318 DECEMBER. 



imagines all fine folk to be, overcomes him with 

 a weakness ; but the thought of his daughter's 

 danger returns with double power, he gets up 

 with a groan, and prepares for his great jour- 

 ney. Look at his long drab coat of a most anti- 

 quated cut ! See how neatly it has been brush- 

 ed ! How clean he is shaven, how nicely his 

 white cravat is tied, and with what a formal air 

 he puts his stick to the ground ! There has 

 been a world of preparation to set him out ; not 

 even the great trouble which rests upon his 

 mind can make him forget that he is in his Sun- 

 day clothes ; and he walks on his way a creature 

 of such simplicity that he seems far likelier to 

 be duped himself than to prevent another being 

 so. 



Observe now this solitary woman. For ten 

 years she has lived in the closest court of the 

 closest alley of a great manufacturing town. 

 Her husband, a clever mechanic, has been earn- 

 ing plenty of money, and plenty of children have 

 grown around them. The good creature, in the 

 abundance of her household affairs, has been so 

 happy that she has almost forgotten that there 

 is a world out of her own house. But there has 

 come a change. Her husband's employment has 

 tailed, and he has gone forth to seek it elsewhere. 

 For a time she hears good news ; he sends her 

 money and hopes of prosperity, though in a 



