Returned Empty

GLASS WITH CARE printed on one side; and, on the other, RETURNED EMPTY. Beneath the former was written, in red ink: Luke xii. 6, beneath the latter: September 12, 1883. This label had been tied to the helpless bundle left, thirty years before on a doorstep in a London suburb, one moonless October night. The man-child, wailing forlornly in the calico wrappings, was obviously a month-old baby.