HOME AT THE HAVEN.

 before. Now and then all agreed to rest awhile; for
 they grew hot and tired with so much stooping; and
 then there were other things to look at and divert
 their attention, such as the nest of a field-mouse full
 of young ones, and a hedgehog, which one of the
 young Whichers turned out of the hedge, and which
 rolled itself up into a round prickly ball. Edward
 had never before seen a hedgehog, and he stayed
 looking at it, and trying to make it unroll itself again,
 long after the rest had returned to their gleaning.
 Presently, the eldest Miss Whicher came out from the
 house, to summon all the gleaners in. The tarts and
 cakes were out of the oven, she said, and the fermety,
 which was to be the principal dish on the supper table,
 would be ready in another hour. She invited all the
 gleaners to coie on to the lawn, at the back of the
 house, and there, in the cool arbour, they could rest
 and bind up their sheaves, and then have a game of
 play. The children obeyed the summons very gladly;
 for, altogether, it was thought they must have gleaned
 what, when divided amongst the village children,
 would make a famous sheaf for each to carry home.
 Lucy, with the rest, was leaving the field, with a
 charming large bundle of wheat in her apron, when
 she looked round to see after Edward. He was only
 then coming away from a corner of the field where the
 hedgehog had been found, and, as he came up to her,
 Lucy was quite vexed to see what a small quantity of
 corn he had gleaned; really not more than he could
 hold in one hand.
 "Oh, Edward!" said she "how little you have
got; what have you been about?" Edward never
liked being behind others in what he did, so that he
was sorry, now it was too late, that he had not gleaned
more industriously He and Lucy were passing at