CHAPTER FIRST.


HOW WILLY MEETS THE YOUNG GLEANER IN THE FIELD--HOW HE PITIES HIS
MISFORTUNES, AND ASSISTS TO FILL HIS BAG WITH CORN.

One hot day in the harvest-time, a little boy named Willy got leave of
his father to go out into the corn-field to watch the reapers bind up
the sheaves and load the wagons; and he gathered the field-flowers, and
formed them into wreaths to give to his mother, because she loved them
dearly. After running about until he was hot and tired, Willy seated
himself under the shade of a tree, to rest and amuse himself with his
flowers. The poppies, corn-bottles, and darnel, he tied up into bunches.
As he was thus occupied, he saw a poor little ragged boy enter the
field, his feet bleeding, and an empty bag slung by a cord around his
neck.

Willy instantly felt sorry for the distressed boy, and went up to him,
and asked him kindly what he cried for and what caused his feet to
bleed. And he made the boy sit down under the walnut-tree by him, and,
by dint of kind inquiries, drew out of him this pitiful story:--

[Illustration]

"We are five children, and our father and mother are very poor. I am the
eldest, and my father sends me out in the harvest to glean in the
corn-fields, for we have no field of our own to reap, and the little
money for which father toils so hard is barely enough to procure our
daily bread; but I can fill this bag in a day if I work diligently, and