Grateful Peter's new year's gift

heavily, and the same shrill wind that howled and whistled through the keyholes and roared in the chimneys was whirling the white flakes round the heads of the few people to be found in the streets. What a night it was! That piercing wind laid hold of all the passengers. Some it drove onwards, nearly lifting them off their feet; others it forced backwards, making them fight for every inch of the way through the snow which it flung in their faces. Umbrellas were of no use that night. Those who tried to use the frail shelters of silk or alpaca saw them turned into playthings by that unruly pitiless wind. Glad were they to furl them tightly again, though in many cases they only managed to carry home a battered bundle of broken ribs and silk. Nobody that could help it would be out of doors at all. "I wish I weren't forced to be out," thought a little fellow called Peter Grant, as, tired with battling against the wind, he leaned against some railings to regain breath. "And it's little use stopping out. I've only taken three coppers to-night. Who'd stay to buy baked taters in this snow and wind? I've shouted myself hoarse, and nobody stops to listen. If plenty of folks were out, the wind wouldn't let them hear me." Peter Grant was twelve years old, and a baked-potato merchant. He had a home—if that poor cellar in Number Three Court, Back Potter Street, could be called one—and he possessed what all great and rich people do not—a true friend. While Peter is leaning against the railings, I will tell you his story, so far as he can remember it. Peter Grant was only a trotting thing of four years old when he lost his father, and from the neat little home they had been accustomed to, he and his mother were obliged to remove to one room in the court I have mentioned. Peter's mother went out washing and working; but a day came when she returned earlier than usual because she was too ill to finish her work. Old Sally Graham, who lived in the cellar, used to take care of Peter during his mother's absence. She loved the little fellow dearly, and was Mrs. Grant's faithful nurse until, after a fortnight's illness, Peter was left motherless too. There was a talk of taking…