HOW @ PATSEY OWN Da yriSme a @lkaleu) Ngee

yg HERE was a great commotion in the Killikelly cabin that
morning. There always was, for that matter, for they made
up the jolliest crowd of Irish children you ever saw, and the
little cabin at Fernsea was much too small to hold either the
crowd or the noise. But the laughing and shouting were so much
louder than usual, that if you had been there you would surely
have asked what it was all about.

No one need to stay in doubt long upon any matter in Fern-
sea, for news traveled quickly in the little village. It was simply
this: the Killikellys were going to America.

Poor little Patsey was happier than all the rest put together,
and when you say that you say a good deal, for hardly anybody

except the babies slept a wink that night for joy. But Patsey had reason to be
glad, for as he was a cripple who had never been able to go far from home, even
in a jaunting car, the prospect of being carried more than two thousand miles
in a big steamer was more than delightful.

Patsey had read more than the rest about that wonderful land, and all that
he had heard and studied about it only whetted his curiosity and increased his
joy. Why,“ Meriky” was where they had Indians, and gave away land to poor
people, and had paper for money. (They have only silver, gold and copper
money there, in Ireland, you know.) He knew about this because Jimmie
Mack’s sister, who was out at service in America, wrote long letters to Jimmie,
and told him all about these jolly things.

They were to sail in about a week, and the little Killikellys were busy
enough. They bade all their schoolmates good-by ; helped to carry the lighter
articles of furniture to the neighbors who had bought them; gave away their
toys (they were not so much to look at, but they were very dear to them), so
that their playmates would have something to remember them by. So they
started over the field to the railway station one bright morning, a lark high up
in the sky singing them a cheery farewell song as they tramped away together.

Patsey carried in one hand a little leather satchel which knocked against his
crutch as he hobbled along. Little Mike offered to carry it for him, asking, with
wonder in his big blue eyes:

“ Phwat’s in it, any way?”

“Oh! somethin’ foine — yez’ll be sure to lose it, Mickey, if I lets yez carry it.

_ Oi can take it all roight.”
All their kindly entreaties were in vain. Patsey would neither tell them
what it held, nor allow it out of his sight one instant. Even when the pangs of