"Nor have I the time now, for Simon has gone to Master Mayor's with the manchets and cold baked meats for the feast to-night; and I must be at home to send off the other matters. But here is little Peter come from Mary Brent to ask you to come down and see her lodger who lies very ill. Peter says he hath no infectious disease, but suffers from the effects of hardship and famine. It seems Davy's captain took him off a wreck on which he was floating, a few days before they came to port. He was very ill and all but starved; and Davy, like the good fellow he is, brought the poor man home to his mother's house." "Has Davy returned, then? I am right glad to hear it," said Jack. "He was always a good lad, though he would go to sea in spite of the prior." "I think none the worse of him for preferring to work and help his mother," observed the master baker. "But Mary would like you to come down and see the poor man; and hark ye, lad, you might as well carry a little basket with you, just some biscuits and manchets, and a jellied fowl. I had reserved two or three for ourselves, but we can well spare one, and it is just the meat for a sick man." "And a pot of my spiced confection of cherries," added Madam Barbara. "They are very cordial to a weak stomach. But mayhap Master Jack is too fine a gentleman to carry such a large basket through the streets." "I would cuff his ears soundly, if I caught him in any such foppery," said Master Lucas. "And I give you full leave to do so," returned Jack, laughing. "Do but have the matters ready, and I will set out without delay." As I have said before, Mary Brent's circumstances had greatly improved of late. She had repaired her house, which had once been a good one, and frequently took lodgers. These were generally of a very profitable kind, being ship-masters and mates, who spent their money freely, ate and drank of the best, and made many a valuable present to the gentle retiring widow and her pretty little daughter. She was standing on her own doorstep as Jack came up, talking with a neighbor who seemed to be rather out of humor. "Oh, very well! Mighty well, Neighbor Brent!" she said, as Jack came up. "If you can afford to take a penniless stranger into your best room and keep him for goodness knows how long without the least hope of any pay, why, 'tis no concern of mine." Mary looked as though she were decidedly of the same opinion, but she answered gently— "It is no more than I should like to have some woman do for my boy, if he were wrecked and landed in a strange place, neighbor." "All that is mighty fine," said Dame Higgins, tossing her head. "What I say is, 'let every herring hang by its own head.' If you don't look out for yourself, nobody will look out for you. Take care of number one, is my motto; and it has served me well so far. Take my advice, let this man be carried and laid where he belongs, at the convent door, and let the monks take care of him."