LITTLE DORRIT:

Daily Southern Cross, Volume XIII, Issue 954, 19 August 1856, Page 4

LITTLE DORRIT:

BY CHARLES DICKENS.

CHAPTER IX. LITTLE MO IHER. « The morning light was m no hurry to climb the prison Wall and look in at the snuggrry windows; and when it did come, it would have l>een more welcome if it had come alone, instead of bringing a rush of lain with it. But the equinoctial gales were blowing out at s>ea and the impartiil «o Uh west unif. in Us flight, would noi neglect even the narrow Marshalsea. While it roaied through the steepl" of Saint George's f'hurt'h, nnd twirled all the cowls in the neighbourhood, it made a swoop to beat the Southwark smoke into the jail ; and. plunging down the chimneys of the icw e.aiy lolltgians who wt-ie yet lighting their tires, halt suffocated thorn. Arthur Clenmun would have been li:tle disposed to linger in b^d, though his bed had been in a more private situation, and less affected by the raking out ot yescerday's fire, the kindling of to-day's under the cc llegiate boiler, the tilling* ol th.tt Sp.irtan vessel at the pump, the sweeping and sawdustingof the common room, and other such prepaiations Heartily glad to see the morning. though little rested by the night, he turned out as soon as he could d stmguish objects about him, and paced the y»rd for two heavy hours before the gate was opened. The walls were so near to one another, and the wild clouds hurried over them so fast, that it gave him a sensation like the beginning of seaside ne c s to look up at the gusty sky. The lain, tariiud ablaut i>y iidv\s of wind, blackened that side ot the central bui'ding »vhich he had visited last night, but left a narrow dry trough under the lee of the wall, whore he walked up and down among waifs of straw and dust and paper, the waste droppings oi the pump, and the stray leaves of a esterday's greens. It was as haggard a view of life as a man nerd lwk upon Nor was it lelieved by any glimpse of the little creature who had brought him there. Perhaps she glided out at her doorway and in at that w here her fatht r lived, while his face" was turned from both ; but he stiw nothing of her. It was too early for her brother; to have seen him once, was to have seen enough ot him to know that he would be sluggish to leave whatever frowsy bed he occupied at night ; so, as Arthur Clennam walked up nnd down, waiting for the gate to open, he cast about in his mind for future rather than for present means of pursuing his discoveries. At last the lodge-gate turned, and the turnkey, standing on the step, taking an early comb at his hair, was ready to let him out. With a joyful sense of rolaese he passed thro gh the lodge, and found himself again in the little outer courtyard where he had spoken to the brother last night. There was a string of people already straggling in, whom it was not difficult to identify as the nondescr pt messengers, go-betweens, and eirand-beareis of the place. Some of them had been lounging in the rain until the gate should open ; others, who had timed their arrival with greater nicety, were coming up now, and passing in with damp whitey-brc .vn paper from the grocers, loaves of bread, lumps oi butter, eggs, milk, and the like. The shabbiness of these attendants upon shabbiness, the poverty of these insolvent waiters upon insolvency, Avas a sight to see. Such threadbare coats and trousers, such fusty gowns and shawls, such squashed hats and bonnets, such boots and shoes, such umbrellas and walking-sticks, never were «een in Rag Fair. All of them wore the cast off clothes of other men and women: wore made up of patches and pieces* of other people's individuality, and had no sartorial existence of their own proper. " Their walk was the walk of a race apart. They had a peculiar way of doggedly slinking round the corner, as if they were eternally fcomg to the pawnbrokers When they coughed, they couched Ike people accustomed to be forgotten on door -steps and in draughty pa-sages, waiting f<>r answer* to letter? m faded ink, which gave the recipients of those manusciipts great mental disturbance, and no satisfaction. As they eyed the stranger in passing, they eyed him with borrowing eyes— hungry, sharp, speculative as to hi* softness if they were acered'tod to him, and theiikdihoodof hi« standing something handsome. Mendicity on commission stooped in their high shoulders, shambled in their unsteady legs, buttoned and pinn'd and darned anddiagged their clothes, frayed their button- holes, leaked out at their figures in dirty little ends of tape, and issued from their mouths in alcoholic breathings. As these people passed him standing in the courtyard, and one of them turned back to enquire if he could assist him with his services, it came into Arthur Clennam's mind that he would speak to Don it again before he went away. She would have recovered her first surprise, and might feel easier with him. He asked this member of the fiaternity (who had two red herrings in his hand, and a loaf and a blacking-brush under his arm), where was the nearest place to get a cup of coffee at. The nondescript replied in encouraging terms, and brought him to a coffee-shop in the street within a stone's throw. " Do you know Miss Dorrit?" asked the new client. The nondescript knew two Mi6s Dorrits ; onb who was born inside — That was the one ! That was the one ? The nondescript had known her many years. In regard of the other Miss Dorrit.the nondescript lodged in the same house with herself and uncle. This changed the client's half-formed design of remaining at the coffee-shop until the nondescript should bring him word that Dorrit had issued forth into the street. lie entrusted the nondescript with a confidential message to her, importing that the visitor who had wait- don her father last night, beggpd the favour of a few words with her at her uncle's lodging ; he obtained from the same source full directions to the house, which ■was very near ; dismissed the nondescript gratified with half-a-crown ; and having hastily refreshed hin sslf at the coffee-shop, repaired with all speed to the cl&rioaet- i player's dwelling. < There were so many lodgers in this house, that the i door-post seemed to be as mil of bell- handles as a i cathedral organ is full of stops. Doubtful which might : be the clarionet-shop, he was considering the point when > a shuttlecock flew out of the parlor window, and ( alighted on his hat. He then observed that in the par- '. lor-window was a blind with the inscription, Mr. i Crippi.es' Academy ; also in another line, Evening Tuition- ; and behind the blind was a little white-faced boy, with a slice of bread and butter, and a battledore. The window being accessible from the footway, he ! looked in over the blind, returned the shuttlecock, and put his question. "Dorrit?" said the little white-facpd boy (Master : Cripples in fact). " Mr. Dorrit ? Third bell and one knock." The pupils of Mr. Cripples appeared to have been making a copybook of the street door, it was so extensively scribbled over in pencil. The frequency of the inscriptions, " Old Dorrit." and " Dirty Dick," in combmation, suggested intentions of personality on the part of Mr. Cripples' pupils. There was ample time to make these observations, before the door was opened by the poor old man himself. " Ha ! " said he, very slowly remembering Arthur, 1 you were shut in last night ? " I " Yes, Mr. Dorrit. I hope to meet your niece here | presently." "Oh ! " said he, pondering. " Out of my brother's 1 way ? True. Would you come up-stairs and wait for her ? " , "Thank you." , Turning himself as slowly as he turned in his mind ( ■whatever he heard or said, he led the way up the nar- , row stairs. The house was very close, and had an un- s wholesome smell. The little staircase windows looked ] in at the back windows of other houses as unwholesome i as itself, with poles and lines thrust out of them, on f ■which unsightly linen hung : as if the inhabitants were ] angling for clothes, and had had some wretched bites j not worth attending to. In the back garret— a sickly room, with a turned up bedstead in it, so hastily and , recently turned up that the blankets were boiling over, ■ as it were, and keeping the lid open— a half-finished breakfast of coffee and toast, for two persons, was i jumbled down anyhow on a rickety table. ] There was no one there. The old man, mumbling to 1 himself, after some consideration, that Fanny had run away, went to the next room to fetch her back. The ' visitor, observing that she held the door on the inside, 1 and that when the uncle tried to open it, there was a sharp adjuration of " Don't stupid ! " and an appearance : of loose stocking and flannel, concluded that the young ' lady was in an undress. The uncle, without appearing to come to any conclusion, shuffled in again, sat down in his chair, and began warming his hands at the ffire | Not that it was cold, or that he had any waking idea whether it was or not. " What do you think of my brother, sir ? " he asked, when he. bye and bye, discovered what he was doing, left off. reached over to the chimney-piece, and took his clarionet case down. " I was glad," said Arthur, very much at a loss, for his thoughts were on the brother before him ; " to find him so well and cheerful." " Ha ! " muttered the old man, •' Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes ! " Arthur wondered what he could possibly want with the clarionet case. He did not^want it at all. He discovered, in due time, that it rs not the little paper of snuff (which was also on the chimney-piece), put it back again, took down the snuff instead, and solaced himself with a pinch. He was as feeble, spare, and slow in his pinches as in everything el6e, but a certain little trickling of enjoyment of them played in the poor worn nerves about the corners of his eyes and mouth. » Amy, Mr. Clennam. What do you think of her r "

"I am much imprcsspd Mr. Dorrit, by all that I havP seen of her and thought ot her." "My brother would have been quite lost without Amy," he returned. "We should el have been lost without Amy. She is a veiy good girl, Amy. She does her duty " Arthur fancied that he heard in these praises, a certain Une of custom which he had heaid from the father last night, with an inward protest and feeling of antagonism. It was not that they stinted her praises, o* were insensible to what she did loi them ; but that they were lazily habituated to hei, as they weie to all the rest of their condition. He fancied that although th< y had before them, every day, the means of comparison between her and one another and themselves, they regaided her as being hi her nei-eoary pi toe ; as holding a position tn wauls them all which belonged to her, like lu-r name or her age. lleld'icied that they viewed hoi, not as having risen away from the prison atmosphere, but as appertaining to it : as being vaguely what they had a right to expect, and nothing more. Her uncle resumed his breakfast, and was munching toast sopped in coffee, obli vious of his gu°st, »vhen the thitd bell rang. That was Amy, he said, and went down to let her in ; leaving the visitor with as vivid a picture on his mii.d of his begrimed hands, dirt-worn face, and decayed figure, as if he were still drooping in his chair. She came up after him, in the usual plain dress, and with the usual timid mnnnei. nor lips were a little parted, as if her heait beat faster than usual. " Mr. Clennam, Amy," said her uncle, "lias been expecting you some time." " I took thp liberty of sending you a message." "I received the message, sir." "Are you going to my mother's this morning? I think not, for it is past your usual hour." "Not to day, sir lam not wanted f>-day." " Will you allow me to walk a little way in whatever direction yon m.iy be goins? 1 can then speak to you as we walk, both without detaining you here, and without intruding longer here ivjself " S-h » looked embnirassrd, but said, if'hc pleasei. He made a pretence of having mislaid his walking- stick, to give her time to set tv-et v -e bedstead right, to answer her sister's impatient knock at 'he wall, and to say a-woid softly to her uncle. Then he found it, and they went down-stairs ; she first, he following, the uncle standing at the stair-head, am! pi cb ably foi get ting them before they reached the ground floor Mr. CrippUs's pupils, who were by this time coming to school, desisted from their morning recreation of cuffing one another w ith bags and books, to stare with all the eyes they had at a stranger who had been to see Dirty Dick. They bore the trying spectacle in silence, until the mysterious visitor was at a safe distance ; when they buist into pebbles and yells, and likewise into reviling dances, and in all ie c pects buried the pipe of peace with so many savage ceremonies, that if Mr Cripples had been chief of the Oripplewayboo tribe with his war-paint on, they could scaicely have done greater justice to their education. In the midst of this homage, Mr. Arthur Clennam offered his arm to Little Don-it, and Little Dorrit took it. "Will you go bv the Iron bridge," said he, "wheue there is an escape horn the noise of the street ?" Little D # orrit answered, if he pleased, and presently ventun d to hope that he would "not mind" Mr Cnpples's bo}S, for she had herself received her education, such as it was, in Mr. Cfipples's evening academy. He returned, with the best will in the woikl, that Mr CiippWs bojs weie forgiven out ot the bottom of his soul. Thus did Cripples unconsciously become a master of the ceremonies between them, and bring them moie naturally together than Bo.iv Nash might have done jf they had lived in his golden days, and he had alighted from his coach and six for the purpose The morning remained squally, and the streets were miserably muddy , but no rain fell as they walked towards the Iron Ihid^e. The little creature seemed so young iv his eyes that theie were moments when he found himself thinking of her, if not speaking to her. as if she were a child. Perhaps he seemed as old in her eyes as she seemed young in his " I am sorry to hear you were so inconvenienced last night, sir, as to be locked in It was very unfortunate." It was nothing, he returned He had had a very good bed. 4Oh yes !" she said q-uckly ; " she believed there were excellent beds at the coffee house." He noticed that the coffee-house was quite a majestic hotel to her, and that she treasured its reputation. "I believe it is very expensive," said Little Dorrit, "but my father has told me that quite beautiful dinners may be got there. And wine," the added timidly. "Were you evpr there ?" "Oh no ! Only into the kitchen, to fetch hot water." j To think of growing up with a kind of awe upon one ', as to the luxuries of that suburb establishment, the Marshalaea hotel ! j " I asked you last night." said Clennam, "how you ' had become acquainted with my mother. Did you ever , hear her name before she sent for you ?" "No, sir." "Do you think your father ever did ?" "No, sir." "He met her eyes raised to his with so much wonder in them (she was scared when tint encounter took place, and shrunk away again), that he felt it necessar}' to say : "I have a reason for a&king, which I cannot very well explain ; but you must, on no account, suppose it to be ot a nature to cause you the least alarm or anxietj . Quite the reverse. And you think that at no time of your father's hie was my name of Clennam ever familiar to him ?" , "No, sir." i He felt, from the tone in which she spoke, that she was glancing up at him with those parted lips ; therefore he looked before him, rather than make her heart beat quicker still by embarrassing her afrpsh. Thus they emerged upon the Iron Bridge, which was as quiet after the roaring streets, as though it had been open country. The wind ble»v roughly, the wet squalls , came rattling past them, skimming the pools on the road and pavement, and raining them down into the river. The clouds raced on furiously in tl.e leadcolored sky, the smoke and mist raced after them, the dark tide ran fierce and strong in the same direction. Little Dorrit seemed the least, the quietest, and weakest of Heaven's erpa?ures. "Let me put you in a coach," said Arthur Clennam, very nearly adding, "My poor child." She hurriedly declined, saying that wet or dry made little difference to her ; she was used to go about in all weathers. He knew it to be so, and was touched with more pity ; thinking of the slight figure »t his side, making its nightly way through the damp, dark, boisterous streets, to such a place of rest. "You spoke so feelingly to me last night, sir, and I found afterward 0 that you had been so generous to my j father, that I could not resist your message, if it was , only to thank you ; especially as I wished very much to say to you — " she hesitated and trembled, and tears rose in her eyes, but did not fall. "To say to me— >" "That I hope you will not misunderstand my father. Don't judge him sir, as you would judge others outside the gates. He has been theie so long ! I never saw him outside, but I can understand that he must have grown different in some things since." "My thoughts will never be unjust or harsh towards him, believe me." "Not," she said, -with a prouder air, as the misgiving evidently crept upon her that she might spem to be abandoning him, " Not that he has anything to be ashamed of for himself, or that I have anything to be ashamed of for him. He only requires to be under- j stood. 1 only ask for him that his life may be fairly j remembered. All that he said was quite true. It all , happened just as he related it. t He is very much respected. Everybody who comes in, is glad to know him. He is more courted than any one else. He is far more thought of than the Marshal is." j If ever pride weie innocent, it was innocent in Little Dorrit when she grew boastful of her father. 1 "It is often said that his manners are a true gentleman's and quite a study. I see none like them in that place, but he is admitted to be superior to all the rest. This is quite as much why they make him presents, as because they know him to be needy. He is not to be blamed for being in need, poor love. Who could be m prison a quarter of a century, and be prosperous !" What affection in her words, what compassion in her repressed tears, what a great soul of fidelity within her, | how true the light that shed false brightness rourill him ! I "If I have found it best to conceal where my home is, it is not because I am ashamed of him. God forbid ! Nor am I so much ashamed ot the place itself as might i be supposed. People are not bad because they come there. I have known numbers of good, persevering, honest people, come there through misfortune. They j are almost all kind-hearted to one another. And it ! would be ungrateful indeed in me, to forget that I have had many quiet, comfortable hours there ; that I had , an excellent friend there w hen 1 was quite a baby, who ] was very fond of me ; that I have been taught there, ' and have workt-d there, and have slept soundly there. I think it would be almost cowardly and cruel not to have some little attachment for it, after all this." She had relieved the faithful fulness of her heart, and modestly said, laisirg her eyes appealipgly to her new friend's, "I did not mean to say so much, nor have I ever but once spoken about this before. But it seems to set it more right than it was last night. I said I wished you had not followed me, sir I don't wish it so much now, unless you should think— indeed I don't wish it at all, unlesß I should have spoken so confusedly, that— that you cm scarcely undeistand me, which lam .afraid may be the case." "He told her with perfect truth that it was not the

case; and putting; himself between her and the shair. wind ami r.iin, shelteied her as well as he c<uild. "I feel permitted now," he said, "to abk you a littlt moie concerning your father. Has he many creditors ?' "Oh! a <?ieat numbui.' • I mean d >taining creditors, who keep him where he is?" "Oh yas ! a great number." "Canymi tell me — I can get the infoimation, nc doubt, else wheie. if you cannot— who is the most influenti 1 of them ?" Douit said, aftei considering a little, that she used te hear long ago of Mi Tite Barnacle as a man of great powor. Howasacommissioier, oiaboaul,oi a trustee, "01 something." He lived in Giobtcnoi Square, fahe thought, or very near it. He was under Government— high in the Circumlocution Office. She appeared to have acquired, in her infancy, some awful impression of the might of this formidable Mr. Tito Barnacle of Grosvenoi Square, 01 \eij neai it, and the Circumlocution Office, which quite crushed her when she mentioned him. "It can do no harm," thought Arthur, ' il I see this Mr. Tite Bainacle." The thought did not present itself so quietly but that her quickness intercepted it. "Ah !" said Little Dnrnt, shaking her head with the mild despah of a lifetime. "Many people used to think once oi getting my poor tath Q r out, but you don't know how hopeless it is." She foigot to be shy at the moment, in honestly warning him away from the sunken wreck he had a dream of raising ; and looked at him with eyes which a«snmlly, in association with hei patient 'face, hoi fragile figuie, In r spare di ess, and the wind and rain, , dil not turn him from his purpose of helping her. i ''E\en it it could be clone." said she — "and it never can be done now— where could father live, or how could ihe live ? I have often thought that if such a change I could come, it might be anything but a sen ice to him | now. People might not think so well of him outs.de ias they do there. He mis;ht not be so gently dealt with I outside, as he is there, lie might not be so lit himself for the hie outside, ab he is for that." Here tor the fiist time she could not restrain her tears | iiom falling; and the little thin hands he had watched when they weie so busy, tiembled as they clasped each ' other. ; "It would be a new distress to him even to know that I earn a little money, and that Fanny earns a little t money. lie is so anxious, about us, you see, feeling 1 helplessly s>hut up there. Such a good, good father !" | He letjhe little buist of feeling go by before he ' spo'te. It was soon gone. She was not accustomed to think of hciself, or to trouble any one with her emotions. He had but glanced away at the piles of city roofs and chimneys among which the smoke was rolling hdu il) , and <xZ the wilderness of masts on the river, and the wilderness of steeple* on the shore, indistinctly | mixed together in the stormy haze, when she was again i as quiet as if she had been plying her needle in his , mother's room '•Y.,u would be glad to have your brother set at libertj ?" "Oh very, vpry glad, sir !" "Well, we will hope for him at least. You told me last night of a ftiend you had ?" Hi« name was Plornish, Little Dorrit said. i And \\ here did Plornish live ? Ploinisli lived in Bleed - ' ing Heait Yard. He was "only a plasteni," Little | Doirit said, as a caution to him not to form high social j expectations of Plornish. He lived at the last house in Bleed. ng Heart Yard, and his name was over a little gateway. j Arthur to -k down the rddress"nnd gave her his. He | had now do.it all he sought to do for the present, excpl that In' wished to lea\e her with a leliance upon ! him, and to ha^e something like a promise from her that she would cherish it. "Theie is one friend !" he said, putting uplvspocketi book "As I take you back — you aie going back ?" "Oh yes ! going straight home." "As I take }ou back," the word home jn red upon him, "lot me "ask you to persuade youiself that you ha\e anothei fueiul. I make no professions, and say no more." "You are truly kind to mo, sir. I am sure I need no more." They walked back through the miserable muddy streets, and among the poor, mean shops, and weie jostled by the crowds of dirty hucksters usual to a poor neighbourhood. There was nothing, by the short way, that was pleasant to any of the fi\e senses. Yet it was not a common passage through common rain, and mire, and noise, to Olennam, having this little, slender, careful creatuie on his arm. How young she seemed to him, or hott old he to her; or what a secret either to the other, in th.it beginning of the destined mtei wearing of their stories, matters not > ere. He thought of her ha\ ing been born and bred among these scenes, and shrinking through them now, familial yet misplaced ; he thought of her long acquaintance with the squalid needs of life, and of her innocence ; of her old solicitude for others, and her few yeais and her childish aspect. They were come into the High Street, where the prison stood, when a \oice cried, "Little mother, little mothei !" Dorrit stopping and looking back, an excited fi^u-e of a strange kind bounced against them (still crying "little mother"), fell down, and scattered the contents of a large babket, filled with potatoes, in the mud. "Oh, Maggy," said Dorrit, "w p hat a clumsy child you are !" Maggy was not hurt, but picked herself up immediately, and then began to pick up the potatoes, in which both Dorrit and Arthur Clennatn helped. Maggy picked up veiy few potatoes, and a great quantity of mud ; but they were all recovered, and deposited in the basket. Maggy then smeared her muddy faca with her shawl, and presenting it to Mr. Clennam as a type of purity, enabled him to sec what she was like. She was about cight-and-twenly, with large bones, large features, large feet and hands, large eyes, and no hair. Her lavgc eyes were limpid and almost colorless ; they seemed to be very little affected by light, and to stand unnaturally still. There was also that attentive listening expression in her face, which is seen in the faces of the blind ; but she was not blind, having one tolerably serviceable eyc\ Her face was not exceedingly ugly, though it was only redeemed from being s>o by a smile ; a good-humour-ed smile, and pleasant in itself, but rendered pitiable by being constantly there. A great white cap, with a quantity of opaque frilling that was always flapping about, apologised for Maggy's baldness ; and made it so very difficult for her okf black bonnet to retain its place upon her head, that it held on round her neck like a gipsey'b baby. A commission of haberdashers could alone ha\ c reported what the rest of her poor dress was made of; but it had a stiong general resemblance to sea weed, with here and there a gigantic tea-leaf. Her shawl looked particu- j larly like a tea-leaf, after long infus'on. Arthur Clennam looked at Dorrit, witli the expression of one saying, " May I ask who this is ?" Don it, whose hand this Maggy, still calling her little mother, had begun to fondle, aiibwered in words. (They were under a gateway into which the majority of the potatoes had rolled.) " This is Maggy, sir." j " Maggy, sir," echoed the personage presented, " Little mother ! " " She is the grand-daughter"— said Dorrit. " Grand-daughter," echoed Maggy. " Of my old nurse, who lias been dead a long time. Maggy, how old are you ? " " Ten. mother," said Maggy. " You can't think how good she is, sir," said Dorrit, with infinite tenderness. " Good she is," echoed Maggy, transferring the pronoun in a most expressive way from herself, to her little mother. "Oi how clever," said Dorrit. "She goes on errands as well as any one." Maggy laughed. " And is as trustwoitliy as the Bank of England." Maggy laughed. " She earns her own living entirely. Entirely, sii ! " said Don it in a lower and triumphant tone. " Really does ! " " What is her history ?" asked Clennam. " Think of that, Maggy! " said Donit, taking her two large hands and clapping them together. " A gentleman from thousands of miles away, wanting to know your histoiy ! " "My history ? " cried Ma.sgy. " I ii f fle mother." " She means me," said Dorrit, rather confused ; " she is very much attached to me. Her old grandmother was not so kind to her as she should have been ; was she Maggy ?" Maggy shook her head, made a drinking vessel of her clenched left hand, drank out of it, and said, " Gin " Then beat an imaginary child, and said, " Broom handles and pokers." " When Maggy was ten years old," said Dorrit, watching her face while she spoke, " she had a bad fever, sir, and she has never giown any older ever since." " Ten years old," said Maggy, nodding her head. " But what a nice hospital ! So comfortable, wasn't it ? Oh so nice it was. Such a Ev'nly place ! " " She had never been at peace before, sir,'' said Dorrit, turning towards Arthur for an instant and speaking low, and she always runs off upon that " "Such beds tker.- is th.re!" cried Maggy. "Such lemonades ! Such oranges ! Such d'lidous broth and wine! Such Chicking ! Oh, ain't it a delightful place to go and stop at ! " "So Maggy stopped there as long as she could," said Doirit, in "her former tone of telling a child's story ; the tone designed for Maggy's ear, " and at last, when she could stop there no longer, she came out. Then, because she was never to be more than ten years old, however long she lived — " " However long she lived," echoed Maggy. " And because she was very weak ; indeed was so weak that when she began to laugh she couldn't stop herself — which was a great pity — " (Maggy mighty grave of a sudden.) " Her grandmother did not know what to do with her, and for some years was vorj unkind to her indeed. At

length, in course of time, Maggy began to take pains to improve herself, and to be very at< entive and very industrious . and by degrees was allowed to come in and out as often a i she liked, and got enough to do to support heiself, and does support herself. And that," said Little Dorrit, clapping the two gieat hands together again, " is Maggy's history, as M.iggy knows ! " Ah ! But Arthur would have known what w.as wanting to its completeness, though he had never heard the words Little mother ; though he had never seen the fondling o. the small spare hand ; though he hdd had no sight for the tears now standing in the coloiless eyes; though he had had no heaiing for the sob that checked the clumsy laugh Tie dirty gateway with [he wind and lain whistling through it, and the basket of muddy potatoes waiting to be spilt again or taken up, never seemed the common hole it really was, when he looked back to it by these lights. Never, never! They were very near the end of their walk, and thej now came out of the gat way to finish it. Nothing" would seive Maggy but that they must stop at a grocer's window, short of their destination, for her to show her learning She could read after a sort ; and picked out the fat hgnies in the tickets of prices, for the most part correctly. She also stumbled, with a large balance of success agiinst her failuies, through various philanthropic recommendations (o Try our Mixtuie, Try our Family Black, Try our Orange-finvoured Pecoe, challenging competition at the head of flowery Teas; and various cautions to the public against spurous establishments and adulterated articles. Wl-en he saw how pleasure brought a rosy tint into DorTit's face when Maggy made a hit, he felt that he i could have stood theie nu.kmg a I'b'vry of the grocer's window until the lain and wind were tired. I The court-yard received them at last, and there he said good-bye to Little Doriil. Little as she had always looked , she looked less than ever when he saw her going into the Marshalsea lodge passage, the little mother attended by her big child. The cage door opened, and when the small bird, reared in captivity, h id tamely fluttered in, he saiV it shut again ; and then he came away.