Lizzy Glenn; Or, The Trials of a SeamstressArthur, T. S. (Timothy Shay)
General
Lizzy Glenn; Or, The Trials of a Seamstress
Arthur, T. S. (Timothy Shay)
Women dressmakers -- Fiction
remark, and, therefore, after getting the direction of a
clothing-store, I went there and got a few pairs of coarse trowsers.
This kind of work was new to me. In my ignorance, I made some
portion of them wrong, for which I received abuse from the owner of
the shop, and no money. He was not going, he said, to pay me for
having his work spoiled.
"Dreadfully disheartened, I returned to my lodgings, and set myself
to ponder over some other means of support. I had been, while at
school, one of the best French and Spanish scholars in the seminary.
I had also given great attention to music, and could have taught it
as skillfully as our musical professor. But five years had passed
since I touched the keys of a piano or harp, and I had not, during
that time, spoken a dozen words in any language except my native
tongue. And, even if I had retained all my former skill and
proficiency, my appearance was not such as to guarantee me, as a
perfect stranger, any favorable reception either from private
families or schools. So anxious had I been to make the remnant of my
father's property, which a kind Providence had spared to us, meet
our extreme need, that I denied myself every thing that I could
possibly do without. Having no occasion to go into society, for no
one would recognize me as Eugenia Ballantine, I had paid little
regard to my external appearance, so far as elegant and fashionable
apparel was concerned. I bought sparingly, and chose only plain and
cheap articles. My clothes were, therefore, not of a kind, as you
may yourself see, to give me, so far as they were concerned, a
passport to consideration.
"As two dollars a week would, I knew, in a very short time, exhaust
my little stock of money, I determined to try and rent a room
somewhere, at the lowest possible rate, and buy my own food. I eat
but a little, and felt sure that, by making this arrangement, I
could subsist on one dollar a week instead of two, and this much it
seemed as if I must be able to earn at something or other. On the
day after I formed this resolution I met, in my walks about the city
for the purpose, with the room where you found me, for which I paid
seventy-five cents a week. There I removed, and managed to live on
about one dollar and a quarter a week, which sum, or, at the worst,
seventy-five cents or a dollar a week, I have since earned at making
fine shirts for Mr. Berlaps at twenty-five cents each. I could have
done better than that, but every day I visit my father, and this
occupies from two to three hours."
"And how is your father?" asked Mrs. Gaston, wiping her tearful
eyes, as Eugenia paused, on ending her narrative.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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