There was a shout, a chorus of yells, mingled with which was the last ever given by "Bill Jones's dawg," for his mortal race was run. Even Cerberus of the three heads could not have existed many seconds beneath the shower of bricks and clinkers that assailed him after the savage chop given by father's spade. One yell only, and there was a mass of brick rising over him, the dog's death and burial being a simultaneous act on the part of those who, old and young, did not pause until they had erected a rough but respectable mausoleum over the wolfish creature's grave. "Put a bit o' wet 'bacco on the place," said father, removing his pipe as he turned to where Jane Glyne and mother were examining the little frail morsel, which, in spite of its usage, began now to wail feebly; "put a bit o' wet 'bacco on the place; it ain't dead. There, give it to mother; and, I say, when are you going to pay agen?" "Never," cried Jane Glyne, hastily wrapping the baby in the shawl now handed by one of the staring girls. "Oh, it ain't hurt much," said father; "put a bit o' wet 'bacco on the place." "Hurt!" cried the woman excitedly, as with a newly-awakened interest she held the child tightly to her hard breast, "it's a'most killed, and if it lives, that dog's teeth have poisoned it, and it will go mad." "Not it," growled father; "why, the dawg is dead. Give it to mother, and I say, when--why, she's gone!" He said this after a pause, as he stared after Jane Glyne hurrying towards the path where her bundle lay, but thinking more of her little burden, inoculated by the poison of those wolfish teeth--blood-poisoned, perhaps, as to its mental or bodily state--certainly suffering from lacerations that might end its feeble little life. Volume 1, Chapter I. The Story--Years Ago. CINDERELLA AND THE SISTERS. "Ruth." "Yes, dear; I'll come directly." "Ruth!" "Be quiet, Clo. She can't come yet." "But she must come. Ruth!" "May I go to her, Marie?" "No, certainly not. Finish my hair first." Two pretty little white patient hands went on busying themselves plaiting the rich dark-brown hair of a singularly handsome girl, sitting back in a shabby, painted, rush-bottomed chair, in a meanly-furnished chamber, whose bare boards looked the more chilly for the scraps of carpet stretched by bedside, toilet-table, and washstand. The bed had not long been left, and the two pillows each bore the impress of a head. The bedstead was an attenuated four-post structure, with dreary and scanty slate-coloured hangings, that seemed to have shrunk in their many washings, and grown skimpy and faded with time; the rush-bottomed chairs were worn and the seats giving way, and a tall painted wardrobe had been scrubbed until half the paint had gone. Even the looking-glass upon the paltry old dressing-table seemed to have reflected until it could perform its duties no more, for the silver had come off in patches, and showed the bare brown wood behind.