“The children are merry enough, however,” observed the gentleman. “They can laugh here, much as in other places. I advise you to take a lesson from them, Fleming. Now, don’t you teach them to croak.” The laughter sounded from the direction of the old brick-ground; and thither they now turned. Two little boys were on the brink of a pit, so intent on watching a rat in the water and on pelting it with stones, that they did not see that anybody was coming to disturb them. In answer to Mr. Nelson’s question, whether they were vagrants, and why vagrants were permitted there, Fleming answered that the younger one—the pale-faced one—was his little brother-in-law; the other— “Ay, now, you will be telling me next that the pale face is the fault of this place.” “It certainly is,” said Fleming. “That child was chubby enough when he came.” “Pho, pho! a puny little wretch as ever I saw—puny from its birth, I have no doubt of it. And who is the other—a gipsy?” “He looks like it,” replied Fleming. On being questioned, Moss told that the boy lived near, and he had often played with him lately. Yes, he lived near, just beyond those trees; not in a house, only a sort of house the people had made for themselves. Mr. Nelson liked to lecture vagrants, even more than other people; so Moss was required to show the way, and his dark-skinned playfellow was not allowed to skulk behind. Moss led his party on, over the tufty hay-coloured grass, skipping from bunch to bunch of rushes, round the osier beds, and at last straight through a clump of alders, behind whose screen now appeared the house, as Moss had called it, which the gipsies had made for themselves. It was the tilt of a waggon, serving as a tent. Nobody was visible but a woman, crouching under the shadow of the tent, to screen from the sun that which was lying across her lap. “What is that that she’s nursing? Lord bless me! Can that be a child?” exclaimed Mr. Nelson. “A child in the fever,” replied Fleming.