She sat at the table underneath the dormer window, and was busy at work making paper bags: a widow alone in the world, seventy-eight years of age, who had never received one penny from the parish in her life. Take notice of the little bedroom grate. It is a very small one, but you notice it is made much smaller by two pieces of brick being placed in it, one on each side, and between them a very small fire is burning, or trying to burn. She tells us that she gets fivepence per thousand for her paper bags, and that she buys her own paste; that she works for her landlord, who stops her rent every week out of her earnings. She buys her coal by the quarter of a hundredweight, which costs her fivepence; she does not buy pennyworths. Sometimes the men below give her bits of wood, and the printer lets her have scraps of cardboard. She can't do with less than two quarters in the week, it is so cold, but she manages with a bit less in the summer-time. So the brave old woman gabbles on, telling us all we want to know. I produce some warm clothing, and her old eyes glisten; I give her a whole pound of tea in a nice canister, and I think I see tears; but I take her old skinny hand, all covered with paste, and say: "You must buy a whole hundredweight of good coal with that, or give it back to me; you must not use it for anything else." Ah, this was indeed too much for her, and she burst out hysterically: "Oh, don't mock me--a hundredweight of coal! I'll soon have those bricks out." Come with me into another street. We have no stairs to climb this time, for the house consists of but two stories, and contains but four small rooms. We enter the front room on the ground-floor, and find three old women at work. There being no room or accommodation for us to sit, we stand just inside and watch them as they work. Two are widows bordering on seventy years of age; the other is a spinster of like years. One sits at a machine sewing trousers, of which there is a pile waiting near her. As soon as she has completed her portion of work she passes the trousers on to the other widow, who finishes them--that is, she puts on the buttons, sewing the hem round the bottom of the trousers, and does all the little jobs that must needs be done by hand. When her part of the work is completed, she passes the trousers on to the spinster, who has the heaviest part of the task, for she is the "presser," and manipulates the hot and heavy iron that plays such an important part in the work. Each of them occupies one of the four rooms in the house, but for working purposes they collaborate and use the widow machinist's room; for collaboration increases their earnings and lessens their expenses, for the one room is also used for the preparation and consumption of food. One kettle, one teapot, and one frying-pan do for the three. Old and weak as they are, they understand the value of co-operation and the advantages to be obtained by dividing labour. But they understand