Page:London - The People of the Abyss.djvu/292

240 four in the afternoon, and she looked faint and sick. The woman hesitated an instant, then brought a large plate of 'stewed lamb and young peas.' I was eating a plate of it myself, and it is my judgment that the lamb was mutton and that the peas might have been younger without being youthful. However, the point is, the dish was sold at six pence, and the proprietress gave it for a penny, demonstrating anew the old truth that the poor are the most charitable.

The old woman, profuse in her gratitude, took a seat on the other side of the narrow table and ravenously attacked the smoking stew. We ate steadily and silently, the pair of us, when suddenly, explosively and most gleefully, she cried out to me:—

"Hi sold a box o' matches!"

"Yus," she confirmed, if anything with greater and more explosive glee. "Hi sold a box o' matches! That's 'ow Hi got the penny."

"You must be getting along in years," I suggested.

"Seventy-four yesterday," she replied, and returned with gusto to her plate.

"Blimey, I'd like to do something for the old girl, that I would, but this is the first I've 'ad to-dy," the young fellow alongside volunteered to me. "An' I only 'ave this because I 'appened to