CHAPTER IV.
A FRIEND IN NEED.
Friendship, peculiar boon of heaven,
The noble mind's delight and pride;
To men and angels only given.
To all the lower world denied.
Samuel Johnson.
The experiences of Benny and his sister during the next day were but a repetition of what we recorded in the last chapter; but during the second night they found the shelter of the boat but a poor substitute for a home, and in the morning they were stiff and cramped through lying so long in one position; and when they paid Joe Wrag their third morning visit, the old man noticed that all was not right with them. Nelly especially was gloomy and depressed.
Joe Wrag was generally a silent man, and not given to asking many questions; but when he saw great tears in Nelly's round eyes as she sat gazing into the fire, he felt that he must know what was troubling the child, and help her if he could. He had also a dim suspicion that they had not been to their home of late, and he wondered where they could have spent their nights. Like Benny, he dreaded the idea of little Nelly congregating with young thieves and vagabonds, and felt he would rather a thousand times the
