It was taken for granted that the new hand had had her breakfast, and not a crust was offered to her. The hop raiser had doubts about her sanity, and observed her narrowly, but a dozen times that day he mentally congratulated himself on his acquisition. Lally worked with feverish energy, trying--ah, how vainly--to escape from her thoughts, and she did the work of two persons. She had bread and cheese and a glass of ale at noon, and a similar allowance of food for supper. That night she slept in a barn with the women tramps, but chose a remote corner, where she buried herself in the hay, and slept peacefully. The next day she would have wandered on in her unrest, but the farmer, discovering her intention, offered her a shilling a day, and she consented to remain. That night she again slept in her remote corner of the barn, and no one spoke to her or molested her. She made no friends among the tramps, not even speaking to them. They were rude, vicious, quarrelsome. She was educated and refined, had been the teacher and companion of ladies, and was herself a lady at heart. She went among these rude companions by the soubriquet of “The Lady,” and this was the only name by which the hop farmer knew her. For a week Lally kept up this toil, laboring in the hop-fields by day, and sleeping in a barn at night. At the end of that period, the work being finished, she was no longer wanted, and she went her way, resuming her weary tramp, with six shillings and sixpence in her pocket. For the next fortnight she worked in various hop-fields, paying nothing for food or lodging. Her pay was better too, she earning a sovereign in the two weeks. Three weeks after overhearing Rufus solicit the hand of Miss Wynde in marriage, Lally found herself at Canterbury, shoeless and ragged, a very picture of destitution. Her first act was to purchase a pair of shoes, a ready-made print dress and a thin shawl. Her purchases were all of the cheapest description, not costing her over five shillings. She added to the list a round hat of coarse straw, around which she tied a dark blue ribbon. She found a cheap lodging in the town; and here put on her new clothes. The lodging was an attic room, with a dormer window, close up under the slates of a humble brick dwelling. There was no carpet on her floor, and the furniture comprised only an iron bed-stead, a chair and a table. The house was rented by a tailor, who used the ground floor for his shop and residence, and sub-let the upper rooms to a half dozen different families. The three attic rooms were let to women, Lally being one, and two thin, consumptive seamstresses occupying the others. It was necessary for Lally to find employment without delay, and she inserted an advertisement in one of the local papers, soliciting a position as nursery governess. She had the written recommendation of her former employers, the superintendents of a ladies’ school, and with this she hoped to secure a situation.