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mother into the sea?" asked the boy, raising his head and staring at the priest. "Joey," said Father O'Leary, and he felt a pang of fear for the boy, for this dead composure was unnatural. He had not shown a tear or displayed any anguish. "It is only your mother's body, but her soul is with God and His Blessed Mother. Let that comfort you, that her earthly pain and striving are over, and she is at peace. I have known her since she was a babe, and I baptised her, and never was a sweeter colleen and a woman. Her memory will bless you, and from the radiance of heaven she sends her love to you." "It will be when we sail, will it not?" said Joseph. "You must let me know." Nothing stirred on his face nor in his dark blue eyes, so gritty now with black fatigue. "I will, that, Joey," said the priest, and again he touched Joseph's shoulder timidly. But it was like touching rigid stone. "Will ye join me in prayer for your mother?" "No," said Joseph. His young voice was the voice of a man, and indifferent. "It is that you believe she has no need of prayer, my child?" "There are sreamcars from Philadelphia to New York, are there not?" said Joseph.

"To be sure, Joey. All will be well, if we trust in Our Lord. Joey, it is cold. Put on your coat. And the seamen will be bringing our breakfast before we sail."

He helplessly patted the boy's shoulder, then sighing he turned away, for a sick man had weakly called him in his extremity. He wore old carpet slippers and he shuffled on the sooty floor. Out of exhaustion, the coughers were now quiet and some were lifting themselves on their elbows, or rising and shambling to the latrines. Joseph felt for the packet which hung on a string around his neck, and against his chest. The gold certificates were safe. Fifteen dollars. Three pounds. It was a lot of money which his father had sent to the family before they had left Ireland. And his wages were but two pounds a week. It had taken Daniel Armagh several months to accumulate such a sum.

One porthole was suddenly rosy with dawn, and Joseph stood up on his tiptoes and looked outside. Almost imperceptibly the ship was moving to a pier among a forest of bare masts and crowded hulls. Sailors were already working on the anchored ships, and their rude hoarse voices came faintly to Joseph whose face was pressed against the salt-crusted thick glass of the porthole. The slow oily water of the harbor was black and sluggish, but its small crests were lighted with cold pink. Now Joseph saw the long piers and wharfs and warehouses in the growing light, and beyond them crowded brick houses and other low buildings. Their roofs were wet with moisture and here and there a street could be seen from the ship, narrow and cobbled and winding, with patches of gray leprous snow piled along the curbs. Drays and wagons were beginning to move along those streets, horses straining. A nearby packet, soaked sails billowing, bowed and withdrew from a pier and Joseph could hear the shrill hiss of its passing, so near did it venture. Curious seamen's faces peered at the desolate Irish ship which was to take its place at the pier. Some of the vessels were of the new steam variety and they suddenly poured black smoke and soot into the silent morning air, and their horns bellowed for no reason at all. Foot by foot the Irish Queen moved to the docks and the long sheds upon them, and Joseph strained fiercely to see the faces of the lonely crowds gathered on the wooden wharf. Was his father among them? There were many there, including some women, and they were weeping, for they already knew that the steerage passengers would not be permitted to land. Some forlorn hands waved in greeting. A man was raising a flag on a staff nearby and for the first time in his life Joseph saw the stars and stripes whipping wetly in the cold wind of winter and unfurling heavily to the new and hopeless day. "So, and that is the brave flag," said a man at another porthole, and other men joined him to gaze