Page:Salem - a tale of the seventeenth century (IA taleseventeenth00derbrich).pdf/330



CHAPTER XXII.

THE PARTING.

"Sometimes beneath exterior rough A loyal soul is hidden, That questions not the Master's will,  But does the task that's bidden; For lowly lot and form uncouth  May yet perchance inherit A grace the mighty Cæsar lacked—  A calm, contented spirit."

The person most aggrieved in the prospect of the departure of the little family was our humble friend, the faithful old Winny.

To her it was a loss to which nothing could reconcile her, and though (unlike herself) she bore it in silence, still it was plain to see that she drooped under it.

One day Alice found her sitting upon an inverted wash-tub in front of the hen-house, with her poor woolly head in her hands, in a very despondent attitude. Supposing she was grieving for her coming departure, Alice,