"I'm English," I said.

"Just so. And edyucated, I dare say?"

"I suppose so."

"Ye've not forgiven me that I wronged the old lady? Indeed, but I ask
your pardon, and hers no less. It's not for the best of us to sit in
judgment on the erring, as my mother has often said to me, unless it
comes in the plain path of duty. But maybe your own temper would be a
bit soored if your head was as light and your heart as sick as mine with
starvation and hope deferred--"

"Are you hungry?" I interrupted.

"I'll not be sorry when we get a meal."

"What have you had to-day?" I asked.

"I've been in the dock all day," he answered evasively, "but I'm no
great eater at the best of times, and I chewed two bits of orange-peel,
not to speak of a handful of corn where there was a big heap had been
spilt by some wasteful body or another, that had small thoughts of it's
coming to use. Now hoo in this world's a man to make honest profit on a
commodity he entrusts--"

"Sh! sh! You're raising your voice again," said I. "Where's your hand?
It's only a cake, but it'll be better than nothing." And I held out the
cake Biddy had made me put in my pocket.