THE HAUNTED CRUST. 
(CONTINUED). 
That same year, just a week before Christmas, on a 
Saturday night, I set off from the Water-Lily to pay 
Jerry Rouse a visit. Ay, that was a time that won’t he 
forgotten in Pickersgill for a few years to come, I should 
say,—not by any, at least, who saw what I saw on my 
walk to Jerry’s that Saturday night. Half-dozens of 
hungry, ragged men outside bakers' shops, staring as if 
they’d draw the loaves out with their eyes; women 
going irom shop to shop, to get the most they could for 
then - few halfpence ; and here and there a man carry¬ 
ing a pole with a loaf at the top, and a great ticket to 
show the price and the size together. What did it mean, 
Mr. Martin ? Why, it was the time of the great distress 
in all the factory places; and at Pickersgill it was as 
bad, or worse, than anywhere, and it was the hearing 
of a sore tale of starvation at Gadsliill-in-the-Fields that 
made me get up from the comfortable fireside of the 
Water-Lily and set out on my visit to Jerry. 
Now, Saturday night. I should tell you, was not by 
any means a pleasant time for visiting Jerry. In the 
fust place, Saturday was Nance’s washing-day, and you 
wouldn’t be able to move for .wet rags of clothes hung 
on lines across and across the room. It was her clean¬ 
ing day too, such cleaning as she did; and you’d be 
sure to find her broke down in the midst of it, squatting 
before the fire, railing at Jerry because he wouldn’t take 
the baby, who was always cross on a Saturday night, 
because the steam of the wet clothes brought his cough 
on. Jerry himself would be sitting in the comer where 
Nance had driven him, bending his pale, good-tenrpered 
little face over his work, and surrounded by old boots, 
which the children would be playing with and mauling 
about so that when he wanted a left, he found all rights, 
or when he wanted a right, all lefts. 
That was Jerry’s home on that Saturday night; not a 
very bright one certainly, but a palace to many a home 
at Gadsliill-in-the-Fields. 
But now Jerry didn’t look upon any of these things 
as his troubles, but as all Nance’s ; and listened patiently 
to her complaining, pitying her from the bottom of his 
kind, simple heart, and wondering if ever a woman, let 
her be saint, martyr, or what, had as much to put up 
with as his Nance. 
He had one trouble of his own, though, had Jerry. 
"Where was Mercy these Saturday nights? Tramping 
through the mud and mire, taking home the work as fast 
as he could do it ? As fast as he could do it; yes, but 
Mercy was not so quick gone on these errands aS she 
ed to be,-and poor Jerry noticed it; and had queer, 
uneasy thoughts about it, that made lum stick his awl 
into his thumb sometimes. 
And so I found him that Saturday night, sitting 
sweating over his work, in the steam and smoke, and 
pondering these things concerning Mercy. 
I made the best of my way among the wet clothes to 
him, after speaking to Nance and the children. 
“Ah, Matthew,” he said with a shake back of his 
matted hair and a lightening up of his paleface, “all 
the compliments of the season to you for coming to see 
us in this family kind o’ way. You must take us as we 
are, you know ; we don’t make no stranger of you, do 
we, Nance? Will you clear a chair for Matthew, my 
dear? and I dare say he’ll be so good as to hold the 
little ’un for you.” 
“ No, thank you, Jerry; I’m much beholden to you, 
but I’d rather be excused,” says I. “Me hold a baby, 
indeed ! No. no; that's a thing I never could do. In 
the first place, I never can guess how far a child comes 
down to in its long-clothes; and if you go to stretch your 
arms out, taking it to be taller than it is, it’ll slip through 
’em ; or if you go to take it by the middle, the bead will 
hang down and bring on convulsions or something.” 
So I let Jerry’s baby alone, and took a chair, and 
while I was talking to him stuck my pocket s out beliind, 
to show the mince-meat pics and oranges. It wasn’t 
long before they were found out; for soon, instead of 
fretting and whining, you could hear nothing but suck¬ 
ing and munching all over the room : and then by de¬ 
grees came the whole lot hanging about my knees, and 
looking up at me with their big eyes as if I was the 
most wonderful old boy that ever lived. I don’t like 
children, I never did; but I liked to feel Jerry’s children 
pick my pockets. 
“ So you’ve got a new T landlord. Jerry?” I said to him. 
Jerry looked up from the thread he was w^axing, quite 
astonished. 
“ Haven’t you heard that old Harroway said good-by 
to us all last night ? ” says I. 
“ No,” said Jerry. 
“ Well, he did ; he died at his sister’s farm at Basset.” 
“And who’ll be our landlord now?” asked Jerry. 
“Who? Why', who but his son,” said I, “young Dan 
o’ the water?’” 
Jerry laid down the boot he was welting, and sat con¬ 
sidering, drawing up his little knees, and winding his 
piece of waxed thread round and round them. 
“Matthew,” he said presently, in a low voice, so that 
Nance shouldn’t hear him. “I’m sorry. I’m sorrier for 
this yer then I can tell you.” 
“And why, Jerry?” I asked him. 
“Because,” says he, taking up his boot again, and 
sticking it between his knees, sole upwards, and bringing 
his fist down upon the sole with all his might, “I’d 
rather Dan Harroway be obligated to me for a sound 
lickin’, than I ’ud be obligated to him for the standin’ 
over of half a year’s rent, as ’ll have to be the case now. 
Poor old Harroway, he must have foresaw as his end 
was nigh, for he’s let me alone since the spring, and not 
worrited me once.” 
Ay, thinks I, Dan could tell you two stories to that 
one, but I only said,— 
“It appears to me, Jerry Rouse, you’re a shade too 
hard on that lad,—that Dan Harroway ; it does, now.” 
“ Well, I’m sorry if I am, and I’m willin’ to give him 
every excuse, so long as he keeps out o’ my way. He 
may mend some time or other, but I ain’t much hopes 
myself o’ such a character: he’s had too much to do 
with the water for me.” 
“Why, man alive, what harm could the water do 
him?” says I. 
