Before I relate how far David cöincided in this opinion of his 'gude wife,' I will mention to whom and what she alluded, and how I had an opportunity of declaring a similar conviction.

Seated, after a kind reception by the master and matron, in the best room in the work-house of L——, in Kent, at my request they were proceeding to gratify my curiosity, raised by a picture which hung between the windows. The subject and execution were striking. It had been hit off at one of those luckiest moments for the artist, when, all unconscious, the study presented that inspiration to the task, which so rarely occurs in what is termed a 'sitting for a likeness.' On a three-legged stool, with one foot raised upon the fender, and an old pair of bellows resting on her lap, in the act of blowing the fire; long clustering locks, the brightest yellow that ever rivalled sunbeams, flowing from a head turned toward her right shoulder, from which a coarse Holland pin-a-fore had slipped, by the breaking of one of the strings that had fastened it, sat a child, apparently eight or nine years old, in whose face beamed more beauty, spirit, and intelligence, than surely ever were portrayed on canvass. Well might the good dame cry, 'Dear heart! how sweet a child it was!' Never before or since have I beheld its equal; and the vivid recollection of the wonder I then felt, will never cease to throw its light upon the page of memory, till time turns over a new leaf of existence. What admirable grace—how exquisitely free! She seemed indeed to inhale the breath that panting look bespoke a lack of. What joyous fire in her large blue eyes! And then the parted laughing lips, and small teeth; the attitude, how careless and most natural! All appeared as much to live, as if all actual. But little do I hope, gentle reader, to excite in you as lively an interest for the original, by my weak tints of simple black and white, as the glowing colors of the picture roused in me. I will not attempt it, but at once proceed with the story appertaining to the object of my inquiry, as narrated by my host and his wife.

'Do you tell the tale, Bessum,' said honest David, addressing his spouse, whose name, from Elizabeth and Betsey, had undergone this farther proof of the liberties married folks take with one another; 'do you tell the tale; and if needs be, I can help you on, where you forget any part of it.'

'Ah, you're a 'cute fellow, David,' said the vainly-christened Elizabeth; 'you know how to set an easy task, as well as any one, 'specially when it's for yourself to go about; but never mind, I wont rate 'e for 't, for I know 'tis a sad subject for you to deal with.'

Bessum was evidently right; for the tear that stood trembling for a moment in the corner of David's eye, as she spoke, rolled unheeded down his cheek; while the handkerchief that seemed to have been taken from across his knees, for the purpose of concealing the simplicity of the tribute his honest heart was paying, was employed, for at least the tenth time that day, to brush the dust from the picture of his 'poor dear child.' I was affected to a degree for which I was unable to account, by the touching sigh poor David heaved, as he replaced the handkerchief on his knees, and resigned himself to the pangs my curiosity was about to inflict on him. There was a tender melancholy in the kind creature's face, that seemed to mark the lacerated feelings of intense affection. I could have pressed him to my breast, in sympathy of his sufferings, for I was already a sharer of his grief, before I knew the cause of it. It was at this moment that the dame began her story, in the words of my commencement.

'Ten years to-day,' said she, 'since that picture was painted, Sir——'

'Ah! my poor dear child!' sighed David; from which ejaculation I inferred that I was about to hear a tale of which his own daughter was the heroine; but I was soon undeceived by his wife, who thus proceeded:

'It be n't necessary to go farther back in the dear child's life, than the day she was first placed with me to nurse; who she is, has nought to do with what she is, or the story of her life; certain sure it is, she was the loveliest babe I ever saw, and I and David were as proud of her as if she were our own. Bless her dear heart! how every body talked about her, and how all the folks did love her, too, surely! I can't tell you, Sir, how beautiful she was; and as she grew, her beauty kept good pace with her years, I promise you. She was nine years old the very day the painter came to make a likeness of her for her father; here she sat in this very room, just as you see her in the picture, Sir. She had run in from the garden, where she had been at romps with poor George, and was puffing away at the fire with an old pair of bellows, which she found among the lumber in the tool-house, when the gentleman, who she didn't notice at first, was arranging his matters for the painting of the picture. It was at the moment that she turned round to see who was in the room, that, as he said, he was so struck with her lovely face, that he could have taken her likeness, if he had not seen her an instant longer; and sure enough he was not out much in his reckoning, for he had scarcely taken his pencil in his hand, before the little madcap bounded out of the room, and ran off to her play-mate in the garden. That is a copy of the picture, Sir; and if the poor dear child were sitting here as she was on that day, she couldn't look more like herself than that painting does to me.'

David was in the very act of again converting his handkerchief into a duster, but after a momentary struggle, for once in a way, he pressed a corner of it to his eyes, and kept his seat.

'Of all those, barring myself and David,' continued the dame, 'who loved the sweet child, as to be sure every body did, more or less, none seemed to doat on her so much as the young gentleman who was then our village doctor's assistant, and poor George.'