'Poor Mary Ann,' the landlady said contemplatively. 'If she dies, she'll 'ave to be buried by the work'us. And if she lives, she'll be worse off than ever; for they won't take a girl with cropped hair into a shop, and the fear of infection besides. She ain't got a friend in the world, she ain't; except her own people, and they're only a drain on the poor thing. Poor Mary Ann! she have had a bad time of it. Perhaps it would be kinder in Providence if He took her; for who's to pay for her keep if she gets through the fever? Not that I would ask to be paid for her lodging; I ain't one like that; there's her room, and welcome; that's what I says to my husband when he come home last night; and neither him nor me's afraid of fever, nor would turn out a poor thing as have been took. But law! it would be months afore she'd get another place; and she ain't got nobody to look after her.' 'What have you done with the money I gave you last night?' he asked. 'There it lies, sir--on the mantel-shelf. It ain't for me to touch; it is for the doctor to give his orders about that money.' 'Just put this eighteenpence to it, mistress, and ask the doctor what the poor lass may want. It is all I happen to have with me the now.' Then he left; and walked away with an unusual air of determination He was not downcast because he had parted with his last sixpence. 'It is even better thus,' this stern-faced man was saying to himself, 'for now we must face facts, and get rid of speculation. Let us begin at the beginning--with one's ten fingers! Poor lass! It is a dreadful place, a great city like this; it has no compassion. Surely, in the country, she would not be so utterly thrown down in the race. Surely, some one would say, "_At meal-time come thou hither and eat of the bread, and dip thy morsel in the vinegar;_" and would command the young men and say to them, "_Let her glean even among the sheaves, and reproach her not. And let fall also some of the handfuls of purpose for her, and leave them, that she may glean them, and rebuke her not._" Poor lass! poor lass! Even that cadaverous-jawed, Tennants'-stalk of a woman thinks it would be better for her to die.'