out o' Lewes with her stockin's round her heels, an' she never made nor
mended aught till she died. _He_ had to light fire an' get breakfast
every mornin' except Sundays, while she sowed it abed. Then she took an'
died, sixteen, seventeen, year back; but she never had no childern.'

'They was valley-folk,' said Jabez apologetically. 'I'd no call to go in
among 'em, but I always allowed Mary--'

'No. Mary come out o' one o' those Lunnon Childern Societies. After his
woman died, Jim got his mother back from his sister over to Peasmarsh,
which she'd gone to house with when Jim married. His mother kept house
for Jim after his woman died. They do say 'twas his mother led him on
toward adoptin' of Mary--to furnish out the house with a child, like,
and to keep him off of gettin' a noo woman. He mostly done what his
mother contrived. 'Cardenly, twixt 'em, they asked for a child from one
o' those Lunnon societies--same as it might ha' been these Barnardo
children--an' Mary was sent down to 'em, in a candle-box, I've heard.'

'Then Mary is chance-born. I never knowed that,' said Jabez. 'Yet I must
ha' heard it some time or other ...'

'No. She ain't. 'Twould ha' been better for some folk if she had been.
She come to Jim in a candle-box with all the proper papers--lawful child
o' some couple in Lunnon somewheres--mother dead, father drinkin'.
_And_ there was that Lunnon society's five shillin's a week for her.
Jim's mother she wouldn't despise week-end money, but I never heard Jim
was much of a muck-grubber. Let be how 'twill, they two mothered up Mary
no bounds, till it looked at last like they'd forgot she wasn't their
own flesh an' blood. Yes, I reckon they forgot Mary wasn't their'n
by rights.'