It so happened on a time, that Markland, while standing in one of his well-filled ware-houses, saw a child enter and come towards him in a timid, hesitating manner.

“A beggar!  Drive her away,” said Unkindness and Suspicion, both arousing themselves.

Markland was already lifting his hand to wave her back, when Compassion, who had just then found an old way into his heart, hidden for a long time by rank weeds and brambles, said, in soft and pitying tones: 

“She is such a little child!”

“A thieving beggar!” cried Unkindness and Suspicion, angrily.

“A weak little child,” pleaded Compassion.  “Don’t be hard with her.  Speak kindly.”

Compassion prevailed.  Her voice had awakened into life some old and long sleeping memories.  Markland was himself, for a moment, a child, full of pity, tenderness and loving-kindness.  Compassion had already uncovered the far away past, and the sweetness of its young blossoms was reviving old delights.

“Well, little one, what is wanted?”

Markland hardly knew his own voice, it was so gentle and inviting.

How the, pale, pure face of the child warmed and brightened!  Gratefully with trust and hope in her eyes, she looked up to the merchant.  There was no answer on her lips, for this unexpected kindness had choked the coming utterance.  Rebuff, threat, anger, had met her so often, that soft words almost surprised her into tears.

“Well, what can I do for you?”

Compassion held open the door through which she gained an entrance, and already Good-will, Kindness and Satisfaction had come in.

“Mother is sick,” said the child.

“A lying vagrant!” exclaimed Suspicion, jarring the merchant’s inward ear.

“There is truth in her face,” said Compassion, pleading, and, at the same time, she unveiled an image, sharply cut in the past of Markland’s life—­an image of his own beloved, but long sainted mother, pale and wasted, on her dying bed.

“Give this to your mother,” he said, hastily, taking a coin from his pocket.  There was more of human kindness in his voice than it had expressed for many years.

“God bless you, sir,” the child dropped her grateful eyes from his face, as she took the coin, bending with an involuntary reverent motion.  Then, as she slowly passed to the warehouse door, she turned two or three times, to look on the man who, alone, of the many to whom she had made solicitation that day, had answered her in kindness.

“So much for the encouragement of vagrancy,” said Suspicion.

“Played on by the art of a cunning child,” said Pride.

Markland began to feel ashamed of his momentary weakness.  But, he was not now, wholly, at the mercy of the guests who had so long tormented him.  Compassion, Good-will and Kindness were now his guests also; and they had other and pleasanter suggestions for his mind.  The child’s “God bless you, sir,” they repeated over and over again, softening the young voice, and giving it increasing power to awaken tender and loving states which had formed themselves in earlier and purer years.  Tranquility, so long absent from his soul, came in, now, through the entrance made by Compassion.