‘Nay, Bessy,’ said Margaret, gently, ‘it was but a dream.’

’And why might na I dream a dream in my affliction as well as others?  Did not many a one i’ the Bible?  Ay, and see visions too!  Why, even my father thinks a deal o’ dreams!  I tell yo’ again, I saw yo’ as plainly, coming swiftly towards me, wi’ yo’r hair blown back wi’ the very swiftness o’ the motion, just like the way it grows, a little standing off like; and the white shining dress on yo’ve getten to wear.  Let me come and see yo’ in it.  I want to see yo’ and touch yo’ as in very deed yo’ were in my dream.’

‘My dear Bessy, it is quite a fancy of yours.’

‘Fancy or no fancy,—­yo’ve come, as I knew yo’ would, when I saw yo’r movement in my dream,—­and when yo’re here about me, I reckon I feel easier in my mind, and comforted, just as a fire comforts one on a dree day.  Yo’ said it were on th’ twenty-first; please God, I’ll come and see yo’.’

’Oh Bessy! you may come and welcome; but don’t talk so—­it really makes me sorry.  It does indeed.’

‘Then I’ll keep it to mysel’, if I bite my tongue out.  Not but what it’s true for all that.’

Margaret was silent.  At last she said,

’Let us talk about it sometimes, if you think it true.  But not now.  Tell me, has your father turned out?’

‘Ay!’ said Bessy, heavily—­in a manner very different from that she had spoken in but a minute or two before.  ’He and many another,—­all Hamper’s men,—­and many a one besides.  Th’ women are as bad as th’ men, in their savageness, this time.  Food is high,—­and they mun have food for their childer, I reckon.  Suppose Thorntons sent ’em their dinner out,—­th’ same money, spent on potatoes and meal, would keep many a crying babby quiet, and hush up its mother’s heart for a bit!’

‘Don’t speak so!’ said Margaret.  ’You’ll make me feel wicked and guilty in going to this dinner.’

‘No!’ said Bessy.  ’Some’s pre-elected to sumptuous feasts, and purple and fine linen,—­may be yo’re one on ’em.  Others toil and moil all their lives long—­and the very dogs are not pitiful in our days, as they were in the days of Lazarus.  But if yo’ ask me to cool yo’r tongue wi’ th’ tip of my finger, I’ll come across the great gulf to yo’ just for th’ thought o’ what yo’ve been to me here.’

’Bessy! you’re very feverish!  I can tell it in the touch of your hand, as well as in what you’re saying.  It won’t be division enough, in that awful day, that some of us have been beggars here, and some of us have been rich,—­we shall not be judged by that poor accident, but by our faithful following of Christ.’  Margaret got up, and found some water and soaking her pocket-handkerchief in it, she laid the cool wetness on Bessy’s forehead, and began to chafe the stone-cold feet.  Bessy shut her eyes, and allowed herself to be soothed.  At last she said,