The apple trees were all growing old,
And old was the house that sheltered him;
But that brave, warm heart, was a heart of gold!
Though his head was grey, and his eyes were dim.

Aunt Hannah arose, and walked with a precise and firm step from the room. Enoch Sharp led the way into a low back porch that overlooked that portion of the garden devoted to vegetables. In one end of this porch stood a huge cheese-press; and on the dresser opposite, a wooden churn was turned bottom up, with the dasher leaning against it. Several milking-pails of wood, scoured to a spotless whiteness, were ranged on each side, while nicely kept strainers hung over them. There was a faint, pure smell of the dairy near, as if the porch opened to a butter and cheese-room; but the exquisite cleanliness of everything around made this rather agreeable than otherwise.

The principal object in the porch, however, was an old man seated in a huge armed-chair of unpainted oak, with a splint bottom worn smooth by constant use. The chair stood near the back entrance, and the old man seemed quite too large and unwieldy for any attempt at exercise; but his broad, rosy face was turned toward the door, as he heard Enoch Sharp and his sister coming through the kitchen; and one of the frankest smiles you ever beheld, beamed from his soft brown eyes over the benevolent expanse of his face.

"Well, Nathan, what do you want of me?" inquired the austere lady in her usual cold tones.

The good man seemed taken aback by this short address. He looked at the Judge as if for help, saying,

"Hasn't he told you, Hannah?"

"Yes, he wants us to keep this little thing in yonder, and let others pay us for it. I don't sell kindness—do you, Nathan?"

"No, no, certainly not; but then, Hannah, you must reflect; the Judge's own house is not exactly suited for a person like this little girl; and if we don't take her who will?"

The woman stood musing, her cold face unchanged, her eyes cast thoughtfully downward.

"You see, sister," persisted uncle Nathan, "this little girl isn't as the Judge says, a sort of person to make a pet of, like the one Mrs. Farnham has adopted."

Aunt Hannah started, and looked up with one of those sharp glances, that we have once seen disturb the cold monotony of her face. There was something in the name of Mrs. Farnham, that seemed to sting her into life.

"She isn't handsome, you know," persisted the good man, "but you won't care for that, Hannah. The Judge says she's a bright, good little creature, and she'll be company for us, don't you think so?"

Aunt Hannah looked at the Judge, who stood regarding her with some degree of anxiety.

"Judge," she said, "that woman yonder? She is rich, and these two children loved each other—why did she send this girl to me?"

"She did not; I brought her without her knowledge," said the Judge.
"Young Farnham first suggested it."

"Young Farnham?" said the woman, and a glow came to her forehead.

"But why were they put asunder?"

"Mrs. Farnham seems to have taken a dislike to poor Mary," was the reply. "The other child is very pretty, and this was a great recommendation, for a lady like her, you know; besides my ward was very anxious that you should take charge of her."

The quick fire once more came to aunt Hannah's eyes. She drew herself up, and looking at Enoch Sharp, said, with a degree of feeling very unusual to her,

"Judge Sharp, you can go home. I will take the girl and bring her up after my own fashion; but, as for your money, we are not poor enough—my brother and I—to sell kindness—not, not even to him."

The Judge would have spoken, but aunt Hannah waved her hand, after her usual cold, stately fashion, saying, "take the girl—or leave her with me."

"But she will be a burden upon you!" he began to say.

Aunt Hannah did not answer, but going into "the out room," removed Mary's bonnet and mantilla, then, taking her by the hand, she led her into the porch directly before uncle Nathan.

"Talk with her," she said; "I have the chores to do up yet."

"Yes, yes, talk with uncle Nathan, Mary; you will feel at home at once," cried the Judge, somewhat annoyed that all his benevolent plans could not be carried out, but glad, nevertheless, that his poor favorite had found a home.

There are faces in the world which a warm-hearted person cannot look upon without a glow of generous emotion. Those faces are seldom among the most beautiful. Certainly, I have never found them so; but, this power of waking up all the sweet emotions of an irrepressible nature is worth all the beauty on earth. Uncle Nathan Heap's face was of this character. Full and ruddy, it beamed with an expression so benevolent, so warm and true, that you were ready to love and trust him at the first glance.

Mary Fuller had too much character in herself not to feel all that was noble in his. Her eye lighted up, the color came in a faint hue to her cheeks, and, without a word, she placed her little hands between the plump brown palms that were extended to receive her.

Uncle Nathan drew her close up to his knees, pressing her little hands kindly between his, and perusing her face with his friendly brown eyes.

"There, that will do, you are a nice little girl," he said, "I'm glad the Judge thought of bringing you here."

Mary was ready to cry. This reception was so cheering, after the cold interrogations of aunt Hannah.

"Go, bring that milking-stool, yonder, and sit down here while I talk with you a little," said uncle Nathan, pointing toward three or four stools, that hung on the picket fence in the back garden.

Mary ran across the cabbage patch, and brought the milking-stool, which she placed near the old man.

"Close up, close up," he said, patting his fat knee, as if he expected her to lean against it. "There, now, this will do. Sit still and see how you like the garden while the sunshine strikes it."

Mary looked around full of serious curiosity. The sunshine was falling across the cabbage patch, which she had just crossed, tinging the great heads with gold. The massive effect of this blended green and gold; the deep tints of the outer leaves, lined and crimped into a curious network; the inner leaves folded so hard and crisp, in their lighter green; all struck the child as singularly beautiful. Then the dun red of the beet leaves, that took up the slanting sunbeams as they strayed over the garden, scattering gold everywhere; and the delicate and feathery green of the parsnip beds: these all had a charm for her young eyes, a charm that one must feel for the first time to appreciate.

"Don't you think it a pleasant place out here?" said uncle Nathan, looking blandly down upon her.

"Oh! yes, very, very nice. I never saw so many things growing at once before."

"No! Don't they have gardens in New York then?"

"Some persons do, but not with these things in them: but they have beautiful roses and honeysuckles, and sights of flowers; don't you like flowers, sir?"

"Like flowers? Why, yes. Didn't you see the coxcombs and marigolds in the front garden?"

"Yes," said Mary, a little disappointed; for, to say the truth, she found more beauty in the nicely arranged vegetable beds, with their rich variety of tints, just then bathed in the sunset; besides, a taste for rare flowers had been excited, by many a childish visit to those pretty angles and grass plats, bright with choice flowers, that beautify many of our up-town dwellings in New York. "Yes, they are large and grand, but I like little tiny flowers, with stems that shake when you only touch them."

"Oh, you'll find lots of flowers like that in the spring time, I can tell you. Among the rocks and trees up there, the ground is covered with them."

"And can I pick them?" asked the child, lifting her brightening eyes on uncle Nathan, with a world of confiding earnestness in them, but still doubtful if she would dare to touch even a wild blossom without permission.

"Pick them!" repeated the old man, laughing till his double chin trembled like a jelly. "Why the cattle tramp over thousands of them every day. You may pick aprons full, if you have a mind to."

"I shouldn't like much to pick them in that way," said the child, thoughtfully.

"Why not, ha?"

"I don't know, sir."

"Call me uncle Nathan!"

"Well, I don't know, uncle Nathan," repeated the child, blushing, "but it seems to me as if it must hurt the pretty flowers to be picked, as if they had feeling like us, and would cry out in my fingers."

"That is a queer thought," said uncle Nathan, and he looked curiously on the child.

"Is it? I don't know," was the modest reply, "but I always feel that way about flowers."

"She is a strange little creature," thought uncle Nathan, who had a world of sympathy for every generous emotion the human soul ever knew, "what company she will be here in the old stoop nights like this."

Then in a quiet, gentle way, uncle Nathan began to question the child, as his sister had done; but Mary did not shrink from him as she had from his relative; and the sunset gathered around them, while she was telling her mournful little history.

The old man's eyes filled with tears more than once, as he listened. Mary saw it and drew close to him as she spoke, till her little clasped hands rested on his knees.

Just then aunt Hannah came into the porch with a pail in her hand, foaming over with milk.

"Oh!" exclaimed uncle Nathan, lifting himself from the arm-chair with a heavy sigh, "I oughtn't to have been sitting here, in this way, while you are doing up the chores, Hannah. Give me the stool, little darter, I must do my share of the milking, any how."

"Sit still! The child's strange yet; I can do up the chores for once, I suppose," answered aunt Hannah, placing a bright tin pan on the dresser, and tightening a snow-white strainer over the pail. "Sit down, I say."

Uncle Nathan dropped into his capacious chair, with a relieving sigh, though half the authority in aunt Hannah's command was lost in the flow of a pearly torrent of milk which soon filled the pan.

"Can't I help?" inquired Mary, going up to aunt Hannah, as she lifted the brimming pan with both hands, and bore it toward a swinging shelf in the pantry.

"Not now; when you are rested. Go back to Nathan," answered aunt
Hannah, looking sideway over the uplifted milk pan.

Mary drew back to her place by the old man, and they watched the sun as it set redly behind the hills, covering the garden and all the hills with its dusky gold.

"See!" said uncle Nathan, pointing to an immense sun flower crowning a stalk at least eight feet high. "See how that great flower wheels round as the sun travels toward the mountains; and stands with its face to the west, when it goes down. Did you ever see that before?"

"The great, brown flower, fringed with yellow leaves—does it really do that?" cried Mary, with her bright eyes wandering from the stately flower to uncle Nathan's face. "Oh! how I should love to sit and watch it all day!"

"I do sometimes, Sundays, when it's too warm for anything else," said uncle Nathan; "but supposing you go to bed early, and get up in the morning, as sure as you do, that sunflower will be found looking straight to the east."

Aunt Hannah, who had bustled about the porch and pantry some time, appeared after a short interval, at the back door. Uncle Nathan understood the signal, and taking Mary by the hand, led her into a kitchen, neatly covered with a rag carpet, and furnished with old-fashioned wooden chairs. A little round tea-table stood in the middle of the room, covered with warm tea-biscuit, preserved plums in china saucers, and plates of molasses-pound-cake, with a saucer of golden butter, and one of cheese, placed at equal distances.

Aunt Hannah took her seat behind an oblong tray of dark japaned tin, on which stood a conical little pewter tea-pot, bright as silver, and a pile of tea-spoons small enough for a modern play-house, but so bright that they scattered cheerful gleams over the whole tray. Three chairs stood around the table, and in one of these Mary placed herself, obedient to a move of aunt Hannah's hand. A bowl of bread and milk stood by her plate, to which she betook herself with hearty relish, while aunt Hannah performed the honors of her pewter tea-pot, mingling a judicious quantity of water with Mary's portion of her favorite beverage, while uncle Nathan reached over and sweetened it with prodigality, observing that "it was the nature of children to love sweets," at which aunt Hannah gave a cold smile of assent.

After tea, uncle Nathan withdrew to his seat on the porch again. Mary would have made herself useful about the tea-things, but aunt Hannah dismissed her with an observation that she might rest herself in the porch.

It was very pleasant to keep close up to the side of that old man, and find protection from her loneliness, in the shadow of his great chair. Still, a sadness crept over her poor heart, for with all her simple-hearted courage, the place was strange, and in spite of the cordial voice of uncle Nathan that came cheerfully through the gathering darkness, she felt a moisture creeping into her eyes. The very stillness and beautiful quiet of everything around had elements of sadness in it to a creature so sensitively organized as she was. She thought of her father, and fixing her meek eyes on the stars, as they came one by one into the sky, began to wonder if he knew where she was, and how much like a father that good old man was acting toward his little girl.

Then she thought of Isabel; and of Judge Sharp; of the great, good fortune that had befallen her in being so near them both, and her poor little heart swelled with a world of thankful feelings. I do think the sweetest tears ever shed by mortal, come from those grateful feelings, that, too exquisite for words, and too powerful for silence, can find no language to express themselves in but tears.

Mary Fuller began to sob. She had for the moment forgotten the old man's presence.

"What is this?" cried uncle Nathan, laying one hand over her head, and patting her cheeks with his broad palm, "homesick a'ready?"

"No, no," sobbed Mary, "I, I was only thinking how good you all are to me, how very, very happy I ought to feel."

"And can't. Is that it?"

"I don't know," answered the child, wiping her eyes, and looking up, searching for uncle Nathan's face in the star-light. "There is something here that isn't happy entirely, or a bit like sorrow, but sometimes it almost chokes me, and would quite if I couldn't cry it off."

"I used to feel that way once, I remember," said uncle Nathan, thoughtfully, "but it wore off as I grew older."

"I shouldn't quite like to have it wear off," said the child, fixing her eyes on the stars, and clinging to the golden dreams that so haunted her, just before this fit of weeping came on, "altogether, I don't think one would like to part with one's thoughts, you know."

"Not even when they make you cry?"

"No, I think not—those are the thoughts that one loves to remember best."

"Come, Nathan," said aunt Hannah, appearing in the porch with a tallow candle in her hand, "it's almost bed-time."

Uncle Nathan arose and entered the kitchen. Seating himself at the little round stand, he opened a huge old Bible, that lay upon it, and putting on a pair of iron spectacles began to read.

Mary, seated by aunt Hannah, listened with gentle interest with her little hands folded in her lap, and her large grey eyes dwelling earnestly on the face of the white-haired reader.

When the chapter was done, they all knelt down, and uncle Nathan poured forth the fullness of his faith in a prayer, that went over the child's heart like the summer wind upon a water-lily, stirring all its young thought to their gentle depths, as the fragrant leaves of the lily give forth their sweetness. Two or three times she heard aunt Hannah murmur some words uneasily, as if a thought, at variance with her brother's prayer, disturbed her. But directly the child was enwrapped, heart and soul, in the earnest words that fell from the old man's lips, and when she stood up again, her face had a sort of glory in its expression. It was the first night in a long, long time that Mary had been so near heaven.

And this was the kind of home which Enoch Sharp had given to the orphan. Did she sleep well? If grateful thoughts can summon angels, many bright spirits hovered over her little bed that night.

But aunt Hannah never closed her eyes.