving my babies something: but what it was I don't know. At first I thought it was a plaything; but now I think it was a sorrow. At least. . . ."
"Dear! dear!" cried her sister, in alarm, as if she saw the spirit drifting beyond her ken.