rman, to pull on shore to the
landing-place.

As soon as the baskets and other articles had been carried up to the
house, Mrs Chopper sent out for the dinner, which was regularly
obtained from a cook's-shop. Joey sat down with her, and when his meal
was finished, Mrs Chopper told him he might take a run and stretch his
legs a little if he pleased, while she tended to the linen which was to
go to the wash. Joey was not sorry to take advantage of this
considerate permission, for his legs were quite cramped from sitting so
long jammed up between baskets of eggs, red herrings, and the other
commodities which had encompassed him.

We must now introduce Mrs Chopper to the reader a little more
ceremoniously. She was the widow of a boatswain, who had set her up in
the bumboat business with some money he had acquired a short time before
his death, and she had continued it ever since on her own account.
People said that she was rich, but riches are comparative, and if a
person in a seaport town, and in her situation, could show 200 or 300
pounds at her bankers, she was considered rich. If she was rich in
nothing else, she certainly was in bad and doubtful debts, having seven
or eight books like that which Joey was filling up for her during the
whole day, all containing accounts of long standing, and most of which
probably would stand for ever; but if the bad debts were many, the
profits were in proportion; and what with the long standing debts being
occasionally paid, the ready-money she continually received, and the
profitable traffic which she made in the way of exchange, etcetera, she
appeared to do a thriving business, although it is certain the one-half
of her goods were as much given away as were the articles obtained from
her in the morning by Nancy.

It is a question whether these books of bad debts were not a source of
enjoyment to her, for every night she would take one of the books down,
and although she could not read, yet, by having them continually read to
her, and knowing the pages so exactly, she could almost repeat every
line by heart which the various bills contained; and then there was
always a story which she had to tell about each--something relative to
the party of whom the transaction reminded her; and subsequently, when
Joey was fairly domiciled with her, she would make him hand down one of
the books, and talk away from it for hours; they were the ledgers of her
reminiscences; the events of a consid