ight, fled to her for comfort, and the girl who had lost her
place, or to whom worse misfortune had come, told her story to the
big-hearted sinner, who nodded and cried and said, "It's the Widdy
Maloney that'll see you're not put upon more. Hold on an' be aisy,
honey, an' all'll come out the way you'd be havin' it, an' why not?"

It was at this stage of experience that Mrs. Maloney decided to remove
to the Big Flat. The last raid of Dennis, the youngest and only boy not
housed at the expense of the State, had reduced her belongings to their
lowest terms, and she took possession of her new quarters, accompanied
only by a rickety table, three chairs, a bed with two old straw
mattresses, and some quilts too ragged to give any token of their
original characteristics, a stove which owned but one leg,--the rest
being supplied by bricks,--and such dishes and other small furniture as
could be carried in a basket. But there went with her a girl kicked out
by the last man who had temporarily called her his mistress,--a mere
child still, who at ten had begun work in a bag-factory passing through
various grades of slightly higher employment, till seduced by the
floor-walker of the store that it had been her highest ambition to
reach. Almost as much her fault as his undoubtedly, her silly head
holding but one desire, that for fine clothes and never to work any
more, but a woman's heart waking in her when the baby came, and
prompting her to harder work and better life than she had ever known.
There was no chance of either with the baby, and when at last she farmed
out the encumbrance to an old couple in a back building who made this
their business, and took a place again in the store, it was relief as
well as sorrow that came when the wretched little life was over. But the
descent had been a swift one. When what she had called life was quite
over, and she sat dumb and despairing in the doorway to which she had
been thrust, thinking of the river as the last refuge left, the widow
had pushed her before her up the stairs and said,--

"Poor sowl, if there's none to look out for ye, then who but me should
do it?"

This was the companion who lay by her side under the ragged quilts, life
still refusing to give place to death, though every paroxysm of coughing
shortened the conflict.

"She's that patient that the saints themselves--all glory to their
blessed names!--couldn't be more so; but I'd not know how to manage if
it wasn't for the