nothing," muttered he, and fell back;
and my poor wife and I walked out of the court, and back to our dismal
room in the prison.

It was a hard place for a gentle creature like her to be confined in; and
I longed to have some of my relatives with her when her time should come.
But her grandmother could not leave the old lieutenant; and my mother had
written to say that, as Mrs. Hoggarty was with us, she was quite as well
at home with her children. "What a blessing it is for you, under your
misfortunes," continued the good soul, "to have the generous purse of
your aunt for succour!" Generous purse of my aunt, indeed! Where could
Mrs. Hoggarty be? It was evident that she had not written to any of her
friends in the country, nor gone thither, as she threatened.

But as my mother had already lost so much money through my unfortunate
luck, and as she had enough to do with her little pittance to keep my
sisters at home; and as, on hearing of my condition, she would infallibly
have sold her last gown to bring me aid, Mary and I agreed that we would
not let her know what our real condition was--bad enough! Heaven knows,
and sad and cheerless. Old Lieutenant Smith had likewise nothing but his
half-pay and his rheumatism; so we were, in fact, quite friendless.

That period of my life, and that horrible prison, seem to me like
recollections of some fever. What an awful place!--not for the sadness,
strangely enough, as I thought, but for the gaiety of it; for the long
prison galleries were, I remember, full of life and a sort of grave
bustle. All day and all night doors were clapping to and fro; and you
heard loud voices, oaths, footsteps, and laughter. Next door to our room
was one where a man sold gin, under the name of _tape_; and here, from
morning till night, the people kept up a horrible revelry;--and sang--sad
songs some of them: but my dear little girl was, thank God! unable to
understand the most part of their ribaldry. She never used to go out
till nightfall; and all day she sat working at a little store of caps and
dresses for the expected stranger--and not, she says to this day,
unhappy. But the confinement sickened her, who had been used to happy
country air, and she grew daily paler and paler.

The Fives Court was opposite our window; and here I used, very
unwillingly at first, but afterwards, I do confess, with much eagerness,
to take a couple of hours' daily sport. Ah! it was a strange place.
There was