remembrancers of projects and hopes and disappointments. For many
months now every visit had been with heavier heart; his tap at the
Hewetts' door had a melancholy sound to him.

A woman's voice bade him enter. He stepped into a room which was not
disorderly or unclean, but presented the chill discomfort of poverty.
The principal, almost the only, articles of furniture were a large bed,
a wash-hand stand; a kitchen table, and two or three chairs, of which
the cane seats were bulged and torn. A few meaningless pictures hung
here and there, and on the mantel-piece, which sloped forward somewhat,
stood some paltry ornaments, secured in their places by a piece of
string stretched in front of them. The living occupants were four
children and their mother. Two little girls, six and seven years old
respectively, were on the floor near the fire; a boy of four was
playing with pieces of fire-wood at the table. The remaining child was
an infant, born but a fortnight ago, lying at its mother's breast. Mrs.
Hewett sat on the bed, and bent forward in an attitude of physical
weakness. Her age was twenty-seven, but she looked several years older.
At nineteen she had married; her husband, John Hewett, having two
children by a previous union. Her face could never have been very
attractive, but it was good-natured, and wore its pleasantest aspect as
she smiled on Sidney's entrance. You would have classed her at once
with those feeble-willed, weak-minded, yet kindly-disposed women, who
are only too ready to meet affliction half-way, and who, if
circumstances be calamitous, are more harmful than an enemy to those
they hold dear. She was rather wrapped up than dressed, and her hair,
thin and pale-coloured, was tied in a ragged knot. She wore slippers,
the upper parts of which still adhered to the soles only by miracle. It
looked very much as if the same relation subsisted between her frame
and the life that informed it, for there was no blood in her cheeks, no
lustre in her eye. The baby at her bosom moaned in the act of sucking;
one knew not how the poor woman could supply sustenance to another
being.

The children were not dirty nor uncared for, but their clothing hung
very loosely upon them; their flesh was unhealthy, their voices had an
unnatural sound.

Sidney stepped up to the bed and gave his hand.

'I'm so glad you've come before Clara,' said Mrs. Hewett. 'I hoped you
would. But she can't be long, an' I want to speak to you firs