[CHAPTER III.]
Roughing it.
Ne'er saw I, never felt a calm so deep!
The river glideth at his own sweet will:
Dear God, the very houses seem asleep;
And all that mighty heart is lying still.
—Wordsworth
ext morning Benny was stirring early, and when the first faint rays of the coming day peeped through the dust-begrimed and patched-up window, they saw the little fellow busily engaged in gathering together what things he and Nelly possessed previous to their final departure from home.
Nelly still slept on, and several times the brother paused and looked fondly down upon the fair face of the sleeping child. She looked very beautiful, Benny thought, as she lay sleeping there, with a pink spot glowing on either cheek, and the long flaxen hair thrown carelessly back from the pale forehead. Once or twice she murmured in her sheep, and the same happy smile spread over her face that he had noticed the evening before when she sat gazing into Joe Wrag's fire.
"I wonder what she's a-dreamin' on?" he murmured to himself. "Perhaps she sees the hills and flowers and trees agin."
Then he set to work again turning over a heap of rubbish that had been pushed as far back as possible under the stairs. At length a joyful exclamation burst from his lips as he came upon a small heap of potatoes.