Page:The White Peacock, Lawrence, 1911.djvu/117

Rh laid down from the breast, lay kicking on the squab, purple in the face, while another lad was pushing bread and butter into its mouth. The mother swept to the sofa, poked out the bread and butter, pushed her finger into the baby’s throat, lifted the child up, punched its back, and was highly relieved when it began to yell. Then she administered a few sound spanks to the naked buttocks of the crammer. He began to howl, but stopped suddenly on seeing us laughing. On the sack-cloth which served as hearth rug sat a beautiful child washing the face of a wooden doll with tea, and wiping it on her nightgown. At the table, an infant in a high chair sat sucking a piece of bacon, till the grease ran down his swarthy arms, oozing through his fingers. An old lad stood in the big arm-chair, whose back was hung with a calf-skin, and was industriously pouring the dregs of the teacups into a basin of milk. The mother whisked away the milk, and made a rush for the urchin, the baby hanging over her arm the while.

“I could half kill thee,” she said, but he had slid under the table—and sat serenely unconcerned.

“Could you”—I asked when the mother had put her bonny baby again to her breast—“could you lend me a knitting needle?”

“Our S’r Ann, wheer’s thy knittin’ needles?” asked the woman, wincing at the same time, and putting her hand to the mouth of the sucking child. Catching my eye, she said:

“You wouldn’t credit how he bites. ’E’s nobbut two teeth, but they like six needles.” She drew her brows together, and pursed her lips, saying to the