104 RUTH.

hands in his. “Do you know you look like your mother, who
was my cousin too? Poor little Ruth! I remember now they
told me she left a little girl. Now let us walk a little way
together, and tell me all about the dragons.”

“The dragons!” said Ruth, looking up.

“ Yes, that is a pet name I used to have for your aunts when
I was a boy. You know they are my real aunts, and not my
great-aunts, so, of course, I may call them pet names.”

Ruth smiled shyly, and was soon so at her ease that he
drew from her an account of her dreary daily life, and of the
cause of the tearful eves, which now, however, were cleared of
all traces of grief.

After her recital was over her cousin was silent a few
moments before he said, “ Well, Ruth, you know I have been
away for many a long year and have just returned to settle
down in the old home. Iam your cousin John Wylie, and I
am going with you to call on your aunts; but first I want to
stop at the shop, where I first saw you, to pick out a doll for a
little girl I know. It is fortunate I met you, for I should
never know how to select it.”

So back they went to the shop, and it was something to
Ruth to hold in her hands, even for a few minutes, the beau-
tiful creature which she had so fondly gazed upon from outside.

“You think she will do?” said her cousin John, smiling at
the tender kiss which Ruth furtively bestowed upon the doll,
as she regretfully gave her up to be put into a box.