On the fourth of July the four gates were thrown open, and all the village, rich and poor, went in, for the first time, to see what the idle hours of six persons had accomplished. The praises that the men and boys received, to say nothing of Bonny Betty, who was there in all her pride with her children, quite compensated them for any little extra fatigue they had undergone. The boys and girls were neatly dressed, and the poor women, the wives of the gardeners, began to take rank among the better order of labourers, for their husbands were beginning to attract notice. It was constantly—“Well, Jemmy Brady, how does your garden come on? are you almost tired yet?” “Tired! Is it I that am tired, sir, when I and the wife and children had a dish of potatoes of my own raising larger nor any you ever seed in our foolish little market? Sure you have not seen Bonny Betty’s stall, as they call it—only just go over to-morrow, being Monday, ye’ll see a sight—early York cabbage—ye see I’ve learned the names of things since I belonged to your garding—and there’s real marrowfat peas, and big white ingans, as big as a tay saucer, and ye’ll may be hardly see the end of the beets and carrots, they’re so long, and then there’s the early turnip just fit to melt in your mouth; sure we had a mess of them with our pork and potatoes this blessed day, and how could a poor man like me, with seven childer, all babies nearly, get the like of turnips and white ingans, unless I made them grow myself, barring I might send to York for them, but poor people can’t do that.” Every one of the shanty people took a pride in having vegetables on the table every Sunday, and in a little time Bonny Betty did nothing, literally, but sell vegetables; and most scrupulous was she in keeping the different interests separate. Each man and boy had his basket, and every morning they were filled and carried to Betty’s shed, erected for the purpose. No market woman was ever prouder, and none certainly so happy, if we make allowance for the increased illness of her youngest child. But even this she did not see, for so great a change had taken place in the circumstances and health of all the rest, that she went on, hoping that in God’s good time little Christie would get well too. The trial day came—the first of November. It was on Saturday, and the six candidates took a holiday, for they could now afford it. Jemmy Brady and Larry M’Gilpin, at one time the worst off, and the most dirty and ragged of them all, were now clean and decently dressed; they were each the richer too, in having another child added to their number, but they were very much set up about, as Larry had the felicity of calling his new daughter Sally M’Curdy—and never even when in a hurry did he shorten the name—and Jemmy only wished that his boy had been twins, that they might both have been called Oliver Price.