N PRISON 1 AND OUT . i, ,11 .. ^ . v * ;>-'-' "I PEOPLES :^>v--^ /5^S In Prison and Out. BY HE SB A STRETTON, "Max Kramer" "Nelly's Dark Days," " Bede't Charity" "Alone in London" &<.,&. NEW YORK: THE AMERICAN NEWS COMPANY 39 AND 41 CHAMBERS STREET. ft is my wish that Messrs. DODV, MEAD, &* COMPANY alone should publish this story in the United States; and I appeal to the generosity and courtesy of other publishers to allow me to gain some benefit from my work on the American, as well at the English, side of the Atlantic. HESBA STRETTOM 2132879 CONTENTS. CHAPTER L TO BEG I AM ASHAMED . CHAPTER II. A BOY'S SENTENCE o CHAPTER IIL THE WEDDING-RING IN PAWN 3 CHAPTER IV. OLD EUCLID'S HOARD 46 CHAPTER V. LESSONS IN PRISON 61 CHAPTER VI. NOT GOD'S WILL? 70 CHAPTER VIL BESS BEGINS BUSINESS 81 CHAPTER VIIL THE PRISON-CROP ON A YOUNG HEAD .... 93 CHAPTER IX. BROKENHEARTED . . . . . . . .105 CHAPTER X. BLACKETT'S THREATS 115 CONTENTS. CHAPTER XL AN UNWILUN3 THIEF CHAPTER XIL VICTORIA'S COFFIN I4O CHAPTER XIII. GLAD TIDINGS .151 CHAPTER XIV. MRS. LINNETT'S LODGINGS .... , 161 CHAPTER XV. AN.HOUR Too SOON .... .172 CHAPTER XVI. TWICE IN JAIL ,182 CHAPTER XVII. MEETING AND PARTING .193 CHAPTER XVIII. A RED- LETTER DAY ,202 CHAPTER XIX. VICTORIA'S WEDDING 21 , CHAPTER XX. BLACKETT'S REVENGE ,222 CHAPTER XXL WHO IS TO BLAMZ? . . . . . , , .238 CHAPTER XXII. THROUGH JAIL TO THE GRAVE. . . . 250 CHAPTER XXIIL OUT CF THE PRISON-HOUSE . . -259 IN PRISON AND OUT. CHAPTER I. TO BEG I AM ASHAMED. THE small back room, which was the home of a family, was not much larger than a prison-cell, and, in point of cleanliness and light and ventilation, was far inferior to it There was a fair-sized sash-window; but more than half the panes were broken, and the place of the glass supplied by paper, or rags so worn as to be useless for any other purpose. Besides this, the next row of houses in this thick knot of dwelling-places was built so close, as to shut out even a glimpse of the sky from the rooms on the ground-floor of a house four stories high. The whole street had been originally built for tenants of a better class ; but, from some reason or other, it had fallen into the occupation of tha 8 IN PRISON AND OUT. poorest, and each room was considered sufficient accommodation for a separate family. This small, dark, back room had been in- tended for a kitchen. Close against the "window stood the dust-bin, into which was emptied all the waste of the house, when it was not cast out into the street. Fortunately there was very little waste of food ; for every scrap that could be eaten was greedily devoured, except in very extraordinarily good times. It was fortu- nate ; for the dust-bin was seldom looked after, as the inmates of the crowded dwelling knew little, and cared less, for sanitary laws. Even the poor, hard-working woman, who had been struggling for years to pay the rent of this dark, unwholesome den as a home for herself and her children, hardly gave a thought to the tainted air they breathed, whether the wirdow was open or shut. She sighed now and then for better light, and the cool freshness of free air ; but darkness and a sickly atmosphere seemed to be the natural lot of all about her, and she was not given to murmur. She had grown so weary with the long and monotonous battle of life, that she had no longer energy enough to TO BEG I AM ASHAMED. 9 murmur. It was God's will, she said to ^erself, finding something like peace in the belief. There was a darker depth of misery to which she had not yet sunk, that of feeling there was no God at all. Her husband had been dead for ten years, and she had had two little children to hamper all her efforts to lift herself and them out of their poverty. She had often failed to procure necessaries, and she had never been so success- ful as to be able to provide for more than their barest wants. They had all learned how to pinch hard, how to eat little enough, and how to wear the scantiest clothing. They were always trying to trick Nature, who never ceased to de- mand urgently more than they could give, but who consented to take less than her claim, though the landlord would not. The children spent most of their waking hours in the street ; for there was a small boiler in the kitchen, and the mother took in washing, with which every inch of the small room was crowded. When the weather was too bad for them to be in the streets, they lived on the common staircase or in the passages hearing and seeing every form IO IN PRISON AND OUT. cf evil, and of good also, swarming about them, and growing up amongst them as other children grow up amid the peaceful influences of well ordered homes. In the mother's mind there were still linger ing dim memories of a very different childhood, and of better times before her marriage. Some- times there came to her, as there comes to all of us, sudden flashes of light out of the misty past; and she saw again her cottage -home down in the country, and the village-school she went to, and her first place as a young servant in the vicarage, where the clergyman's wife had taken care she should keep up her acquaintance with the Collects and the Catechism. Most of the Collects, and nearly all the Catechism, had faded away from her remembrance ; but many a quiet Sunday afternoon she had talked to her children of the vicarage garden, where flowers grew all the year round, and of the village- green, where boys and girls could play unmo- lested and unnoticed ; and how she left r ome to come tc London for high wages, and had never Been it again. Then she told them of the gay and grar.j doings there had been in the greaf TO BEG I AM ASH VMED. 1 1 houses where she had been in service until she met with their father, and gave up all the gran- deur and luxury for love of him. And then her voice would falter a little as she talked to them of his death, and of all the troubles following quickly one after another, till she was thankful to have even such a home as this. The poor mother was ignorant ; but her igno- rance was light and knowledge compared with that of her children. They knew nothing, and thought of nothing, beyond what they saw and heard about them. David could read a little, but Bess not at all. The thick knot of streets was swarming with children ; and it was not difficult to escape the notice of the school-in- spector on his occasional visits, especially as Bess was thirteen and David nearly fourteen years of age. The boy had begun to earn a few pence in the streets as soon as he could sell matches ; and he was now getting a precarious and uncertain living for himself by " hob-;ob- bing," as he called it. The Sunday afternoons and evenings, when their mother's work stood still for a few short hours, were their holidays. She had no longer a Sunday gown to wear; but 12 IN PRISON AND GOT. she never failed to put on her wedding-ring, which on week-days was carefully laid aside, lest it should get too much worn with her hard work. Bess and David felt that their mother was different from most other women in the street. She did not drink or swear or brawl ; and all their little world knew she was honest. They were vaguely fond of her good character ; and David was beginning to feel for her a pro- tecting tenderness he could not have put into words. For a long while neither of them knew that she was suffering from the fatal and painful disease of cancer, which had thrust its deep roots into her very life. When he did know it, David's heart burned within him to see her standing bravely at her washing-tub, enduring her agony as patiently as she could. At last she was compelled to seek help from the parish ; and the relieving-officer, after visiting her, rec- ommended out-door relief. There was no doubt what the end must be, and not much uncer- tainty as to how soon the end must come. Four or five shillings a week would cost the par- ish less than taking the woman and her girl TO BEG I AM ASHAMED. 13 even if the boy was left to take care of himself into the house, and provide for her the neces- iaries and comforts the medical officer would Certainly pronounce indispensable. He advised a carefully reckoned dole of four and eightpence a week. Mrs. Fell was more than satisfied. Separa- tion from her children would have been more bitter than death itself; but now she would have Bess and David with her as long as she could keep death at bay. The four shillings and eightpence would pay her rent, and leave almost fourpence a day for other expenses ! If she could only drag on through the winter, and keep a home for Bess and David, she would not murmur, however hard her pain was. She could bear worse anguish than she had yet borne for their sakes. But there was one enemy she had not thought of. The wasting caused by her malady pro- duced a crav'ng hunger, worse to endure, if possible, than the malady itself. It was no longer, possible to cheat herself, as she had been used *o do in former years, with putting off her hunger until it changed into a dull faintness. 14 IN PRISON AND OUT. The gnawing pain showed itself too piamly in the desperate clinching of her teeth, and the wistful craving of her sunken eyes. Three- pence and three farthings a day one penny and one farthing apiece could do little towards maintaining a truce with this deadly foe, who must surely conquer her before the winter could be ended. " It's just as if a wolf was gnawin* me," she said to David one evening, when he came in with a loaf of bread and a slice of cooked fish from a stall in the street ; " not as ever I see a wolf, save once when father was alive, and you was a baby, and we all went to the Zoological Gardens for a holiday. It feels as if all the hunger I ever had had hidden itself away some- where, and heaped itself up, and is all let loose on me now. You children take your share first, for fear I'd eat it all, and not leave enough for you." "It's all for you and Bess, mother," he an- swered : "I ate my supper at the stall." He did not say that he had made his supper of a crust of mouldy bread he had found lying ir the street, and was still as hungry as a grow- TO BEG I AM ASHAMED. 15 ing lad generally is. Like his mother, he was quite used to disregard the urgent claims of his appetite. But he sat down at the end of her ii oning-toard, and watched her by the feeble light of the candle as she greedily devoured the food he had brought. It seemed as if his eyes were opened to see her more clearly than he had ever done before, and her face was indelibly impressed upon his memory. For the first time, as it appeared to him, he noticed her thin, sunken cheeks ; her scanty hair turning gray ; her eager, bright eyes; and the suffering that filled her whole face. The tears dimmed his sight for an instant, and a slight shiver ran through him, as he gazed intently on her. " Mother," he said, " I only took fourpence all day for running two errands, for all I've been on the lookout sharp. Mother, I must take to beggin'." " No, no ! " she answered, looking up for a moment from the food she was so eagerly eat* ing. " I must," he went on : "there's lots o' money to be got that way. They all says so. I couldn't make myself look hungrier than I am j i6 IN PRISON AND OUT. and I'll tell the truth, as you're dyin' of a can- cer, ay ! and dyin' of hunger. I know there'd be folks as would help us. I hate the thought of it as much as you ; but it's better me than Bess. Little Bess *ud be frightened," he ad- ded, looking at his ragged sister, for whose sake he had fought many a battle, and borne many a beating in the streets. "I never thought it 'ud come to beggin'," said his mother in a sorrowful, faltering voice. "Nor me," continued David; "but there's hardly no work for such as me as don't know nothink. I'd have chose to be a carpenter like father; but there's no chance of that. Don't you cry, mother : you've done your best for us, and it's my turn to do my best for you ; and beggin's the best as I can do." David felt it a bitter pass to come to. Un- taught and ignorant as he was, he had his own dream of ambition to be a carpenter, and earn wages like his father. He had gone now and then to a night-school, and learned,, after a fashion, to read and write a little; bat there was no school where a ragged boy I Ve him could learn any kind of hand' craft b> M"hich TO BEG I AM ASHAMED. IJ he could earn a livelihood. If there aad been such a place, how gladly would he have gone to it, and how heartily would he have set himself to work ! There was no one to blame, perhaps ; but still he felt it to be a hard and bitter lot to turn out as a beggar. "I'll do it," he said, after a long silence, "not just round here, you know, mother; but out in the country, where folks ain't all in such a hurry. I'll take care of the police, and I'll be back again afore Sunday ; and you've got Bess with you, so as you won't be lonesome. If I've luck, I'll try again next week. There's kind rich folk as 'ud do somethink for you, if they only knew ; and I'll go and find 'em out. Don't you take on and fret, mother. It ain't thievin', you know." " I'll think about it in the night, Davy," she answered sadly. In the painful, wakeful hours of the night, the poor mother thought of her boy tramping the roads in his ragged clothing and with his almost bare feet, and stopping the passers-by to ask for alms. It had been the aim of her long- aborious life to save herself and her children 1 8 IN PRISON AND OUT. from beggary. Oh, if this cruel malady had only spared her another two or three years, until David had been more of a man, and Bess a gr jwn-up girl ! She could have laid down to d'*e thankfully then, though now she had a terrible dread of dying. But, as far as she could see, there was nothing else to be done than to let David try his luck. There were good rich folks, as he said, if he could only find them. She must let him go and search for them. "You may go," she said in the morning, after they had eaten together the few fragments her hunger had been able to spare the night before ; " and God bless you, Davy ! Don't you aever do nothink save beg. That's bad enough ; but remember, both of yer, what I always said, 'Keep thy hands from pickin* 'and stealin'.' Them's good words to go by. And, Davy, come back as soon as you can; for I'll be hungrier for a sight of you than I am for victuals. Always tell out your tale quiet and true, as your mother's dyin* of cancer and famishin* with hunger; and if they answer ' No,' or shakes their heads, turn away at on',e, TO BEG I AM ASHAMED. 19 and try somebody else. Don't stop folks as are in a hurry. Kiss me afore you go, Davy." It seemed a solemn thing to do. He felt half-choked, and could not speak a word as he bent down to kiss her tenderly. He put his arm round his sister's neck, and kissed her too ; and then, catching up his threadbare cap, he went to the door trying to whistle a cheery street tune. He paused in the doorway, and looked back on them. " Good-by, mother," he cried ; " don't you fret after ire." 2O IN PRISON AND OUT, CHAPTER IL A BOY'S SENTENCE. DAVID was in no haste to enter upon his new calling. He walked on until he had left the busier street far behind him, and had come upon the open and quieter roads in the suburbs. Here and there trees were growing on the inner side of garden-walls, and stretched out their leafy branches, tinted with autumn _Glors, over the side-paths along which he pur- sued his unknown way. The passers-by were more leisurely than those in the city, and occa- sionally gave him a glance, as if they both saw and noticed him, such a glance as he never met amidst the ciowds who jostled one another in the thoroughfares he was accustomed to. This observation made him feel shy, and more averse than ever to begin his unwelcome task A BOY'S SENTENCE. 21 It was past noonday before he could bring him- self to stop a kindly-looking lady, who had looked pleasantly on him, and to beg from her help for his mother. His first appeal was successful, and gave him fresh courage to try again. The kind- hearted woman had helped him to take the first step downwards. He met with rebuffs, and felt downcast and ashamed ; but he also met with persons who gave him money to get rid of his pinched face, and others who believed his story, though he was several miles from home, and bestowed upon him a penny or two, feeling they had done all they were called upon to do for a perishing fellow-creature. Not one took any steps to verify his story, but passed on, and soon forgot the ragged lad, or remembered him with a pleasant glow of satisfaction in having discharged a Christian duty. By the time night fell, David was ten miles from home, and felt foot-sore and weary; for his worn-out shoes, bought at some rag-mart, chafed his feet, and did not .even keep out the dust of the dry roads. But he had taken three shillings and eightpence; and he counted the 22 IN PRISON AND OUT. coppers from one hand to another with m wild ;oyfulness. So much money he had never pos- sessed at one time in his whole life ; and, when he lay down to rest in a lodging-hcuse in a back street of the town he had reached by nightfall, he could not sleep soundly, partly from delight, and partly from the feir of being robbed. If he had luck like this, he would go home rich en Saturday night. Early in the morning he started off again to pursue his new calling, which was quickly losing its sense of degrada- tion. If begging was so profitable a business, and he had no chance of being trained for any other by which he could earn honest wages, it was no wonder that the boy should choose beg- gary rather than starvation. David began to feel that there was less chance of dying of cold or hunger. It was a pleasant autumn day, and numbers of people were about the roads, sauntering leisurely in the warm and bright sunshine. Again many of them were willing enough to give a penny to the half -shy boy who askeJ in a quiet tone for alms. He had not fallen inta any professional whine as yet ; find he was easii) A BOY'S SENTENCE. 2j repulsed,- -so easily that some, who refused at first to g.ve, called after him to come back. There was a touching- air of misery about his thin, overgrown frame and pinched face, which appealed silently for help. He was willing, he said, to clean boots or clean steps, or do any other job that could be found for him as a labor- test ; but very few persons took the trouble to find him work to do. It was much easier to take a penny out of the purse, drop it into his hand, and pass on, with a feeling of satisfaction of at once getting rid of a painful object, and of appeasing the conscience, which seemed about to demand that some remedy should be found for abject poverty like his. Possibly it did not occur to any of these well-meaning and charita- ble persons, that they were aiding and encour- iging the poor lad to break one of the laws of the country. Whilst it was still day, though the sun was sinking in the sky, David sat down under a hedge tc count over his heavy load of pence, which threatened to be too weighty for hi 3 ragged pockets. He had now five shillings' worth of copper, and he did not know where to 24 IN PRISON A.ND OUT. exchange them for silver. He placed his old cap between his feet, and dropped in the coins one after another, handling them with an almost wild delight. How rich he would be to go home to his mother, if he had equal luck on his way back ! Five shillings for two days' begging ! Now that he had found out how easy and profitable it was, and how little risk attended it if you only kept out of sight of the police, his mother and Bess should never know want again. He felt very joyous, and his joy found vent in clear, shrill whistling of the tunes he had learned from street-organs. He was whistling . through the merriest one he knew, when a hand was laid heavily on his shoulder ; and, looking up, he saw the familiar uniform of a policeman. " You're in fine spirits, my lad," he said. " What's this you're crowing over, eh ? Where did you get all those coppers in your cap ? How did you come by them, eh ? " David could not speak, though he tried to seize and hide away his gains; but in vain. The policeman picked up his cap, and weighed it in his hand. 11 You've been begging on the roads," he said, A BOY'S SENTENCE. 23 in a matter-of-course manner, "and you must come along with me. We'll give you a night's lodging for nothing, I promise you. We must put a stop to this sort of thing." Still David neither moved nor spoke. This sudden reversal of all his gladness and prospects paralyzed him. He had known al" the while that any policeman had the power to take him up for begging, and lock him for the night in a police-cell, and charge him with his offence before a magistrate. Not a few of his acquaint- ances had been in jail, and they mostly said it was for begging. The thought of his mother fretting and longing for him at home, and the grief and terror she would feel if he did not get back on Saturday night, as he had promised, flashed across him. The policeman was busy counting over the heap of coppers, and David saw his chance, and seized it. He sprang to his feet, and fled away with as fast steps as if he had been fleeing for his life. But it was of no avail to try to escape from the strong and swift policeman, who instantly pursued him. David was weak and tired, and could not have run far if it had been for his 26 IN PRISON AND OUT. life. He felt himself caught firmly by the collar, and shaken, whilst two or three passers- by stood still, witnessing his capture. "You young rascal'!" said the policeman, "you're only making it all the worse for your- self. Here's five shillings and more in his cap," he went on, addressing the by-standers ; "and I'll be bound he's been begging along the roads as if he hadn't a farthing. That's how the public is imposed on. Five shillings ! and I don't earn more than four shillings a day. There's a shame for you ! " "Ay, it is a shame!" echoed one of the spectators, " a big lad of his age, that ought to be at honest work, earning his own bread ! " " Nobody's ever taught me how to work ! " sobbed David, standing bewildered and ashamed, the centre of the gathering crowd. " We'll teach you that in jail, my fine fel- low," said the policeman, marching him off, followed by a train of rough lads, which grew larger and noisier until they reached the police- station, and David was led in out of their sight. It was a dreary night for David. Theie was no bed in the eel?, and no food was given to A BOY'S SENTENCE. 2J him In his anxiety to save all Ue could to carry home with him, he had not tasted a morsel since morning; and his meal then had been nothing but a pennyworth of bread, which he had taken reluctantly from his treasure. He had been thinking of buying his supper, and what it would cost him, when his gains had been seized from him, and handed over to the custody of the police-superintendent. He was weary too, foot-sore, and worn out with his long tramp. But neither his hunger nor fatigue pressed upon him with most bitterness. He crouched down in a corner of the cell, and thought of his mother and Bess looking out for him all Saturday, and waiting, and watching, and listening for him to open the door, and never seeing him at all ! His mother had said she would be hungrier for a sight of him than for bread ! Would they send him to jail for begging ? Boys had been sent there for three days or a week, and his mother would be fret- ting all that time. He would lose his money too, and go home as penniless as he left it. He hid his face in his hands, and wept bitterly till his tears were exhausted, and a raging hea.1 28 IN PRISON AND OUT. ache followed. At times he slumberea a little^ sobbing heavily in his short and troubled sleep. When he woke he felt the pangs of hunger sharper than usual ; for he had been nearly a night and a day without tasting food, and his hunger made him think again of his mother. Hungry, weary, and bewildered, with an aching head and a heart full of care and bitterness, David passed through the long and weary hours of the night. It was after mid-day before food was pro vided for him, and then he could not eat it. He felt sick with dread of the moment when he should be taken before the magistrate. He had seen other prisoners summoned and led away to receive their doom ; but his turn seemed long in coming. At last it came. He obeyed the call of his name, and found himself, dizzy-headed and sick at heart, standing in a large room, with a policeman beside him. There was a singing in his ears, through which he listened to the charge made against hin, and to the policeman in the witness-box giving his evidence. " Have you any thing to ray for yourself ? " A BOY'S SENTENCE. 29 asked a voice in front of him ; anil David raised his dim eyes to the face of the magis- trate, but did not answer, though his lips moved a little. " Were you begging ? " asked the magistrate again. " Yes," answered David with a violent effort ; "but I am not a thief, sir: I never stole a farthing." "Is there any previous charge against this boy ? " inquired the magistrate. A second policeman stepped into the witness- box, and David turned his dazed eyes upon him. He had never seen him before. "I have a previous charge of stealing iron against the prisoner " " It's not true ! " cried out David in a voice shrill with terror. " I never was a thief. Somebody ask my mother." " Silence !" said the officer who had him in charge, with a sh^rp grip cf his arm. "You must not interrupt the court." " He was convicted of theft before your worship six months ago," pursued the police- man in the box taking no notice of David's 30 IN PRISON AND OUT. interruption. " He went then by the name of John Benson, and was sentenced to twenty-one days." " Have you any thing more to say ? " asked the magistrate, looking again at David. " It wasn't me ! " he answered vehemently. " He's mistook me for some other boy. I never stole nothing, and I never begged afore. Yo.u ask my mother. Oh, what will become of my mother and little Bess ? " "You should have thought of your mother before you broke the laws of your country," said the magistrate. "This neighborhood is infested with beggars, and we must put a stop to the nuisance. I shall send you to jail for three calendar months, when you will be taught a trade by which you may earn an honest liveli- hood." David was hustled away, and another case called. His had occupied scarcely four minutes. The day was a busy one, as there had been a large fair held in the district ; and there was no more time to be spent upon a boy clearly guilty of begging, and who had been convicted of theft. No one doubted for a momerit this latter A BOYS SENTENCE 31 statement, or thought it in the least necessary to inquire if the boy's vehement denial had any truth in it. Another prisoner stood at the bar, and David Fell was at once forgotten. It seemed to David as if he had been suddenly struck deaf. No other sound reached his brain after he heard the words, "To jail for three months." Three months in jail ! Not to see his mother for three months ! Perhaps never to see her again ; for who could tell that she would live for three months ? I-t was only a few minutes since he heard his name called out before he was hurried into court ; but it might have been many years. He felt as if his mother might have been dead long ago ; as if it was very long ago since he left home, with her voice sounding in his ears. He seemed to hear her saying, " Go' 3 bless you, David ! " and the magistrate's voice directly following it, " I shall send you to jail for three months." His be- wildered brain kept repeating, " God biess you, Davy ! I shall send you to jail for three months." It was as if gome one was mocking him with these words, 32 IN PRISON AND OUT CHAPTER III. THE WEDDING-RING IN PAWN. NO doubt it was somebody's duty to infc rra Mrs. Fell of David's conviction, and sen- tence to three months' imprisonment ; but whether the official notice was sent to the mother of the boy who had been previously convicted of theft, or failed to reach David's mother through the post, we do not know. She never received the information. Mrs. Fell and Bess fclt the time pass heavily while he was away. The poor woman had always been more careful of her children than the neighbors were ; and she had never allowed Bess to play about the streets, if David was not at hand to t ike care of her. Bess was growing a tall and pretty girl now, an4 needed more than ever to have somebody to look after her. THE WEDDING-RING IN PAWN. 33 So she was compelled to stay in-doors, shut up in the close and tainted atmosphere and the dim light ol their miserable home. Mrs. Fell did a little washing still by stealth ; but she was fearful of the relieving-officer finding her at her tub, and taking off her allowance. She could earn only a few pence, and that with sharp pain ; but the pangs of hunger were sharper. Bess was old enough, and willing to help, though she could not earn sufficient altogether for her own maintenance. Still, if David should happen to come back with a little money to go on with, all would be well for another week or two, and some work might turn up for him. Mrs. Fell was very lonesome without her boy, and sorely did she miss him. She was one of these mothers who think nothing of their girls in comparison with their sons ; and David had always been good to her, and cheered her up when she was most downcast She fancied he was growing like his father ; and the sound of his voice or his footstep brought back the mem- ories of happier days. David had promised to be back on Saturday, but she almost expected 34 IN PRISON AND OUT. him on Friday night ; but Friday night passed by, and David was still away. During the long, sleepless hours of darkness, she was think- ing of him ceaselessly, little dreaming that her boy was spending his first night in jail. Saturday passed slowly by ; and, when even- ing came, Mrs. Fell set her door ajar, and sat just within it in the dark, looking out into the lighted passage and staircase, common to all the lodgers. David would be sure to whistle as he came down the street, and her ear would eatch the sound while he was still a long way off. She felt no hunger to-night, and was scarcely conscious of her pain. All her thoughts and cares were centred on her boy. "He'd never break his promise, Bess," she said. softly. "He knows I'm hungering for a sight of him, and, whatever luck he's had, he's sure to come home to-night. I've wished a thousand times as I'd never let him go ; but it's over now, and he shall never go again, if we can only keep him from it. We'll get more wash- ing done, you and me : won't we, Bess ? And maybe David will have better luck in getting jobs to do. O my lad, my lad ! But he'll be here very soon now." THE WEDDING-RING IN PAWN. 35 She checked the sobs which hindered her from hearing, and sat still for some minutes, listening, with strained ears, to catch his whistle amid the hubbub of sounds that noised about her. At last she sent Bess to the street-door to look up the narrow, ill-lighted street, to the corner with the brilliantly illuminated spirit- vaults, round which David might come any mo- ment with the proceeds of his begging expedi- tion. Bess had some bright visions of her own, based upon the stories of successful beggary which the neighbors told to one another ; and she was as full of impatient anticipation as her mother. "It's almost like the time I used to watch for father, Bess, before we were wed," said Mrs. Fell plaintively ; " and I was never jnore on the fidgets then than I am now for Davy, poor lad ! I can't keep myself still a moment. Father used to wear a plush weskit as was as soft as soft could be, and I'd dearly like Davy to have one like it. I priced one in a shop one day ; but it was more than I could give when I was in full work. And, Bess, I'd like you to have a pink cotton gown, such as I was wed in. $6 IN PRISON AND OUT. Rut there ! it's no use to think on such things It's God's will, and he knows best If my lad 'ud only come in, I should care for nothing." Bess went off to tHe door, stepping softly past the front room, where their next neighbor, Blackett, lived, and gazed up to the stream of light shining across the road through the tavern- window. She stood there for a few minutes in silence. "He's comin', mother," cried Bess quietly; and the poor woman's heart throbbed painfully as she leaned back against the wall almost faint from joy, whilst Bess ran eagerly up the street towards the light, which for a brief moment had irradiated the figure of her brother. But it was not David whom she met, though it was a boy of his age and size ; and Bess felt neai crying out aloud when she saw who it was. Still he was an old companion and playfellow, and as nearly a friend as Blackett's son could be; for he was Roger Blackett, whose father, living in Ae front room on the ground-floor, close against the door through which every one went to and fro, was the terror of all the in- mates cf the crowded house. THE WEDDING-RING IN PAWN. 37 "Roger, have you seen our Davy any- where ? " she inquired. " No, I haven't," he answered. " Is father in the house, Bess ? " "Ay," she said. "Then I'll stay outside," he went on. "He does nothing but bang me, and curse at me for an idle dog and a cowardly soft. He's drove the rest of 'em into thievin', and he'll never let me a-be till he's drove me to it I was very near it to-night, Bess." "Oh, don't!" she cried, "don't! I'd never do worse than beg, if I was you. I know David 'ud die afore he'd steal, and so 'ud mother. We'd all clem to death afore we'd take to thievin'." " I'd have been drove to it long ago," said Roger, " if it hadn't been along of you and your mother, Bess. Father's always larfin' at folks like you settin' up to be honest ; and he's always sayin' as I haven't got a drop of real blood in me. I'm bound to be drove to it, however long I fight shy of it. Only it 'ud vei you, Bess." "Ah!" she answered earnestly, " mother 'ud 38 IN PRISON AND OUT. never, never let David or me speak to you again. She's set dead agen thievin', mother is. She won't let us know auy jail-birds. You see," continued Bess with an air of pride, "none of us has ever been in trouble, up before the justices, you know. We've never had nothink to do with the police, 'cept civility ; and the police has nothink to do with us. Better starve nor steal, mother says." But Bess had been so long in the street, that Mrs. Fell's impatience had conquered her. She had crept to the street-door, and was making her way painfully towards them. "Bess, is it Davy?" she called. "Be sharp, and bring him here." " We're coming, mother," cried Bess. " It's only Roger. You go back, and let him come into our room for a bit, for company. You come with me, Roger, and talk a bit to mother : she's frettin' after Davy so ! You ask her about the parson's garden, and the place where she used to live, and any thing you can think of, for a bit. till Davy comes." The t ivo children stole softly past the closed door of the front room, and hid themselves in the darkness of Mrs. Fell's kitchen. THE WEDDING-RING IN PAWN. 39 "It's nobody but poor Roger," said Bess softly, " Davy's not come yet, and Roger's afeard of his father till he gets dead drunk. Let him stay with us a bit, mother." There had always been a dread in Mrs. Fell's mind of her children growing too intimate with Roger Blackett, whose two elder brothers were openly pursuing the successful calling of. thieves, with occasional periods of absence supposed to be passed in prison ; but she had been too much afraid of Blackett to forbid all intercourse with his sons. Roger was nearly fourteen, and had not been in trouble yet ; so she could not very well refuse to let him enter her room. "He's welcome," she said coldly, "as long as he keeps himself honest." " That won't be for long," muttered Roger : "father's always a-goin' on with me to keep myself, and I've got no way o' keepin' myself, save thievin'. He's getting angrier with me every day." "But there's God'll be angry with you if you thieve," said Mrs. Fell; "and, if you make him angry, he can do worse at you than your father. You ought to be afeard of him." 4O IN PRISON AND OUT. " Where is he ? " asked Roger. "He lives in heaven, where good folks go when they die," she answered; "but he sees every thing, and can do every thing. Every thing as happens is just what he pleases. He could make us all rich and well and happy in a moment o' time, if he chose: but it's his will we should be poor and ill and miserable, and it's all right somehow; so we must keep still, and believe as it's all right. I know I often says, 'It's God's will,' and it seems a little better. But what I was going to tell you is, that God won't ever have thieves in heaven. There's a great pit somewhere, full of fire and brimstone, where all wicked folks go ; and, if you thieve, you'll go there. I don't know ex- actly where it is, or how it is; but it's all gospel, they say. It's worse than hundreds of jails." The woman's low, weak, faltering voice, uttering these terrible words in the darkness, made Roger's heart shrink with a strange awe and dread. He was glad to feel Bess close beside him, and to know that she was listening as well 'as himself. "God's* worse than father," he said, trem bling. THE WEDDING-RING IN PAWN. 4! " No, no," continued Mrs. Fell. " I've heard talks preachin' in the streets, and some among 'em said he loxes us all somehow. I heard one of 'em saying over and over again, ' God is love.' 'And he'd some little tickets, about as big as pawn-tickets, with those words printed plain on 'em, and he gave one to everybody as asked him. I s'pose there's some truth in it. ' God is love,' I say to myself hundreds o' times in the night, when I lie awake for pain ; and there's comfort in it. Ay, when my pains are worst, and when I'm faintin' with hunger, if I say, ' God is love,' it helps me on a bit. It's all I know, and I don't know that very clear." " Do God love everybody ? " inquired Roger anxiously. " Yes," she answered. " Do he love father ? " he asked again. "Yes, I s'pose so," she said in a tone of doubt. " Then I don't think much of God," went on Roger. " He didn't ought to love father. He ought to put him in that pit o' fire and brim- stcne; for he's a thief, and he wants to make me a tlief. And, if he loved any on us, ne'd 42 IN PRISON AND OUT. let us be drove to thievin' and beggin* Fo^ks say as Davy's gone a-beggin'- No : God loves rich folks maybe ; but he don't care a rush for poor folks." "I can't tell how it is," moaned Mrs. Fell: " only it's a comfort to me to say, ' God is love,' and make believe it's true. And my Davy'll never be a thief, Roger, never! If folks do say he's gone a-beggin', they can't say worse of him. Ah, I wish he'd only come ! " But though she and Bess sat up till long after midnight, and until every inmate of the overcrowded tenement had returned to their miserable dens, and there was not a sound to drown the echo of any footstep coming down the street, there was still no sign of David's coming. Bess fell asleep at last on the floor at her mother's feet ; but she kept awake, shiver- ing with cold and pain, and heart-sick with vague terrors as to what should keep the boy away. As day after day passed on, bringing no tidings of David, the mother's anguish of soul grew almost into.erable. It seemed to over- master her bodily pain, and render her nearly THE WEDDING-RING IN PAWN. 43 insensible to it. Every morning she wandered about, asking news of her boy from everybody who had eve/ known him, until her strength was worn out ; and then she would stand for hours, leaning against the wall at the street- corner, looking along the road, and straining her eyes to catch some glimpse of him amid the ever-changing stream of people passing by. She could no longer bring herself to stand at her washing-tub, cheating the parish by earning a few extra pence for herself by the toil of her hands. Little by little, all that was left of her few possessions found their way to the familiar pawn-shop, till her room was as bare of furni- ture as it was possible to be, and yet be a human dwelling-place. There was one treasure she had never parted with, however pressing and bitter her necessi- ties had been through her long years of widow- hood. It was the one possession which had been the pride of her heart. This was her wedding-ring, of good solid gold, bought for her and placed upon her hand by the husband she had lost twelve years ago. She had been too cai sf ul of it to wear it while at work ; but 44 IN PRISON AND OUT. every evening and every Sunday her children had been used to see the golden glitter of it on her finger, and to regard it with a sort of rever ential delight. It was the visible sign to them of their dead father, and of the good times their mother could tell them of, but which they had not known themselves. They had gone to bed many a night supperless that they might keep the mother's ring from the pawn-shop, and run no risk of losing it. But things had come to such a pass during David's absence that the ring must go. It was still little worn, not much thinner than when David Fell, the carpenter, had wedded his young wife with it. Next to any grief or calamity befalling her children, this was the sharpest trial Mrs. Fell could undergo. Bess helped her to crawl to the pawnbroker's shop, for she would not trust it even to Bess, and she laid it down on the counter with a pang nearly heart-breaking. The pawnbroker fastened a number to it, gave her a ticket, and pushed a few shillings towards her. "Take care of it! " she cried, with vehement jrgency in her tone ; " take care of it. I shall THE WDDING-RING IN PAWN. 45 redeem it : God in heaven knows I shall redeem it some day. It's God's will ! " she sobbed, her dim, eager eyes following it as the pawnbroker opened a drawer, and dropped it carelessly among a heap of pledges similar to it 46 IN PRISON AMD OUT. CHAPTER IV OLD EUCLID'S HOARD. AS Mrs. Fell, leaning heavily on the arm of Bess, crept homeward, after her sor rowful visit to the pawnbroker, they saw an old man, one of their neighbors, making his way, with a shambling and limping tread, along the uneven pavement before them. The lamps were lit down the narrow and dirty street, and the light fell on the dingy figure of the old man as he passed under them with his stooping shoulders and his long, rugged locks of gray hair falling below his battered and broken hat, round which still clung a little band of black material that had not become quite brown with rain and sunshine. He was a small man, and seemed to have withered and shrunk into a more meagre thinness than when his clothes OLD EUCLID S HOARD. 47 had been bought, now many years ago. The face under the battered hat was of a yellow brownness, and much wrinkled, with shaggy eyebrows hanging over his eyes. There was a gleam in these dim and sunken eyes, as if it was possible for him to smile; but the possi- bility seldom became a fact. He looked half asleep as he shuffled along; and in a low, husky voice he was dreamily crying "Cresses," but not at all as though he expected any one of his neighbors to spend a penny on his perishable stock. " There's poor old Euclid ! " said Mrs. Fell in a tone of pity, as if she was looking at one whose circumstances were as bad, if not worse, than her own. The old man's baptismal name was Euclid, his surname Jones ; but in the multitude of Joneses his surname had long been lost, and was almost forgotten. He was the son of a village schoolmaster in some quiet spot in Wales, who had called his only child Euclid, with a vague and distant hope of seeing him some day a distinguished mathematical scholar. But the schoolmaster and his wife had both 48 IN PRISON AND OUT. died before little Euclid had fairly mastered the alphabet, and from that time he had lived among the neighbors, now with one and noW with another, passing from cottage to cottage, until he was old enough to scare crows and tend pigs. Little learning did Euclid get at these early employments. In course of time he drifted up to London, where he worked on the roads till he was disabled by an accident. He had married a wife, who bore him eight children, born and bred under every chance against health and life, and dying, all but one, just as they grew old enough to do something for themselves, after they had tested their father's love and endurance to the utmost. His wife was dead also. He had buried them all in their own coffins, unassisted by the parish, a remembrance which stirred up his downcast heart with a feeling of honest pride whenever it crossed his brain. Life had brought to Euclid an enigma to solve, stiffer and more intricate than the most abstruse mathematical problem, how to keep himself and his off the parish during life and how to get buried, when all was over, w thout OLD EUCLID S HOARD. 49 the same dreaded and degrading aid. The problem was but partially solved yet: there still remained his youngest child and himself to die and be buried. Euclid turned in at the same door as that to which Mrs. Fell was painfully creeping. He lived in the one attic of the house, having the advantage over Mrs. Fell in more light and fresher air, and in the quietness of a story to himself ; but he possessed few other advan- tages. His household goods were as poor as hers had been before all that was worth pawn- ing had gone to the pawn-shop. The fireplace consisted of three bars of iron let into the chimney, with a brick on each side for a hob, on one of which stood a browb earthenware teapot simmering at the spout, as if the tea had been boiling for some time. There was a bed on the floor close by the handful of fire, and Euclid's first glance fell upon it ; but it was empty, for a sickly-looking girl of eighteen was sitting on a broken chair before the fire, cowering over it with outstretched hands. She had wrapped herself in an old shawl, and was holding it tightly about her, as though she felt the chill 5O IN PRISON AND OUT. ot the November evening; but she smiied brightly when the old man's wrinkled face and dim eyes met her gaze, as he stood in the door- way an instant, looking anxk/usly and sadly at her. "Come in, daddy, and shut the door," she said cheerfully. " I'm not bad to-day ; but you're late, later than ever. It's gone six, and I thought you would never, never come." " Folks did not care to buy creases this cold day," he answered, his husky voice striving to soften itself into tenderness ; " but, Victoria, my dear, you've not waited tea for me ? " "I should think I have," she said, rising from the only chair, and compelling him with all her little strength to sit down on it, while she took an old box for her seat. " I couldn't relish the best o' tea alone at this time o' night, and you in the streets, daddy. So we'll have it at once ; for it's been made, oh ! hours ago, at least, it's near an hour by the clock. That clock's real company to me, father," she added, looking proudly at a little loud-ticking clock against the wall, which seemed the best and busiest thing in the bare room. OLD EUCLID'S HOARD. 51 " I ain't got no 'erring for you, Victoria, he said regretfully, " nor nothing else for a relish, nothing save a few creases, and they'd be too cold for your stomach, my dear. If you feel set on any thing, I'll take a penny or two from our little store, you know. It's all quite safe : isn't it, my dear ? " "Yes, yes," she answered, a shadow flitting across her face for a moment ; " you needn't never be afeard of that not being safe. I'm not set on any think, daddy." "How much is it now, Victoria?" he in- quired, his eyes glistening a little as he listened eagerly to her reply. "It's two pound, sixteen shilling, and nine- pence three farthings," she answered without hesitation. "I take good care of it." " I think we shall do it, Victoria," he said, with an air of satisfaction ; " and after that, my dear, there will be nobody but me ; and I'm not afeard but I'll save enough for that. No, no : I shouldn't like any on us to die like a scamp upon the parish, and be buried in a parish coffin." Victoria had been reaching down the two 52 IN PRISON AND OUT. cracked cups and the loaf of bread from a corner cupboard; and now she stood for a moment looking wistfully into the fire, her pale, thin face flushed a little into almost delicate beauty. Under the pillow on which she rested her head every night, and on which it lay many a long hour of the wearyful day, there was always hidden a precious little store of money, slowly accumulating by a few pence at a time, the fund that was to pay for her own coffin, and the other costs of her own poor funeral. She had made a shroud of coarse calico for her- self, and kept it carefully ready against the tine it would be needed. There was no question in her mind, or her father's, that this fund would be needed probably before the next summer came. Her doctor, who was a druggist living- in the next street, assured her that good living and better clothing and warmer lodging were all she needed; but he might as ivell have ordered her to the south of France for ae winter. It was Euclid's chief anxiety now tnat the sum should grow as fast as possible, lest an unusually severe winter might hasten on the necessity for it. And to Victoria it OLD EUCLID S HOARD. $3 matter of as much interest and care as to him, so often did she reckon up the cost of a coffin and a grave, and count over the money pro- vided to procure them for her. She thought of it again as she stood looking into the fire, and saw as vividly and fleetly as a flash of lightning her own funeral passing down the narrow, common staircase, the children trooping after it, but only her old and weeping father follow- ing as mourner. She stooped down, and kissed him, as if to comfort him beforehand for the grief that was to come.. " Is any think ailin* you, Victoria ? " he in- quired in as gentle a tone as he could lower his voice to. "Nothin 1 fresh, daddy," she answered: "only you'll be lonesome when I'm gone." "Ay, ay," said Euclid. " It'll be a dark shop wi'out you, my dear." He said no more, but sat slowly rubbing his legs up and down before the fire, while his memory travelled back over the twenty-five years that had passed since he was a strong man, able and willLig to work hard and to live hard for the sake of his wife and children. 54 IN PRISON AND OUT. Victoria saw him counting his children or. hii fingers, as he huskily muttered their nai.ies. He seemed to see them all, his boys and girls, who were gone out of this troublesome world down into the dark secret of the grave : they were all living in his memory, and his wife, too, who had trodden the same strange yet familiar road eighteen years ago. He had buried them all, and had never once taken a penny from the parish. His withered face lit up as the thought crossed his mind. "Victoria," he said, as if this recollection had reminded him of Mrs. Fell, " there's a mort o' trouble downstairs in the ground-floor back. There's Mrs. Fell as bad off or worse than us, though she do take parish pay. There's no luck in parish money, I know ; but she's dead beat, I s'pose. I saw her comin' back from the pawn-shop, and she looked like death. There's her boy David away, and nobody knows where he's gone to, and she's almost heart- broke. I ook the liberty o' noticin', and there's not a scrap o' fire in their room. So, Victoria, my dear, if you didn't mind it, we might aik her up here a bit when we've done our tea OLD EUCLID S HOARD. 55 There's not enough for all, or we'd ask her to come up for her tea. But she's got no fire, and we have ; and four of us will be warmer than two, if you didn't mind it." "Mind it, daddy?" repeated Victoria. "I'd be right glad if she'll come." Many a time had Victoria glanced longingly into Mrs. Fell's room as she passed the door, and wished she would call out, and invite her in. But Mrs. Fell had felt herself in a superior position to Euclid, a laundress being surely of a higher social standing than a water-cress- seller, to say nothing of living on the ground- floor instead of the attic, and she had taken but little notice of Euclid's girl amid the con- stantly changing members who inhabited the house. Bess was better known to Victoria; and David had many a time shown himself friendly, and run errands for her when she was too poorly to go out herself. To-night she could not swallow a morsel after her father's suggestion. As soon as tea was over, and the cups and teapot put away, with every token of their poor meal, Euclid went downstairs to ) his invitatior in person, whilst Victoria 56 m PRISON AND OUT. arranged n empty box or two to serve as seati about the fire, upon which she put another tiny shovelful of coals. Her color came and went fitfully as she heard Mrs. Fell's slow footstep mounting the steps leading to their- attic, fol- lowed by her fathei and Bess ; and she received them shyly, but gladly, at the door. " It's very kind on you and Mr. Euclid, I'm sure," panted Mrs. Fell, with the ghost of a smile on her face, "and I take it neighborly; and if there's any thing as me and Bess can do" "Please come and sit down in the chair," said Victoria, interrupting her easily ; for she was still struggling for breath. She was soon seated in the chair, which was placed in front of the fire ; whilst Euclid sat on one side on an old box, with Bess and Victoria opposite on another. The flickering flame of the small fire shone upon their faces, and was the only light by which they saw each other. But in a fevr minutes they felt almost like old friends. " She's the last I've got," said old Euclid to Mrs. Fell, nodding at Victoria, who was talking to B;ss " Her mother died on her, when sbe OLD EUCLID S HOARD. 57 urere bom eighteen years ago. She were too weak to get the better on it, and she had to ga I'd five little children when she died. Victoria's got her complaint," he went on, in a lower tone, * and she's the last out o' eight on them. Boys ffid gals, they're all gone afore me." "It's His will as knows best, Mr. Euclid," said Mrs. Fell, with a heavy sigh. " I s'pose it is," replied Euclid. " I hope He knows ; for I'm sure I don't. I've had no time for thinkin' of nothink but how to keep off the parish. Not as I'd say a word agen a woman takin' parish pay, a poor weakly woman like you. But it 'ud be a sore disgrace for a man to come on the parish even for his buryin'." Mrs. Fell sighed again, and sat looking into the red embers of the fire sadly, as if she was seeing again the bright days of her married life. "I never lost nobody, save my poor David, my husband, I mean," she said ; "and by good luck he were in a buryin' club, and they gave him a very good funeral, a hearse, and a mournin'-coach for me and the two children, arid plumes ! But there'll be nobody save the parish to bury me ; for Bess is only a child, and David's gone " $8 IN PRISON AND OUT. "Where's he gone to ?" asked Victoria. "He went out on a little journey nigh upon a month ago," she answered ; " and we've never heard a word of him since he said ' Good-by, mother.' He's never come back again. Some- Ihink's happened to him, I know; for he's always that good to me and Bess, you couldn't think! I'm frettin' after him all the while more than I can tell : it's wastin' me away But it's God's will, as good folks say ; and there's none on us as can fight agen him." "And Bess says you've been forced to part wi' your weddin' ring," Victoria replied, with a shy look of sympathy. The tears welled up into Mrs. Fell's eyes, and Bess bowed her head in shame. For the first evening in her life, when she had no work to do, the poor woman felt that her finger had lost its precious sign of her married life. She might almost as well have been an unmarried woman, one of those wretched creatures on whom she had always looked down with honest pride and a little hardness. She laid her right hand over her \indecorated finger, and looked back into Victoria's sympathizing face with an expressior of bitter grief. OLD EUCLID S HOARD. 59 "I'll work till I drop to get it back," cried Bess, with energy. " I wish my missis were alive now," said Euclid. " I'm always a-wishin' it ; but she were a good woman, and she knew sum mat more about God than most folks, and about Him as died for us. I never was a scholar ; but she could read, ay, splendid ! and she knew a mort o' things. She taught me a lot, and I remembered them long enough to teach Victo- ria some of 'em. Victoria, my dear, there's them verses as was your mother's favorites, them as I taught you when you was little. I've forgot 'em myself, Mrs. Fell ; but she's got them all right and straight in her head, and she says them back to me now my memory's gone. Sometimes I think it's her mother a sayin' of 'em. 'The Lord,' you know, my dear." Victoria's face flushed again, and her voice trembled a little as she began to speak, whilst Bess fastened her dark eyes eagerly upon her ; and Euclid and Mrs. Fell, with their careworn and withered faces turned straight to the fire, nodded their heads at the close of each verse, as if uttering a silent "Amen." 6O IN PRISON AND OUT. " The Lord is my shepherd : I shall not want " He maketh me to lie down in green pas- tures ; he leadeth me beside the still waters. " He restoreth my soul ; he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake. "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil ; for thou art with me : thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. "Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies; thou anointest my head with oil : my cup runneth over. " Surely goodness and me - cy shall follow me all the days of my life ; and ' wUl dwell in the house of the Lord forever." LESSONS IN PRISON. 6l CHAPTER V. LESSONS IN PRISON. IT was quite dark at night when the p: ison van containing David and other convicted offenders reached the jail to which they were committed. As yet he was still feeling be- wildered and confused ; and the sound of heavy doors clanging after him as he passed through them, and the long, narrow passages along which he was led, only served to heighten his perplexity. He had hardly ever been within walls except those of the poor house which had been his home as long as he could remember, and the prison appeared immeasurably large as he dragged his weary footsteps along the stone flagging of the corridors. The spotless cleanli- ness of both floor and walls seemed also to re- move him altogether out of the world with 62 IN PRISON AND OUT. which he was acquainted. The dirt and squalor of the old jails would have been more home- like to him. By the time his hair had been cropped close to his head, and the prison-garb put upon him in the place of his own familiar clothes, stained and tattered with long wear of them, he began to doubt his own identity. Was he really David Fell ? Could he be the boy who had hitherto led the freest life possible, roaming about the busy streets, with no person to forbid or to question him ? David Fell could not be he who was now locked up quite alone in a little cell, dimly lighted by a gas : jet, which it- self was locked up in a cage lest he should touch it Not a sound came to his ears, let him listen as sharply as he could. Where was the old roll and roar of the streets, and the cries of children, and the shrill voices of women, and the din and tumult, and stir and life, to which he was accus- tomed ? No dream as dreadful as this silence and solitude had ever visited him. For a long while he could not go to sleep, though his previous night in the police-station had been one of wakefulness. His hammock was comfortable, more comfortable than any .LESSONS IN PRISON. 63 bed he had ever slept on, and his prison-rug was warm ; but the very comfort and warmth brought his mother to his mind, his mother and little Bess. What were they doing now ? Were they shivering on their hard mattress, under their threadbare counterpane, which was all that was left to them to keep out the night's chill ? Perhaps they were looking out for him. What day was it? Was it not Saturday to- day ? And he had promised to be home on Saturday ! Oh, how different it would all have been if he had only escaped being caught ! He would have been at home by this time ; and they could have had a bit of fire in the grate, and some- thing to make a feast of as they sat round it, whilst he told the story of his wanderings, and tried to describe all the rich, good folks who had been kind to him. Or if the magis- trate had taken away all the money, and let him go home on his promise never to go begging again, even that would have been nothing to this trouble. He fancied he could see his mother's face, pale yet smiling, as she listened to his danger, and his escape from it ; and Bess, sit- 64 IN PRISON AND OUT. ting on the floor, with shining eyes and clasped hands, hearkening eagerly to every word. Why had they sent him to jail ? At last he sobbed himself to sleep; but all through the night might be heard, if there was any ear to hear, the heavy, deep-drawn sob of the boy's over- , whelmed heart. He was awakened early in the morning, and briefly told what he must do before quitting his cell. Then he ate his breakfast alone in the dreary solitude of the prison-walls, and the food almost choked him. It seemed to the boy, used to the wild, utter freedom of the streets, as if his very limbs were fettered, and that he could not move either hand or foot freely. His body did not seem to belong to himself any longer. Hewas neither hungry nor cold, as he might have been at home ; but his head ached, and his heart was sore with thoughts of his mother. He was unutterably sick and sad. Cold and hun- ger were almost like familiar friends to him ; but he did not know this faintness and heavi- ness, this numbness which kept him chained to the prison-seat, and made it appear an impossi- bility that a day or two ago he was rambling LESSONS IN PRISON. 65 abovt as long as he pleased, and where he pleased, in the wide, free world, outside the prison-walls. Were there any boys like him still running and leaping and shouting out yonder in the autumn sunshine? It was Sunday morning, and he was left longer than usual to himself. He was taken to the chapel, and sat in his place during the reading of the prayers and the sermon which followed ; but not a word penetrated to his bewildered brain. It was much the same on the week-day when he went to school. He knew a little both of reading and writing ; but he could not control his attention to make use of what he knew. He said the alphabet stupid- ly, and wrote his first copy of straight lines badly. He could not bring himself to think of these things. His mind was wandering sadly round the central thought that he was in jail, and what would become of his mother and little Bess -without him. David waj naturally a bright boy, active in mind and body; but he was crushed by the sudden zit