Yes, there it was, just as Mrs. Pritchard had described—a simple slab of marble beneath the protecting shape of the ancient yew tree. There were all the familiar names—names that were now as those of familiar comrades. Bertie read them one by one with an odd dreaminess stealing over him. He sat down upon a low bough of the great tree and gazed at the marble slab with wide-open, abstracted eyes. Where were they all now, those children who had laughed and played up and down the corridors of his present home, and had made the silent house ring again with their merry romps and happy voices? They had been children once just his age, perhaps they too had known just such thoughts as so often crowded into his busy brain. They had seen the same things that he looked on day by day; surely they must once have been very like him, and known just those very same feelings and longings as he experienced. And where were they all now? What did they think of the bright world they had left behind? Was all forgotten as if it never had existed? or did the children who had never lived to grow old look down sometimes with smiling eyes upon the happy home they had left, and perhaps spare a loving glance for the little boy who loved them all without ever having seen them? These thoughts crowded fast upon Bertie as he sat still in the dark yew tree. What was death? he asked himself again and again—the death that had come so very near him once, and had almost grasped its prey. What was it? What became of those who were taken away from this world! Where did they go, the children who never grew up? And a voice in his own heart answered so clearly and softly, that the child was quite startled. “Suffer the little children to come unto Me: for of such is the kingdom of heaven.” Bertie lifted his head and looked round; but there was no one near, and he smiled at his passing fear. “They are in heaven,” he said softly to himself, “with Jesus—I suppose it is always heaven where He is. They must be very happy. I hope I shall go there some day. I wonder if I shall know them when I do. I feel as if I should.” The thought of having in heaven some children who seemed almost like living friends was a strange and rather solemn one to the little boy. It filled him with a sense of mingled happiness and awe, and he looked again at the names upon the tombstone, and read them slowly one by one. And then his eye was caught by four words, standing quite alone at the foot of the stone: “Thy will be done.” Bertie covered his face with his hands and sank into a sort of dream, which he could not possibly have put into words. Strange thoughts and flitting memories crowded in upon his brain, and he shut out all outward sights, and was deaf to all outward sounds, and knew nothing more until he was suddenly aroused by feeling himself touched very gently, and his own hands taken away from his face. “What is the matter, my little man?”