Mrs. Crawley had brought two children with her when she came from the Cornish curacy to Hogglestock, and two other babies had been added to her cares since then. One of these was now ill with croup, and it was with the object of offering to the mother some comfort and solace, that the present visit was made. The two ladies got down from their carriage, having obtained the services of a boy to hold Puck, and soon found themselves in Mrs. Crawley’s single sitting-room. She was sitting there with her foot on the board of a child’s cradle, rocking it, while an infant about three months old was lying in her lap. For the elder one, who was the sufferer, had in her illness usurped the baby’s place. Two other children, considerably older, were also in the room. The eldest was a girl, perhaps nine years of age, and the other a boy three years her junior. These were standing at their father’s elbow, who was studiously endeavouring to initiate them in the early mysteries of grammar. To tell the truth Mrs. Robarts would much have preferred that Mr. Crawley had not been there, for she had with her and about her certain contraband articles, presents for the children, as they were to be called, but in truth relief for that poor, much-tasked mother, which they knew it would be impossible to introduce in Mr. Crawley’s presence. She, as we have said, was not quite so gaunt, not altogether so haggard as in the latter of those dreadful Cornish days. Lady Lufton and Mrs. Arabin between them, and the scanty comfort of their improved, though still wretched income, had done something towards bringing her back to the world in which she had lived in the soft days of her childhood. But even the liberal stipend of a hundred and thirty pounds a-year—liberal according to the scale by which the incomes of clergymen in some of our new districts are now apportioned—would not admit of a gentleman with his wife and four children living with the ordinary comforts of an artisan’s family. As regards the mere eating and drinking, the amounts of butcher’s meat and tea and butter, they of course were used in quantities which any artisan would have regarded as compatible only with demi-starvation. Better clothing for her children was necessary, and better clothing for him. As for her own raiment, the wives of few artisans would have been content to put up with Mrs. Crawley’s best gown. The stuff of which it was made had been paid for by her mother when she with much difficulty bestowed upon her daughter her modest wedding _trousseau_.