r is doing
what is right."

"Yes, if he works at an honest livelihood."

"Don't talk so loud about _honesty_; the very word is enough to make
people suspect something not right. I'll tell you all when you come up
to my house; for you see, Jack, you must help me to carry these things
up. D'ye think you can manage this bag of pease? Let's try." Between us
we contrived to get the bag, which weighed about half a hundredweight,
on my back, and I walked off with it, Grumble following me with the
copper and the other small bag, which I afterward found contained copper
nails. When we arrived at his dwelling, which was as dilapidated and
miserable as old Nanny's, he took out his key and fumbled a long while
at the lock; at last he opened it. "You had better stay till I get a
light," said he. In a minute he came with one to the door, and told me
to follow him. I went in, put down the bag, and, some grains falling
out, I took them up.

"Why, this is coffee, Grumble!"

"Well, _pease_ is our name for coffee, _sand_ for sugar, and _vinegar_
for rum, when we get any."

"Well, but, Grumble, I wish to know how you came by these things?"

"I'll tell you, Jack, if you ask everybody how they come by things, you
will have enough to do; but the fact is, the man wants me to sell them
for him."

"Why, you said he gave them to you out of charity!"

"Oh, that was only because I couldn't spare breath to tell you all about
it."

"But why should he lower them down in the dark, if they are his own
property?"

"Jack, I don't ask whose property it is; all I know is that I come by
it honestly. I don't steal it, and I can't prove that the man does. Why,
Jack, if one is to be so nice as that, you can't go into a grocer's shop
to buy sugar, or coffee, or pepper, or indeed into almost any shop, if
you first want to know whether the people have come by the goods
honestly before you buy of them."

"Still, it is so plain that the man must have stolen them."

"Suppose it is; how are so many poor people to find their livelihood and
support their families, if they refuse to get a shilling or two when it
is offered? If we were only to live upon what we get honestly, why, we
should starve; the rich take good care of that by grinding us down so
close. Why, Jack, how many thousands get their living on this river! and
do you think they could all get their living honestly, as you call it?
No; we all plunder one another in this world[4]. You asked me wh