place where the fire ought to have been, was an old 'ooman--the
ugliest and dirtiest I ever see--who sat rocking herself backwards
and forwards, backwards and forwards, without once stopping, except
for an instant now and then, to clasp together the withered hands
which, with these exceptions, she kept constantly rubbing upon her
knees, just raising and depressing her fingers convulsively, in
time to the rocking of the chair. On the other side sat the mother
with an infant in her arms, which cried till it cried itself to
sleep, and when it 'woke, cried till it cried itself off again.
The old 'ooman's voice I never heard: she seemed completely
stupefied; and as to the mother's, it would have been better if she
had been so too, for misery had changed her to a devil. If you had
heard how she cursed the little naked children as was rolling on
the floor, and seen how savagely she struck the infant when it
cried with hunger, you'd have shuddered as much as I did. There
they remained all the time: the children ate a morsel of bread
once or twice, and I gave 'em best part of the dinners my missis
brought me, but the woman ate nothing; they never even laid on the
bedstead, nor was the room swept or cleaned all the time. The
neighbours were all too poor themselves to take any notice of 'em,
but from what I could make out from the abuse of the woman up-
stairs, it seemed the husband had been transported a few weeks
before. When the time was up, the landlord and old Fixem too, got
rather frightened about the family, and so they made a stir about
it, and had 'em taken to the workhouse. They sent the sick couch
for the old 'ooman, and Simmons took the children away at night.
The old 'ooman went into the infirmary, and very soon died. The
children are all in the house to this day, and very comfortable
they are in comparison. As to the mother, there was no taming her
at all. She had been a quiet, hard-working woman, I believe, but