deficient in self-respect, asked sharply: “Where do you come from?” “From Litton Mill, Sir.” “Where are your indentures?” “There they are, Sir,” said Blincoe, holding up the papers. There were two or three gentlemen, in the counting-house, and they looked earnestly over the indentures and then at Blincoe, one of them saying, “Did you come from Pancras workhouse?” “Yes, Sir.” “Why, we are all come from thence! we brought many children the other day to this Mill.” “Indeed, Sir,” said Blincoe, pitying, in his heart, the poor creatures, and thinking it would have been merciful to have killed them outright at once, rather than put them to such a place as Litton Mill had proved to him. Looking at the names of the subscribing officers and overseers, one of the Pancras parish officers said to Mr. Clayton: “Some of these officers are dead.” Blincoe again exclaimed “Indeed, Sir,”—recollecting the atrocious lies and cruel deceptions, those men had practised upon him, in his infant years, by telling him to believe that, in sending him to a cotton-factory, he was to be made at once a gentleman; to live upon roast beef and plum-pudding; to ride his master’s horses; to have a watch in his pocket and plenty of money, and nothing whatever to do! Poor Blincoe could not help thinking to himself:—“Where are the souls of these men gone, who, knowing the utter falsehood of their seductive tales, betrayed me to destiny far more cruel than transportation?” The overseers, looking at the distorted limbs of this victim of parochial economy, said “Why, how came you so lame? you were not so when you left London, were you?” “No, Sir, I was turned over, with the rest of the unclaimed ’prentices, from Lowdham Mill, to Ellice Needham, of Litton Mill.” “How did they keep you?—what did you live upon?” “Water porridge—sometimes once, sometimes twice a day—sometimes potatoes and salt for supper: not half enough, and very bad food.” “How many hours did you work?” “From five, or occasionally six o’clock in the morning, till nine, half-past ten, and sometimes eleven, and, on Saturday nights, till twelve o’clock.” The person wrote these answers down; but made no comment, nor ever noticed the material facts; that Blincoe had not been taught the trade he should have learnt, and that the parish officers of Pancras had utterly neglected him and his miserable comrades, when the Lowdham Mill factory stopped! The manager then bade a person shew Blincoe where he might get lodgings, and bade him come to work in the morning. Blincoe was too much afraid of giving offence, by asking questions in the counting-house, to venture to enquire as to his parentage; but, as soon as he had got lodgings, he strove to make out where the officers were to lodge that night, at Mellor, to enquire further; but hearing they were just then gone, he was deprived of the opportunity! This occurrence, filling his mind with melancholy reflections, he shed many tears in solitude that night! The next morning,