It really did seem a hard case. I knew, from personal observation, that the charge of idleness was undeserved, and it was very unfair to make the poor little thing suffer for a slackness of trade which she could not help. To keep a growing child running about all the morning in the open air without giving it a morsel of food to appease its hunger till nearly twelve o'clock, was a piece of barbarity that quite shocked me. For, however hard I may be by nature, and however apt to drive my own barrow through the world without troubling myself about the toes that happen to be in the way and to get pinched, yet I do not think I have ever been guilty of gratuitous cruelty to either man or beast; indeed, the mere sight of it always fills me with disgust. The mention of breakfast gave me a sudden bright idea of how to assist the child without laying myself open to the reproaches of prudence. Had I not saved a shilling the day before by breakfasting at the restaurant instead of at the hotel? and was not a penny saved a penny gained? I had never calculated on being able to begin gaining anything as yet, so that that shilling was an addition to my funds which I had not reckoned upon, and which I was clearly entitled to regard as an extra--a thing that I could throw away or do what I pleased with--an accidental item which need not be entered on my receipts at all, so that prudence had no right to expect to be consulted as to what was done with it. And, feeling quite certain of the soundness of this argument, I did not wait to hear whether prudence took the same view of the matter or not, but instantly presented the coin to the child, recommending her to spend part of it now in getting breakfast, and to reserve the remainder against some future emergency. The sight and feel of the shilling checked her tears with surprising quickness, and her wan, melancholy, little physiognomy brightened up wonderfully. Holding her basket towards me, she offered either to let me pick out the best flowers for myself, or else to do it for me if I liked; adding, with a slight hesitation, that perhaps there _might_ be one or two old flowers since yesterday that had got mixed among this morning's lot, and if so, she would be more likely to know the fresh ones than I should. The touch of confusion with which this was said, made me suspect that the contents of her basket were by no means so fresh as she professed them to be, and that she, being well aware of that fact, was moved by an impulse of gratitude to proffer her services as chooser in order that I might not be cheated.