Clara Hopgood

'What was the use when the poor dear was only seven year old? What

call was there for him to come to a blessed innocent like that? I

did tell him to look in when my husband was took, for I know as

before we were married there was something atween him and that gal

Sanders. He never would own up to me about it, and I thought as he

might to a clergyman, and, if he did, it would ease his mind and make

it a bit better for him afterwards; but, Lord! it warn't no use, for

he went off and we didn't so much as hear her name, not even when he

was a-wandering. I says to myself when the parson left, "What's the

good of having you?"'

Mrs Caffyn was a Christian, but she was a disciple of St James rather

than of St Paul. She believed, of course, the doctrines of the

Catechism, in the sense that she denied none, and would have assented

to all if she had been questioned thereon; but her belief that

'faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone,' was something

very vivid and very practical.

Her estimate, too, of the relative values of the virtues and of the

relative sinfulness of sins was original, and the rector therefore

told all his parishioners that she was little better than a heathen.

The common failings in that part of the country amongst the poor were

Saturday-night drunkenness and looseness in the relations between the

young men and young women. Mrs Caffyn's indignation never rose to

the correct boiling point against these crimes.

The rector once ventured to say, as the case was next door to her,'It is very sad, is it not, Mrs Caffyn, that Polesden should be so addicted to drink. I hope he did not disturb you last Saturday

night. I have given the constable directions to look after the

street more closely on Saturday evening, and if Polesden again

offends he must be taken up.'

Mrs Caffyn was behind her own counter. She had just served a

customer with two ounces of Dutch cheese, and she sat down on her

stool. Being rather a heavy woman she always sat down when she was

not busy, and she never rose merely to talk.

'Yes, it is sad, sir, and Polesden isn't no particular friend of

mine, but I tell you what's sad too, sir, and that's the way them

people are mucked up in that cottage. Why, their living room opens

straight on the road, and the wind comes in fit to blow your head

off, and when he goes home o' nights, there's them children a-

squalling, and he can't bide there and do nothing.'