At these words the child redoubled her cries and

clung faster. Heads were popped out of doors and windows, but no one seemed disposed to come to the rescue. Ada's heart beat violently: the man was coming towards her with threatening gestures, and she could not free herself from that agonized grasp. He was not sober enough to see that the little girl was really keeping her a prisoner. "Let go," he roared again. "Let go, or I'll make ye!"

Would nobody help her? It seemed to the doctor's daughter that she had been standing there for many long minutes before assistance arrived, but the whole scene occupied only a few seconds. A tall young man came striding round the corner, and planted himself between Ada and her enemy.

"Be off!" said the new comer firmly. "Don't. let me hear you speak to this lady again!"

The man charged at him at once like an infuriated bull; but being unsteady on his legs, he lost his balance, and fell headlong on the causeway, cutting his face against a broken paving-stone. There he lay, half stunned by the fall, and wholly unable to rise.

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Hooray! daddy's down!" cried the child, relaxing her hold, and looking upon the fallen bully with indescribable satisfaction. The little thing's triumph was far sadder to witness than her agony. Ada, shocked and frightened, laid her hand upon the girl's shoulder, and said earnestly—

"Oh, you must not be glad that he is hurt! Is he really your father?"

"Yes, he's my daddy. Law, miss, I wish he'd killed hisself-that I do! Didn't he come down a whopper?" she added, with an intensity of delight in her tone and manner.

By this time a little crowd of neighbours had gathered round the prostrate man; and, to her great relief, Ada caught sight of Mr. Wayne coming up the street at full speed. Instead of going straight home after the school had closed, he had paid a visit to a sick woman in one of those shabby houses.

"Oh, Mr. Wayne, I am so thankful to see you," was Ada's cry; and a few words explained the whole matter. The little girl stood looking on with the same expression of gratified spite, and the father made no effort to rise to his feet.

"This is Martha Ryan," said Mr. Wayne, taking the child's hand. "She was in my wife's class this afternoon. I know something of her history, and I will hear all she has to say. Do go home at once, my dear Miss Fenway,-you have been frightened and upset."

"Miss Fenway!" exclaimed a voice by her side.

It was her protector who had spoken. Ada had been too flurried to remember that she owed him any thanks, and she turned towards him now in some surprise. He was an entire stranger, yet he had uttered her name as if it were familiar to him.

"Yes," she said, " and I am very much obliged to you for coming to my rescue."

"May I ask you if you are related to Dr. Fenway of this town?" he inquired eagerly.

"I am his daughter."

The young man's handsome face was lit up by a bright smile.

"I am so very glad to have met you," he said frankly. "I was coming to your house to-morrow. Your father and mine were dear friends, Miss Fenway. I am James Clariston's son."

"I know your name quite well," replied Ada smiling. "Papa will be delighted to see you."

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Then may I take you safely to your own door? I have only been in Alderport a few days, and I shall be glad to learn where Dr. Fenway lives."

Ada gave consent, and turned to shake hands again with Mr. Wayne. The superintendent looked after the young people as they walked away together, and wondered if this chance meeting might be the beginning of a close intimacy? But he had little time to speculate on probabilities: Martha Ryan and her affairs demanded his immediate attention. Mr. Wayne was one of those who seem born to be helpers, and he shouldered, quite naturally, any burden that came in his way.

Meanwhile, Ryan's neighbours were making laudable attempts to set that worthy on his legs again. He had passed from the furious to the maudlin stage, and was shedding copious tears over his prostrate condition. It was very hard, he complained, that a man cannot correct his own child, without being set upon, and knocked down by passers-by. As he had been knocked down, he insisted that he might as well stay down as get up.

Who would be any the better for his getting up, he wanted to know? A question which the bystanders would have found it difficult to answer.

"Ain't he a figure?" said Martha, executing a little skip, as he was slowly raised by the strong arms of two men. "I wish he'd hurt hisself worse, but he's got a good crack any way!"

"Martha,” Mr. Wayne's voice was stern and sad, "you have shocked and grieved me very much. Come away with me to Mrs. Field's house; I want to talk to you."

He knew that Mrs. Field-the sick woman he had just left-was in her bed upstairs; and that the married daughter who lived with her would gladly suffer him to take Martha indoors. The child was not unwilling to accompany him, although she hung down her head and seemed subdued by his reproof.

"Now, Martha," he said, when he had got her safely into Mrs. Field's little room, "I want to know if you have ever heard of Jesus Christ ?" "Teacher told us about Him," she answered, rather sullenly.

"Do you remember what was done to Him?"