'My God!--what girl?' I says, turning all over like a _corpse_; and then I missed my bonnet and shawl, and saw my box empty; she had even taken the book from under the child's cheek. But that wasn't all. I'd have forgiven her for the loss of the clothes, and the tears she forced from the eyes of my innocent child; I'd forgive her for making my heart grow oulder in half an hour, than it had grown in its whole life before; _but my wedding ring_, ma'am!--her head had often this shoulder for its pillow, and I'd throw this arm over her, so. Oh, ma'am darlint, could you believe it?--she stole my wedding ring aff my hand--the hand that had saved and slaved for her! The ring! oh, many's the tear I've shed on it; and many a time, when I've been next to starving, and it has glittered in my eyes, I've been tempted to part with it, but I couldn't. It had grown thin, _like myself_, with the hardship of the world; and yet when I'd look at it twisting on my poor wrinkled finger, I'd think of the times gone by, of him who had put it on, and _would_ have kept his promise but for the temptation of drink, and what it lades to; and those times, when throuble would be crushing me into the earth, I'd think of what I heard onct--that a ring was a thing like etarnity, having no beginning nor end; and I'd turn it, and turn it, and turn it! and find comfort in _believing_ that the little penance here was nothing in comparison to that without a beginning or an end that we war to go to hereafter--it might be in heaven, or it might (God save us!) be in the other place; and," said poor Biddy, "I drew a dale of consolation from _that_, and _she_ knew it--she, the sarpint, that I shared my children's food with--_she_ knew it, and, while I slept _the heavy sleep of hard labour_, she had the heart to rob me!--to rob me of the only treasure (barring the childre) I had in the world! I'm a great sinner; I can't say, God forgive her; nor I can't work; and it's put me apast doing my duty; and Jessie, the craythur, laid ever so much store by it, on account of the little innocent charrums; and, altogether, it's the sorest Christmas day that ever came to me. Oh, sure, I wouldn't have that girl's heart in my breast for a goolden crown--the ingratitude of her bates the world!" It really was a case of the most hardened ingratitude I had ever known--the little wretch! to rob the only friend she ever had, while sleeping in the very bed where she had been tended, and tendered, and cared for, so unceasingly. "She might take all I had in the world, if she had only left me _that_" she repeated continually, while rocking herself backwards and forwards over the fire, after the fashion of her country; "the thrifle of money, the _rags_, and the child's book--all--and I'd have had a _clane breast_. I could forgive her from my heart, but I can't forgive her for taking my ring--for taking my wedding ring!"