63 



A PACKET OF SEEDS SAVED BY AN OLD GARDENER. 



[Continued from p. 41.] 



In the afternoon the butler came to me, and said I was to go and 

 lodge at a cottage on the green. It belonged to our master, and 

 he let a widow woman live in it rent free, because her husband, 

 who was once coachman in the family, was killed by one of the 

 horses flinging him at exercise. The butler was to give me the offer 

 of a place too in the stable, and out of livery ; but I begged off, 

 for I did not like stable ways ; and I knew that at exercise before 

 breakfast the coachman and grooms always had something to drink 

 at a public house they passed by ; and I hadn't then forgot what 

 my father said at parting about drinking, and its making my bundle 

 so small. So I begged off; and when I told the reason, the butler 

 said I was a great fool, for " what harm did a glass do a man ?" and 

 yet all the while his nose and face were giving the lie to his tongue. 

 After work I went to my lodgings; and queer enough I felt 

 when I went in with my bundle of little better than rags, for I'd my 

 best on my back. I hadn't the heartiest of welcomes. The old 

 lady did washing for the Hall servants, and the cottage wasn't the 

 largest. She had two sons ; one was coachman to the squire, and 

 one a servant somewhere else; and she had one daughter who helped 

 at home. This girl was two years older than me, and so marked 

 with the small-pox, that the other girls in the village used to call 

 her " Pock-pitted Bet." You never saw any of them keep company 

 with her in going to church ; (she kept no holidays ;) she was so 

 plain, and she dressed so plain too and so neat. And there was 

 something in that ; for any body that passed her and looked back at 

 her face wasn't disappointed at all. It's often set me wondering 

 how ordinary people can be so foolish as to dress so fine, and some- 

 times outrageously grand, as if to call people to look at their want 

 of beauty; and many a laugh I've seen at some of the Hall folks on 

 this score. And not at the Hall folks only, for I've often seen the 

 same in other people ; if you looked at the things on their backs, 

 and their airs, you'd surely have taken them for quality ; and if you 

 only watched 'em long enough, you'd see 'em slip into some little 

 poking place, and no occasion to walk in after them to see if it was 

 clean and all to rights ; for I always noticed that when people make 

 themselves so fine for the sake of being looked at, they're sure to 

 spend a deal of time looking at other people. Somebody goes by 

 the window, up they jump ; and that look's not enough, they must 

 go to the door, or to the bedroom up-stairs ; and if they once get 

 their elbows on the window-sill, no more hearty work that day. But 

 Elizabeth was none of this sort, and though she was so common- 

 looking in her face and dress, and, as I said, none of the other girls 

 kept her company, yet I always noticed, that when any of them were 

 in any trouble, (and they were safe to be after our young gentlemen 

 had been home from college,) they were sure to find their way to 

 her to make her their friend. 



