amed
her sequel. The writing is so exactly similar to that of "The Hens,"
that the two portions can scarcely be identified as belonging to
different writers. Julie used often to reproach me for indulging in
what John Wesley called "the lust of finishing," but in matters
concerning her own art she was as great an offender on this score as
any one else!

Julie gave a set of verses on "Canada Home" to the same number as
"Flaps," and to the March (1879) number she gave some other verses on
"Garden Lore." In April the second part of "We and the World" began to
appear, and a fresh character was introduced, who is one of the most
important and touching features of the tale. Biddy Macartney is a real
old Irish melody in herself, with her body tied to a coffee-barrow in
the Liverpool Docks, and her mind ever wandering in search of the son
who had run away to sea. Jack, the English hero, comes across Biddy
in the docks just before he starts as a stowaway for America, and his
stiff, crude replies to her voluble outpourings are essentially
British and boy-like:--

"You hope Micky 'll come back, I suppose?"

"Why wouldn't I, acushla? Sure, it was by reason o' that I got
bothered with the washin' after me poor boy left me, from my mind
being continually in the docks instead of with the clothes. And
there I would be at the end of the week, with the captain's jerseys
gone to old Miss Harding, and _his_ washing no corricter than
_hers_, though he'd more good-nature in him over the accidents, and
iron-moulds on the table-cloths, and pocket-handkerchers missin',
and me ruined intirely with making them good, and no thanks for it,
till a good-natured sowl of a foreigner that kept a pie-shop larned
me to make the coffee, and lint me the money to buy a barra, and he
says, 'Go as convanient to the ships as ye can, mother: it'll ease
your mind. My own heart,' says he, laying his hand to it, 'knows
what it is to have my body here, and the whole sowl of me far
away.'"

"Did you pay him back?" I asked. I spoke without thinking, and
still less did I mean to be rude; but it had suddenly struck me
that I was young and hearty, and that it would be almost a duty to
share the contents of my leather bag with this poor old woman, if
there were no chance of her being able to repay the generous
foreigner.

"Did I pay him back?" she screamed.