the tone of the
mother, who replies, is full of patience, but fuller still of suffering.

"Hush, Letty, hush! Mother's too sick to get it." But the child
continues to fret and plead. Finally with a groan Mrs. White stretches
out her hand and gets the tin mug of water, of that vile and dirty water
which has brought death to so many in the mill village. The child drinks
it greedily. I can hear it suck the fluid. Then the woman herself
staggers to her feet, rises with dreadful illness upon her, and all
through the hot stuffy night in the close air of the loft growing
momentarily more fetid, unwholesome, intolerable--she rises to be
violently sick over and over again. It seems an indefinite number of
times to one who lies awake listening, and must seem unceasing to the
poor wretch who returns to her bed only to rise again.

She groans and suffers and bites her exclamations short. Twice she goes
to the window and by the light of the electric lamp pours laudanum into
a glass and takes it to still her pain and her need.

The odours become so nauseous that I am fain to cover my face and head.
The child fed on salt ham and pork is restless and thirsty all night and
begs for water at short intervals. At last the demand is too much for
the poor agonized mother--she takes refuge in silencing unworthy, and to
which one feels her gentleness must be forced. "Hark! The cat will get
you, Letty! See that cat?" And the feline horror in nameless form,
evoked in an awe-inspiring whisper, controls the little creature, who
murmurs, sobs and subsides.

What spirit deeper than her character has hitherto displayed stirs the
mill-girl in the bed next to me? Possibly the tragedy in the other bed;
possibly the tragedy of her own youth. At all events, whatever burden is
on her, her cross is heavy! She murmurs in her dreams, in a voice more
mature, more serious than any tone of hers has indicated:

"Oh, my God!"

It is a strange cry--call--appeal. It rings solemn to me as I lie and
watch and pity. Hours of night which should be to the labourer peaceful,
full of repose after the day, drag along from nine o'clock, when we
went to bed, till three. At three Mrs. White falls into a doze. I envy
her. Over me the vermin have run riot; I have killed them on my neck and
my arms. When it seemed that flesh and blood must succumb, and sleep,
through sheer pity, take hold of us, a stirring begins in the kitchen
below which in its proximity seems a part of