The poor mother was sitting
on the damp sand near the water's edge, with her little ones around her,
when I found them. They were merely stopping to rest on their way from
another portion of the state, to the wild country on the other side of
the river."
"We saw them, too, poor things," said Ruth, quickly, with pity in her
soft eyes. "Father Orin and Toby came by to tell us, and David and I
went at once to do what we could. I can't forget how the mother looked.
She was young, but had such a sad, haggard face, with such a prominent
forehead, and such steady gray eyes. She held a strange looking little
child on her lap. She said that her name was Nancy Lincoln, and she
called the baby 'Abe.' He couldn't have been more than two years of age,
but he looked up at Father Orin, and from his face to ours, like some
troubled little old man."
"Yes, Father Orin and Toby were first to the rescue, as they always are.
I can't imagine when those two sleep, and I am sure they never rest when
awake."
And then, seeing her interest and sympathy, he went on to tell of three
little ones, orphaned by the plague, and left alone and utterly
helpless, in a cabin on the Wilderness Road.
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