LITTLE RIE AND THE ROSEBUDS.
THE last house before you come to the open heath is a gray, cheerless looking place in winter, though in summer it looks pleasant and gay, for it is nearly covered with china roses.
There are a good many trees in the front garden, and some thick laurestinus shrubs. On one side of the porch is the kitchen casement; on the other side the parlor windows. All through the summer, rose leaves drift in whenever these are open, and, even as late as November, rosebuds tap against the glass whenever the blustering gale comes round from the heath, as if appealing to the inmates to take them in and shelter them from the wind and the rain.
The inmates are a mistress and a maid. The former is a widow; but her late husband saved money in his trade, and has left her a comfortable annuity. The latter is not very fair, nor very wise, but, as her mistress says, her honesty makes up for want of wit, and she has a kind heart, though it be a foolish one.
One dreary November afternoon, when the sky was piled up with cold, white clouds, and the gusty wind shook every pool in the gravel walk into ripples, the
