ways on a Sunday morning, as the church-bells began to
ring, the Unknown Lady would give me a Guinea to put into the plate
after service. I remember that the year before she died, when I was big
enough to walk with my hand in Jeremy's, instead of being carried, that
he told me on Easter-Sunday morning that his wife was dead, and that he
had two children in a cellar who had no bread to eat. He cried a good
deal; and before we reached the church, took me into a strange room in a
back-street, where there were a number of men and women shouting and
quarrelling, and another, without his wig and with a great gash in his
forehead, sprawling on the ground, and crying out "Lillibulero!" and two
more playing cards on a pair of bellows. And they were all drinking from
mugs and smoking tobacco. Here Jeremy had something to drink, too, from
a mug. He put the vessel to my lips, and I tasted something Hot, which
made me feel very faint and giddy. When we were in the open air again,
he cried worse than ever. What could I do but give him my guinea? On our
return, to Hanover Square, the Lady asked me, according to her custom,
what was the text, and whether I had put my money into the plate. She
was not strict about the first; for I was generally, from my tenderness
of years, unable to tell her more than that the gentleman in the wig
seemed very angry with me, and the Pope, and the Prince of Darkness;
but she alway taxed me smartly about the Guinea. This was before the
time that I had learned to Lie; and so I told her how I had given the
piece of gold to Jeremy, for that his wife was no more, and his children
were in a cellar with nothing to eat. She stayed a while looking at me
with those blue eyes, which had first their bright fierceness in them
and then their kind and sweet tenderness. It was the first time that I
marked her eyes more than her dress and her diamonds. She took me in her
lap, and printed her lips--which were very soft, but cold--upon my
forehead.

"Child," she said, "did I use thee as is the custom, thou shouldst be
Whipped, not Kissed, for thy folly and disobedience. But you knew not
what you did. Here are two guineas to put into the plate next Sunday;
and let no rogues cozen you out of it. As for Jeremy," she continued,
turning to Mistress Talmash, "see that the knave be stripped of his
livery, and turned out of the house this moment, for robbing my
Grandson, and taking him on a Sabbath morning to taverns, among grooms,