"And what is he?"

"He is a parson."

I remembered the answer of the old housekeeper at the parsonage,

when I had asked to see the clergyman. "This, then, was his

father's residence?"

"Aye; old Mr. Rivers lived here, and his father, and grandfather,

and gurt (great) grandfather afore him."

"The name, then, of that gentleman, is Mr. St. John Rivers?"

"Aye; St. John is like his kirstened name."

"And his sisters are called Diana and Mary Rivers?"

"Yes."

"Their father is dead?"

"Dead three weeks sin' of a stroke."

"They have no mother?"

"The mistress has been dead this mony a year."

"Have you lived with the family long?"

"I've lived here thirty year. I nursed them all three."

"That proves you must have been an honest and faithful servant. I

will say so much for you, though you have had the incivility to call

me a beggar."

She again regarded me with a surprised stare. "I believe," she

said, "I was quite mista'en in my thoughts of you: but there is so

mony cheats goes about, you mun forgie me."

"And though," I continued, rather severely, "you wished to turn me

from the door, on a night when you should not have shut out a dog."

"Well, it was hard: but what can a body do? I thought more o' th'

childer nor of mysel: poor things! They've like nobody to tak'

care on 'em but me. I'm like to look sharpish."

I maintained a grave silence for some minutes.

"You munnut think too hardly of me," she again remarked.

"But I do think hardly of you," I said; "and I'll tell you why--not

so much because you refused to give me shelter, or regarded me as an

impostor, as because you just now made it a species of reproach that

I had no 'brass' and no house. Some of the best people that ever

lived have been as destitute as I am; and if you are a Christian,

you ought not to consider poverty a crime."

"No more I ought," said she: "Mr. St. John tells me so too; and I

see I wor wrang--but I've clear a different notion on you now to

what I had. You look a raight down dacent little crater."

"That will do--I forgive you now. Shake hands."

She put her floury and horny hand into mine; another and heartier

smile illumined her rough face, and from that moment we were

friends.




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