In a moment Dick Bates had taken the leather strap from his waist, and without mercy rained blow after blow upon the head and shoulders of his child.

At first Benny bore the blows without shrinking and without uttering a cry; but this only the more aggravated the inhuman father, and faster and more furious fell the blows, till the little fellow shrieked with pain and begged for mercy. But there was no mercy in the father's heart, and still the blows fell, till little Nelly, unable longer to bear it, rushed in between her father and brother, saying, "You shall not beat Benny so."

"Oh, you want it too, do you?" roared he. "Then take that, and that, and that."

"Faather," said Benny, "will you strike Nell?"

The question for a moment seemed to stagger him, and he looked down upon the pleading face of his suffering child, and into those great round eyes that were full of pain and tears, and the hand that was raised to strike fell powerless to his side, and with a groan he turned away.

What was there in the face of his little daughter that touched this cruel, besotted man? We cannot tell. Perhaps he caught a glimpse in that sweet face of his early love.

It is said that he loved his first wife dearly, and that while she lived he was tolerably steady, and was never unkind to her. He even went with her to the house of prayer, and listened to her while she read the Bible aloud during winter evenings. These were happy days, but when she died all this was changed; he tried to forget his trouble in drink, and in the companionship of the lowest and most degraded men and women.

Then he married again, a coarse drunken woman, who had ever since led him a wretched life; and every year he had become more drunken and vicious.

If he yet loved anything in the world, it was his "little Nell," as he always called her. She was wonderfully like her mother, the neighbours said, and that was doubtless the reason why Dick Bates continued to love her when all love for everything else had died out of his heart.

He had never treated her before as he had treated her to-night; it was a new experience to the child, and for long after she lay on her heap of shavings with dry eyes and hot cheeks, staring into vacancy.

But when the last spark of fire had died out, and her father and stepmother were asleep in the room above, turning to her brother, who was still awake, she said,

"Put your arm about me, Benny, will yer?"