“A doctor will soon settle that question,” said the superintendent.

Then the little one was carried by rough but not ungentle hands to the dead-house on the hill.  I went with it.  I overheard the superintendent tell the master of the work-house that I was a rich man—­an invalid—­and that I passed a great deal of my time at Brighton.  In a lowered voice he added that I was very eccentric, and that happening to be on the Chain Pier that morning, I had insisted upon paying the expenses of the little funeral.

“A kind, Christian gentlemen,” the master said.  “I am glad to hear it.”

I shall never forget the pitiful sight of that tiny white form laid on the table alone—­quite alone—­I could not forget it.  The matron had found a little white dress to wrap it in, and with kindly thought had laid some white chrysanthemums on the little, innocent breast.  Whenever I see a chrysanthemum now it brings back to my mind the whole scene—­the bare, white walls, the clean wooden floor, the black tressels, and the table whereon the fair, tender little body lay—­all alone.

CHAPTER IV.

Our little life in this world seems of little count.  Throw a stone into the sea—­it makes a splash that lasts for one second, then it is all over; the waves roll on just as though it had not been dropped.

The death of this one little child, whom no one knew and for whom no one cared, was of less than no account; it made a small paragraph in the newspapers—­it had caused some little commotion on the pier—­just a little hurry at the work-house, and then it was forgotten.  What was such a little waif and stray—­such a small, fair, tender little creature to the gay crowd?

“A child found drowned by the Chain Pier.”  Kind-hearted, motherly women shrugged their shoulders with a sigh.  The finding or the death of such hapless little ones is, alas! not rare.  I do not think of the hundreds who carelessly heard the words that morning there was one who stopped to think of the possible suffering of the child.  It is a wide step from the warmth of a mother’s arms to the chill of the deep-sea water.  The gay tide of fashion ebbed and flowed just the same; the band played on the Chain Pier the morning following; the sunbeams danced on the water—­there was nothing to remind one of the little life so suddenly and terribly closed.

There was not much more to tell.  There was an inquest, but it was not of much use.  Every one knew that the child had been drowned; the doctor thought it had been drugged before it was drowned; there was very little to be said about it.  Jim, the boatman, proved the finding of it.  The coroner said a few civil words when he heard that one of the visitors of the town, out of sheer pity, had offered to defray the expenses of the little funeral.

The little unknown babe, who had spent the night in the deep sea, was buried in the cemetery on the Lewes Road.  I bought a grave for her under the spreading boughs of a tree; she had a white pall and a quantity of white flowers.  The matron from the work-house went, and it was not at all like a pauper’s funeral.  The sun was shining, and the balmy air was filled with the song of birds; but then the sun does shine, and the birds will sing, for paupers!