after, as could plainly be heard, much rumma- | you is what you've got to act up to, and let's ging and hunting, returned with a pair of slippers have none of your argyments about it," interin her hand. They were capital slippers, made rupted my father, with a frown. of fine leather, and warmly lined, and must, when they were new, have cost a sum that no one but a person of means could afford to give. Probably Mrs. Burke had become possessed of them in the course of her charing, and empty-house cleaning experiences. "They belonged to my good man that's dead and gone-rest his sowl," said Mrs. Burke; "and it's like my preshumption, as you'll say, to offer ye the likes of sich rubbish; but it pains me to hear you complain of achin' feet, poor fellow; and you'll maybe pardon the liberty on that ground. P'r'aps they're a thrifle damp, so we'll warm 'em." So she did. She went down on her knees, and held the slippers to the fire until they were as warm as the toast by the side of them, by which time I had managed to haul off the heavy anklejacks. Then she turned about, still on her knees, and fitted the warm slippers on to my father's feet, clapping her hands, and looking as delighted as though they were her feet that were being comforted, to find that they fitted so nicely. "Are your feet aisier now, Jim?" she asked. "They feels as though they was kivered with welwet," replied my father, holding up a foot, and regarding it approvingly. "They must have cost a goodish bit. D'ye mean to say that you was able to screw the price of 'em out of Tim's earnin's?" "Bedad, it would have puzzled me," laughed Mrs. Burke. "No, Jim, I saved up to buy 'em for him; saved up out of my own earnin's a pinny or so a day." "You don't mean to say that!' exclaimed my father, leaning back in his chair, and wonderingly regarding Mrs. Burke with his only half-sober eyes. "And why not? Wasn't it my juty so to do for the man who was workin' and toilin' for me from daylight till dark? If I couldn't do that and a great deal more for the man of my choice and the mate of my hearth; if I hadn't made up my mind to do it fust and forrard, I'm not the woman that would have crossed the church threshold wid him." After this my father settled down to his tea, without uttering another word, only from time to time regarding Mrs. Burke intently, and tossing his head as though his mind was still occupied with her astounding views of the duties of a wife. "We ought to be very grateful, Jimmy," said he, as he helped me to a drink out of his saucer; 'even when our luck seems deadest out, Jimmy, we never knows what's a-goin' to turn up. the puty song ses, 'There's a sweet little chirrup what sits in the loft,' don't you know ""Looks after the life of poor Jack,'" softly sang Mrs. Burke, in her pretty voice. As "Ah! and not on'y Jacks but Jims, and any other poor cove what stands in need of it," said my father, wagging his head impressively. "I hope you will never stand in need of it, Jimmy; and if you bears in mind what the doctor said to you the other night, you won't. So just you be a good boy, and mind what Mrs. Burke tells you." "He didn't tell me to mind what Mrs. Burke told me, father; he told me to "Never mind what he told you; what I tell "Bless his little heart, he's obejence itself," said Mrs. Burke, at the same time handing me a slice of toast. "Eat this, my good little fellow." I was obliged to eat it, for she kept her eye on me all the time. "You must have had a tightish time of it, I should think, marm," my father presently observed, "what with minding the young 'uns, and making the place so beautiful and clean." "Indade the hintherence the little craythurs have been isn't worth the talk you've wasted on it; they're rather an amusement than a hintherance," replied Mrs. Burke, lightly. "Well, you 're a queer sort," said my father, pleasantly. "There's no keepin' a place tidy where there's a young 'un; at least that's what I've always been give to understand." "Tut; it just dipinds on the way of going about it," replied Mrs. Burke. "When one's used to tidying a place, the job comes as easy as play. But, there, Mr. Ballisat, I'll lave you to judge for yourself how much and how little throuble they 've been to me, for here 's the sacks I've made meanwhiles at fourpence ha'penny each." "What! done all the clearing and made all them sacks?" exclaimed my father, running his thumb up the work to count it. "Earnt eighteenpence, minded two kids, and cleaned a place in one arternoon! Dashed, you're the sort!" "And not hurried myself nayther," rejoined Mrs. Burke, laughing; "it isn't a thrifle of work that frightens Kitty Burke, anyhow." Now, as the reader has already been made aware, this was not the truth by a very long way. She had not made all the sacks since she sat down; she had brought in three ready-made, and all she had completed was one and part of another. Thinking that it was merely a mistake on her part, I was about to correct her, but at the very moment of my opening my mouth her eyes caught mine, and, evidently guessing my intention, she shook her head, and frowned in a way that was not to be mistaken. But I didn't care for her; I owed her a grudge for making me hold the candle, to say nothing about the name she had called me. Besides, my father was there, and she daren't touch me. So, said I, edging closer to my father "What a wicked story-teller you are, Mrs. Burke !" She glared at me Her rage was tremendous. till she squinted. "What's that?" asked my father, turning shortly round on me. "So she is," I stoutly replied. "So she is what? Who are you a callin' 'she,' you unmannered little warmint? She's the cat, don't you know? Now, then, what do you mean by sayin' that Mrs. Burke is a story-teller?" I watched his hand stealing to his waist-belt, and I was afraid to open my mouth. "Lor' bless his heart, don't be angry with him, Jim; shure he manes no harm. He was only about to tell you of the purty stories I've been tellin' him to keep him awake till his daddy come home. That's what he meant by callin' me story-teller, Jim." "Oh, that's it! I thought he was going to in sinivate that you was tellin' a crammer about the sacks." "How do you mane, Mr. Ballisat ?" asked Mrs. Burke, innocently. "Well, I thought the young stoopid was going to say that you were wrong in the number; not that it's any business of mine, or his'n either, come to that." "But the thruth is everybody's business, Jim," replied the virtuous woman. Then turning to me, winking and frowning, said she, "See, Jimmy dear, here is four sacks; tell your daddy how many I have made while you have been sitting and watching me." What was I to do? Evidently my father was more disposed to believe her than me. I had never tasted the strap myself; but I had seen it laid over my mother's shoulders till she screamed murder. "Four, ma'am," I answered. "Breakfast! Lor' bless yer!" laughed my father, "I gets my breakfast in the market." "And why, may I ask? Shure the bit of breakfast must be more comfortable at your own fireside than in the cowld market, Jim ?" "So it is, but I'm off at five to-morrow morning, and so you see it can't be managed,” replied my father. "And why not?" asked Mrs. Burke, opening her brown eyes in affected astonishment. "Is it bekase you are left alone that you are to go out in the cowld widout the dhrap of coffee to warm you? Shure, sir, I should be no dacent woman, though it wor three o'clock instead of five when you went out. Good night, Mr. Ballisat; no fear but the kettle will be biling in time for yer." And she kept her word. I slept with my father, and while it was yet quite dark there came a knock at our door. "There's the pleseman knocking to say it's a quarter to five, Jimmy," said my father, sleepily; after-"just hop out and tap at the window, my boy.' But at the same moment Mrs. Burke's cheery "It's half afther four, Mr. Ballisat, and the kettle 's biling, and there's a nice bit of the fish all hot and a-waitin' for you," said she; and then she tripped back to her own room, humming as gay as a lark. Presently she was back again "Of course," said Mrs. Burke, quietly; "that's thrue all the world over." And shortly wards she gave me a spoonful of sugar. I think I may say that that was the first delib-voice was heard outside the room doorerate lie I ever told in my life; and I verily believe it was one of the most mischievous. My father being half tipsy at the time, he might have forgotten all about the circumstance by the morning; but, according to my experience of my father's memory, what transpired in his presence "May I throuble you to bring out the needle at such times was tolerably accurate. To this off the mantel-shelf, Mr. Ballisat? I've just beday, I believe that when Mrs. Burke demonstrat- thought me I left it there overnight. My silly ed to him how easily she could earn eighteen-head will niver save my fingers, which have been pence, it made a strong impression on him- itching to get at the bit of work this half an stronger even than the Irishwoman's tea-table hour." solicitude and the loan of the slippers. I further believe that the remarks I made tended to raise in his mind doubts as to the truth of her state-teredment, and that the said doubts were completely dissipated by my corroboration of the said state- a woman!' ment. If this view of the case is a correct one, I stand convicted of being an accessory to a very lamentable swindle. At the time, however, I was incapable of this sort of reasoning, and I was inclined even to look gratefully on Mrs. Burke for helping me out of a threatened danger. I was glad that, just in the nick of time, the baby awoke, and put an end to the conversation concerning the sacks. Mrs. Burke took the baby up, and, composing it comfortably on her lap, begged my father to be good enough to hand her the butter-boat from off the hob; and then she proceeded to feed the little thing, and kiss it, and talk to it in a way that quite went to one's heart to witness. No doubt it would have gone to my father's heart; but becoming drowsy, and feeling warm and at his ease, he presently dropped to sleep-a fact Mrs. Burke was unaware of until he began to snore, when she looked up, and with a little toss of her head finished feeding my sister in silence. The operation completed, she carried the baby off to her own room, and after that only came in once, to carry away the tea-things, waking my father by the clatter she made with them. "What time will you be risin' in the mornin', Mr. Ballisat?" asked she, respectfully. "What time, ma'am? oh, about the usual: why?" "Bekase of your breakfast. If you 'll kindly give us the hour, I'll be up and have the kettle biling." "All right, ma'am," called my father, and then, in an under-tone, and to himself, he mut"Send I may live! I never come across such CHAPTER IX. MY NEW MOTHER. I DERIVE A VALUABLE HINT THE reader, of course, foresees the ending of such a beginning-Mrs. Burke became my stepmother. I cannot exactly state how long a time elapsed from the time of my father burying his first wife to his marrying the second, but it must have been several months-seven, at the least, I should say, for when it happened, my sister Polly had grown to be quite a big child; indeed, I recollect that it was as much as I could do to carry her from one end of the alley to the other without resting. But however long a time it was, it saw no alteration in my sentiments towards Mrs. Burke. It is not enough to say I liked her as little as ever. When I first made her acquaintance I simply disliked her; now I hated her deeply and thoroughly. She hated me, and made no scruple of letting me know it. The very first morning after the memorable day of my mother's funeral she told me her mind without reserve. "Come here, my dear," said she, gripping me by the arm and pulling me towards her, as she sat on her chair. "You recollect the divil's prank you had it on your tongue's tip to play me lasht night?" She spoke in allusion to the threatened sack exposure. I made her no answer, but she could of course | injury in the matter of food. There was always see that I well understood what she meant. "You thought you might dare me becase ov yer father being prisint! You thought bekase of me winkin' and coaxin', and givin' you sugar, that I was afeard you'd open your ugly mouth! Hould up your head, you sarpint, and look at me! Listen here, now. You've got the ould un in yer, and I mane to take it out of yer. I'm goin' to be alwis wid you, to look afther and feed you; you'll get nayther bite nor sup but when it's plisant to me to give it you. So mind your behayvour. Dare so much as make a whisper to yer father of what I say or what I do, and I'll make your shkin too hot to hould you.” And seeing how hopeless it was to show fight against such a creature, I am sure I did mind my behaviour. I did her bidding in every particular, and fetched her little private errands, and kept her secrets faithfully; but she didn't treat me at all well. If she didn't make my skin too hot to hold me, it was not for want of trying. From breakfast time to within a few minutes of my father's coming home, I was kept at it, drudge, drudge, drudge, as hard as any charwoman. Indeed, no charwoman would have engaged to perform the many various jobs that were put on me. The baby was my chief care. I was either lugging her about the alley, or sitting on my stool at the street door, or in the back yard, (Mrs. Burke could not bear to hear the baby cry,) hushing her to sleep; and when, after long and patient exertion, this was accomplished, and she was laid in her cradle, I was set to making waxed ends for Mrs. Burke's sack-making, or fetching up coals, or sifting cinders, or slopping about with a houseflannel and scrubbing-brush. Of one sort and another, there was always employment found for me from the time little Polly went to sleep until she woke up again; and all without so much as a kind word or look even. She was a wicked woman. She used to buy gin with the housekeeping money, and threaten me with all sorts of dreadful punishments if I did not promise to tell my father, should he ask me, what a beautiful dinner I had had. She was artful to that extent, that she would send me to the broken victual shop at Cowcross for a penny or a three-halfpenny bone, and this she would place in the cupboard, so that my father, when he came home, might see it, and believe that it was what was left from the nice little joint we had partaken of at dinner-time. She was always very particular in telling me to be sure and bring a small bone or bones, such as those of the loin of mutton, or a dainty spare-rib of pork, or a blade-bone of lamb-any bone, indeed, that might belong to a joint of meat of a sort that might be bought as a dinner for two persons. Once I recollect bringing back a single lean rib-bone of beef of at least twenty inches in length, which was, of course, illsuited to her fraudulent designs, and so exasperated her that she banged me about the head with it, and then packed me off to the rag-shop to sell it for a halfpenny. I was terribly hungry at the time, and what little meat there was on the bone was very crisp, and brown, and tempting, and I begged leave to eat it; but she wouldn't hear of it. She didn't want it herself. She would eat scarcely an ounce of meat from Monday till Saturday, liking gin so much better. She would even go out of her way to do me an a bit of something hot got ready for my father's supper, and when-as happened at least four days out of seven-I had no more than a crust of bread between breakfast and tea, I would contrive to make myself conspicuous, when he sat down to eat, in hopes of getting a bit. If Mrs. Burke's back was turned, I was pretty sure to come in for a mouthful; but so sure as she caught my father in the act of helping me from his plate, she would instantly interfere. "For the love of Hivin, man, hould your hand, unless you'd have him stretched on a bed of sickness wid over-ateing. He is a very dacent boy, Jim, but his gluttony at his meals is somethin' awful. 'Twas ony this blissed dinner-time-and there he is, and can't deny it-that he was helped three times to biled mutton, and each time enough for a man and his dog, as the sayin' is.” Be "And yet you comes a-prowlin' round and a-showin' your teeth at me as though you hadn't tasted a bit for a week, you greedy young willin!" my father would observe, savagely. "You 're better fed than taught—that's what you are. off to bed, now, before you ketch a larruping." And to bed I would go, an empty-bellied and wretched little boy, not daring to utter a word in explanation. One day she served me an especially villainous trick, and one that is among the greenest of a hundred such in my memory. A woman called on Mrs. Burke one morning shortly after breakfast, and they drank gin between them until every farthing of the half-crown my father had left to buy our dinner and his supper was consumed. When the woman was gone, and she recovered from her half-fuddled condition, Mrs. Burke began to feel alarm. The money to buy my father's supper must be raised somehow; but how? Her other gown-the flat-irons-the china butter-boat, even -were already at the "leaving shop," and there was no one in the neighbourhood that would lend to her, or trust her with their goods without cash down. Presently she went out, and in a little while returned in a condition of sad distress, and took to rocking herself in a chair, and crying and moaning in a way that went to my heart to hear. "Ow, what'll I do? what'll I do?" cried she. "Your daddy 'll be comin' home by and by, Jimmy, dear, and there'll be no supper for him, and he'll be beating me till I'm dead. Ow! what'll a poor lone craytur do widout a frind in the world to help her?" I never could bear to see any one crying. Had Mrs. Burke intimated to me with tearless eyes and in her usual manner of talking, that there was danger of my father falling on her and beating her to death, whatever answer I might have made, I should undoubtedly have thought in my inmost mind that it was exactly what I wished; and I verily believe that I wouldn't have given a button certainly not a "livery" one-to have turned him from his purpose. But her moaning and weeping, and calling me Jimmy dear, was altogther more than I could bear; and approaching her, I tried to console her, and told her how willingly I would help her if I knew how. "So you say, Jimmy; so you say; but you don't mane it," replied Mrs. Burke, wringing her hands in the extremity of her woe. How can yer mane it, Jimmy, afther me bad tratement of you?-which I sore repint of, me little jewel, "Well," said I, "I was a-going for a pen'orth and sorra a bit will I ever raise a finger against of stuff for baby, and a chap ran against me, and you agin, Jimmy, while I've a ar-rm hanging to-and-knocked the money out of my hand." me body." "And you 'spect I'm a-going to believe that, do yer?" "You only tell me how I can help you, and you shall see, ma'am," said I, eagerly, and catching hold of her speckled hand, so carried away was I to see her so filled with remorse and penitence; "you only just tell me how, now!" Shure, and there is a way of helpin' me, Jimmy, me little fellow, but it goes agin me to ask it of you. Still, you are a good boy for so kindly offerin', and here's three-ha' pence to spend and do just as you like wid." I was not much surprised to hear my father say this; but what did surprise me-what completely astounded and appalled me-was to hear Mrs. Burke exclaim, with a derisive laugh "Yes; that's how he expicts to come it over us, Jim; that's the purty yarn he pitched to me when he came back wid the empty cup. Ask him where he has been all the afthernoon, Jim, and how them shtains came on the breast ov his pinafore." I suppose she must have borrowed the threehalf-pence when she went out, as I know I took There were stains on the breast of my pinafore. her last fourpence for the last quartern o' gin II had bought a kidney pie with a penny of my fetched. Her generosity completely astonished three-halfpence, and in the ardour of enjoyment me: never before, since she had been my father's must have overlooked a leak in the bottom of the housekeeper, had she given me so much as a sin- pastry, through which the gravy had oozed. gle farthing. Now, more than ever, I pressed her "D-n your young eyes," said my father, to tell me in what way I could help her out of shaking me by the shoulder, you've been and her scrape. prigged that arf-crown, and you've been a-spend"I was thinkin', Jimmy, that you might telling it all the arternoon." your daddy that you lost the half-crown," said she, patting my head kindly. "How could I lose it? You changed it. It was a shilling I took when I went to buy the first quartern of gin." "Whist about gin, Jimmy dear! Mightn't we say that I sint you for a pen'orth of aniseed for the baby, wid the half-crown to pay for it, and you made a shlip, and dropt it down a gully hole? That 'ud be aisy to say, Jimmy dear." "Ah! but see the tow'lling I should get." "Devil a bit of tow'lling, Jimmy, while I was wid you. Be shure, dear, I'll tell him as how that a great hulkin' chap run agin you, and that you couldn't help it a bit. Never fear for the tow'lling, Jimmy; I'll bring you clane out of that, you may freely depind. And you may cut away now, and spind the three-ha'pence as fast as you like." I went off, though not without some misgivings; and I spent the three-halfpence. It was some time since I had had a ramble, and I thought as she was in such a wonderfully kind humour, I might venture to indulge in one. I went as far as Farringdon Market, and I spent the afternoon there. The market clock striking five reminded me that it was high time I went home. But I didn't hurry. Thought I, I'll let father get home first, and Mrs. Burke will tell him about the half-crown, and it will be all over when I go in. I don't know how long he had been home, but when I went up and opened the door, there he was, standing up, and waiting for me, with the waist-belt in his hand. I was for dodging out again, but he caught me by the ear. 'Stop a minnit, young feller," said he, quite pale with passion; "I warnts a whisper with you. What have you done with that there half-crown ?" "I lost it, father," said I, in a terrible fright, and looking appealingly towards Mrs. Burke. Oh, you lost it! Where did you lose it?" "Down a gully-hole, father. Ask Mrs. Burke -she knows,' 66 "And so it's my belief, Jim; but it wasn't my place to shpeak first," said the wicked wretch; "and though it goes to the heart of me to recommend it, if you'll take my advice you'll let him have it hot and shtrong, Jim. 'Shpare the rod and spile the child,' as the scriptur ses, bear in mind." And she stood by while my father laid into me with the thick leather strap till the blood trickled. As well as I could, and as plain as my agony would let me, I cried out the whole story to him while the beating was going on, but he heeded not a word that I said, and flogged away till his arm was tired. I felt brimful of fury against her. When the flogging was over, and I had been kicked into the back-room to wait there in the dark till bed-time, she presently came in to fetch something. Loud enough for my father to hear, said she "I hope the dressin' you've had will do you good, me boy. Mind you don't forget when you go to bed to say your prayers for forgiveness." Hang you, I hate you!" I raged at her; and then thinking of the worst thing I had ever heard to say to her, I called out as she went sniggering out at the door "Judas! Judas! you ought to live in Turkey." But the words did not seem to affect her in the least! she merely turned, with the same ugly smile on her face, to tell me that she hoped I would keep my hands from picking and stealing, and my tongue from lying for the future. "What was that he said?" I heard my father ask her, in a voice as though his temper had sud denly cooled. "He ses he hates me. Never mind him, Jim; he'll know better some day," said Mrs. Burke, soothingly. "But what did he say about-about Judas?" "Did he? I didn't hear," replied Mrs. Burke, lightly. "It's my opinion, Jim, he's so full of the ould un he don't know what he's sayin'." If by the "ould un" she meant the devil, Mrs. Burke was quite right when she said that I was "I ain't a-talkin' to Mrs. Burke; I'm a-talkin' full of him. My wrath against her made my to you. Now then, out with it, and-mind yer-throat swell and my eyes feel hot as fire. For let us have no lies." And as he spoke he spat in his hand, and wagged the strap in it. the time I felt nothing of the cruel weals that scored my body. Nobody but the devil could have filled my young head with such terrible | observation of my father's, but somehow I fell wishes against her. I wished she might die. I wished that death—my image of death, the dreadful eyeless bird with the sharp spikes-might creep into her bed in the night, and sting and tear her till she was glad to run and hide in the pit-hole. But nothing of the sort happened. She made her appearance bright and brisk as ever next morning and for many succeeding mornings, until that one came when my father married her. directly to crying instead of answering him. It couldn't be that I was grieved to hear the news of his marriage, for what possible difference could it make to me? That it gave Mrs. Burke more authority over me was true from a legal point of view, but unless it likewise conferred on her additional powers of spite and muscle, I couldn't possibly be a loser by the change. 66 Well; what do you say?" continued my father, gruffly. "Ain't you got so much as thanky to say? Ain't you glad to get another mother?" I made him no answer. I don't know whether it was owing to his using the word mother so repeatedly, but I couldn't speak for crying. "Now what's the little beggar snivelling about?" observed my father, savagely; and turning to Mrs. Burke, "Well, I'm cust! I suppose I am to ask his pinion as to what's good for me, am I?" The wedding was a very quiet one. Not a single individual in the alley knew anything about it, and even I was in utter ignorance that so important an event was about to take place. One evening, however, they-my father and Mrs. Burke-came home together, (I knew that she had dressed in her smartest and gone out in the morning, but that was not a circumstance of such unfrequent occurrence to excite my curiosity,) and they brought home with them a young man, a friend of my father's, who had, it appeared, oblig-"he can be as cross-grained as Ould Nick when ingly kept an eye on my father's barrow while he and Mrs. Burke stepped into the church. I was about with the baby when they came home, and was called in and sent for a pint of rum. When the rum was brought the strange young man filled a glass. "Well," said he, "Lord bless every/happy couple, I says. May you live long and die happy, both on yer. I looks to'ords you, ma'am" Mrs. Burke acknowledged the compliment by looking towards the young man and inclining her head smilingly; whereon the young man inclined his head smilingly, and drank off half his rum. "And I looks to'ords you, Jim," continued he, grasping my father's hand. "If you make her as good a husband as wot you are a pal, she won't have nothink to holler about." My father nodded in an affable manner, and the young man having emptied the glass, my father took it and filled it. "Don't mind him, my dear," said his new wife; he takes it into his head, as well to my sorrow I have been made to know many and many's the time, though I was never the woman to throuble you, Jim, wid my complaints. But there, I needn't tell you nothing wus of him than you know." I know that she alluded to the scandalous affair of the half-crown, (she was continually alluding to it as a means of turning my father's wrath against me when it suited her purpose,) and I had it on my tongue to give her a saucy answer. I suppose the strange young man detected my intention, for he winked at me in a good-humoured sort of way to hold my tongue, and beckoned me towards him. "Lor, don't be too hard on the youngster," said he. "It ain't them as is hurt cries most. P'r'aps he's crying because he's so jolly glad to get another mother. How old is he, Jim?" "I don' know; how old is he, Kitty?" asked my father of Mrs. Burke. "Bortherin on sivin." "Hain't he amost old enough to begin to think about cutting his own grass, Jim?" "Here's the foresaid," said he, (as a rule he was a man very sparing of his words,) and tossed off the rum at a draught; an example that Mrs. Burke dutifully followed. She had put the baby into my arms again, and "Quite old enough," chimed in my stepmother, finding nothing to interest me in the conversa-promptly, "and quite big enough. He'll have to tion that ensued on the rum-drinking, I was about to leave the room when my father called me back. "Come here, Jim; you see who that is a-sitting on that chair?" and he pointed towards the Irish woman. "Of course I do," I replied, and laughing that he should ask so simple a question. "Well, who is it?" said he, looking serious. "Why, Mrs. Burke." "Say it agin. Think what you are a-goin' to say, and say it slow." "Mrs. Burke." Let that be "Werry good. Now hark to me. than it is Green or Tomkins." do it too before he's much older." "Well, he do go puty nigh to'ords doin' it, don't he?" asked my father, with a bit of a scowl, which must have made known to his wife, if before she was ignorant of it, what an uncertain-tempered man he was. "I'd be glad to know how," sneered she. "How? why, luggin' young Poll about mornin', noon, and night, that's how. Pr'aps you don't think that's work?" "Work, indade! Shquatting about wid a mite of a thing on his lap, and as often jining in play wid he rest as not!" "What do you think, Jack?" asked my father of the stranger. The stranger emphatically replied that sooner than nurse a kid he would prefer "shoring" oysters from morning till night. "Of course you would. Werry well I recollects the time when you had a kid to nuss,' (this perhaps accounted for the stranger's sympathy with me.) "Work, indeed! If there's one job for payin' out the back more than another, it is nursing a baby." |