"Well, yes, John, I think it's getting on
that way," said the old man, in a cheery tone.

"Will you take it here?" John asked.

"Is this the Nag's Head?" the old man
inquired.

The Nag's Head was the house which he had
"used" for forty years.

"No, grandfather," John said; "this is not
the Nag's Head; but they keep a good glass of
ale here."

"Well, just as you like," Daddy assented.

So John took the old man into a public-house
opposite the workhouse gates, and gave him the
usual three-halfpence; for it was Daddy's pride
always to pay for his liquor with his own hand.
While Daddy was sipping his ale, John tossed
off a couple of glasses of spirits: he was trying
to screw his failing courage to the point. When
the old man had finished his glass, John took
him once more by the hand, and hurriedly led
him across the road. He was at the gate,
hesitating, with a full heart, looking through a mist
of tears at the handle of the workhouse bell,
inviting only the clutch of despair, when the
old man looked up in his face and said:

"John!"

"Yes, grandfather."

"Ain't this the workhouse?"

Daddy's look, his intimation that he knew
where he was, the thought that he suspected
his design, struck John to the heart; and he
hurried the old man away from the gate.

"The workhouse, grandfather, no, no!" John
said; "what made you think of that? Come,
come away, come away; we're going home,
grandfather, going home as fast as we can."

John was so anxious to drag Daddy away from
the spot, that he fairly lifted him off his legs
and carried him across the road. In his excitement
and haste he quite forgot Daddy's feebleness,
and hurried him along at such a rate that
the old man lost his breath, and was nearly
falling. It was not until a street had been put
between them and the workhouse, that John
relaxed his speed and allowed Daddy to recover
himself. After that he led him gently back to
the emporium, took him in, and replaced him
in his old chair by the fireside.

"I couldn't do it, Martha," he said; "my
hand was on the bell, when he looked up at me
and spoke to me; and his look, and what he
said, struck me to the heart. I couldn't do it. I
felt as if I was going to murder the poor old man.
It's worse than murder, Martha, to put a fellow-
creature in yonder; it's burying him alive!"

"But, John——"

"I say it shall never be done by me, Martha,"
John interposed, sternly. "We must do the
best we can for him, and strive to the last to
save him and ourselves from that disgrace."

An interchange of looks sealed the compact
between them—that Daddy was to have a home
with them while they had a roof to call their
own, and a loaf of bread to share with him.

Old Daddy had not only been a considerable
expense to John and Martha, but during the
winter months he had been much in the way.
He was always pottering about in the shop,
which being also the sitting-room, did not afford
much scope for business and domesticity
combined. But now the fine days were coming,
and Daddy would be able to spend a good deal
of his time out of doors. So, when the fine
days came, little Benjy, John's youngest but
two, who was not old enough to be of any
assistance in the business, was appointed to the
sole and undivided duty of minding
grandfather, and taking him for walks, when it was
convenient to get him out of the way. Little
Benjy, a little, large-headed, wise-looking boy
of six years, was Daddy's especial pet and
favourite; or, perhaps, it might have been said,
so much more responsible a person was Benjy,
that Daddy was his pet and favourite. Be that
as it would, they loved each other, and on fine
days, when the sun shone, it was their delight
to wander hand in hand among the neighbouring
streets, prattling together like two children,
and gazing in, with child-like wonder, at the
pretty things in the shop windows. The people
round about called them the Babes in the Wood,
and old Daddy was certainly as much a babe as
Benjy. He took the same interest in the
contents of the toy-shops, and sighed as deeply
as Benjy sighed to think that his youthful
guardian could not become the possessor of a
much-coveted toy-gun (with a pink stock),
which went off with a spiral spring. In their
wanderings, day by day, the Babes saw many
strange things, and studied the wonders of
Somers Town with the deepest interest. It
was their special delight to stand before
any open door or window, which afforded
them a view of a process of manufacture.
They stood on gratings and listened to
the rattle of sausage-machines "that went
by steam," Benjy informed his charge and
pupil, who was not very well up in the
modern arts and sciences; they gazed at the
little men in shirt-sleeves and flat caps, who
turned a miniature coffee-mill under a glass case
at the grocer's—such industrious little men,
who always kept on grinding whether their
master was in the shop or not, and never seemed
to go home to their meals. They superintended
the lowering of barrels into public-house cellars,
learning the mysteries of the inclined plane, and
speculating as to whether the barrels contained
the particular kind of six ale which grandfather
liked; they watched the making of shoes and
the turning of wood, and were sometimes
observed to be much absorbed in the flaying of
sheep, a process which had a deep abstract
interest for Benjy, while it set Daddy babbling
about the delights—to him now purely visionary—
of a boiled leg of mutton and caper sauce.

In these wanderings Benjy was careful not to
release his hold of Daddy's hand, for he was
particularly enjoined never to leave him for a
moment, and whatever he did not to let him
tumble down. One muddy day Benjy did let
Daddy tumble, and a sad state of mind he was
in for fear his mother should find it out. He
did his best with his little cotton pocket-handkerchief
to efface all traces of mud from
Daddy's trousers: but he was afraid lest the old