Great Britain -- Social life and customs -- 19th century -- Fiction; Short stories
“Bill says as it's tyking too much on the likes o' me to be addressing
you on your missus' death, but it's not her husband that will despise
a pore working woman oo's lost her best friend. When Bill 'ad the
rumatiks, and couldn't do no work, and Byby was a-growing that thin you
could see thro' 'im, Mrs. Byles says to me, 'Mrs. 'Awkes, you goes to
the Society for the Horganisation of Female Toilers.' Says I, 'Wot is
that?' and she declares, 'It's a set of ladies oo wants to'elp women
to work, and they 'ill see you gets it' So I goes, and I saw a set
of ladies sitting at a table, and they looks at me; and one with
spectacles, and a vice like an 'and-saw, arsks me, 'Wot's yer name?'
and ''Ow old are you?' and ''Ow many children have you?' and 'Are your
'abits temperate?' And then she says, 'If you pay a shilling we 'ill
put your nyme down for work has an unskilled worker.' 'I 'avn't got a
shilling, and Byby's dyin' for want of food.' 'This ain't a Poor 'ouse,'
says she; 'this is a Booro.' When I wos a-going down the stairs, a lady
comes after me. 'Don't cry, Mrs. 'Awkes,' for she had picked up my name.
'I've some charring for you, and we'ill go to get something for Byby.'
If ever there wos a hangel in a sealskin jacket and a plain little
bonnet, but the true lady hall hover, 'er name was Mrs. Trevor. Bill, he
looked up from that day, and wos on his keb in a week, and little Jim is
the biggest byby in the court. Mrs. Trevor never rested till I got three
hoffices to clean, to say nothing of 'elping at cleanings and parties in
'ouses. She wos that kind, too, and free, when she'd come hin with noos
of some hoffice. 'We're horganisin' you, Missus 'Awkes, just splendid,'
with the prettiest bit smile. Bill, he used to say, ''Er 'usband's a
proud man, for I never saw the like o' her for a downright lady in 'er
wys'--and 'e knows, does Bill, being a kebman. When I told 'im he wos
that bad that'e never put a match to 'is pipe the'ole night 'Mariar,'
'e says to me, 'you an' me 'as seen some think of her, but you bet nobody
knew what a saint she wos 'xcept 'er 'usband.'”...
Trevor could read no more, for it had dawned at last upon him that
Christ had lived with him for more than ten years, and his eyes had been
holden.
THE MINISTER OF ST. BEDE'S
I
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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