h it would shock the
delicate feelings of these _charitable_ ladies to hear named.

But we are forgetting the shop. Well, we continued to watch it, and
every day showed too clearly the increasing poverty of its inmates. The
children were clean, it is true, but their clothes were threadbare and
shabby; no tenant had been procured for the upper part of the house, from
the letting of which, a portion of the means of paying the rent was to
have been derived, and a slow, wasting consumption prevented the eldest
girl from continuing her exertions. Quarter-day arrived. The landlord
had suffered from the extravagance of his last tenant, and he had no
compassion for the struggles of his successor; he put in an execution.
As we passed one morning, the broker's men were removing the little
furniture there was in the house, and a newly-posted bill informed us it
was again 'To Let.' What became of the last tenant we never could learn;
we believe the girl is past all suffering, and beyond all sorrow. God
help her! We hope she is.

We were somewhat curious to ascertain what would be the next stage--for
that the place had no chance of succeeding now, was perfectly clear. The
bill was soon taken down, and some alterations were being made in the
interior of the shop. We were in a fever of expectation; we exhausted
conjecture--we imagined all possible trades, none of which were perfectly
reconcilable with our idea of the gradual decay of the tenement. It
opened, and we wondered why we had not guessed at the real state of the
case before. The shop--not a large one at the best of times--had been
converted into two: one was a bonnet-shape maker's, the other was opened
by a tobacconist, who also dealt in walking-sticks and Sunday newspapers;
the two were separated by a thin partition, covered with tawdry striped
paper.

The tobacconist remained in possession longer than any tenant within our
recollection. He was a red-faced, impudent, good-for-nothing dog,
evidently accustomed to take things as they came, and to make the best of
a bad job. He sold as many cigars as he could, and smoked the rest. He
occupied the shop as long as he could make peace with the landlord, and
when he could no longer live in quiet, he very coolly locked the door,
and bolted himself. From this period, the two little dens have undergone
innumerable changes. The tobacconist was succeeded by a theatrical
hair-dresser, who ornamented the window with a gr