The boy was about eight years old when, one day, he asked permission to take some cakes to a poor blind man, who lived at the other side of the dike. His father gave him leave, but charged him not to stay too late. The child promised, and set off on his little journey. The blind man thankfully partook of his young friend's cakes, and the boy, mindful of his father's orders, did not wait, as usual, to hear one of the old man's stories, but as soon as he had seen him eat one muffin, took leave of him to return home.
As he went along by the canals, then quite full, for it was in October, and the autumn rains had swelled the waters,—the boy now stooped to pull the little blue flowers which his mother loved so well, now, in childish gaiety, hummed some merry song. The road gradually became more solitary, and soon neither the joyous shout of the villager returning to his cottage home, nor the rough voice of the carter grumbling at his lazy horses, was any longer to be heard.

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