urage to ask the price of a bird, when the salesman caught sight him
and affably spared him the trouble.

"Eh! here's my young lord wants a bird. . . . You may say what you
like," said he, addressing the bystanders, "but there's none like the
gentry for encouragin' trade. . . . And which shall it be sir? Here's a
green parrot, now, I can recommend; or if your Honour prefers a bird
that'll talk, this grey one. A beauty, see! And not a bad word in his
repertory. Your honoured father shall not blame me for sellin' you a
swearer."

The boy pointed to a cage on the man's right.

"A canary? . . . Well, and you're right. What is talk, after all, to
compare with music? And chosen the best bird of my stock, you have; the
pick of the whole crop. That's Quality, my friends; nothing but the
best'll do for Quality, an' the instinct of it comes out young."
The man, who was evidently an eccentric, ran his eye roguishly over the
faces behind the boy and named his price; a high one--a very high one--
but one nicely calculated to lie on the right side of public
reprobation.

Dicky laid his guinea on the sill. "I want a whistle, too," he said,
"and my change, please."

The bird-fancier slapped his breeches pockets.

"A guinea? Bless me, but I must run around and ask one of my neighbours
to oblige. Any of you got the change for a golden guinea about you?" he
asked of the crowd.

"We ain't so lucky," said a voice somewhere at the back. "We don't
carry guineas about, nor give 'em to our bastards."

A voice or two--a woman's among them--called "Shame!" "Hold your
tongue, there!"

Dicky had his back to the speaker. He heard the word for the first time
in his life, and had no notion of its meaning; but in a dim way he felt
it to be an evil word, and also that the people were protesting out of
pity. A rush of blood came to his face. He gulped, lifted his chin,
and said, with his eyes steady on the face of the blinking fancier,--

"Give it back to me, please, and I will get it changed."

He took the coin, and walked away resolutely with a set white face.
He saw none of the people who made way for him.

The bird-fancier stared after the small figure as it walked away into
darkness. "Bastard?" he said. "There's Blood in that youngster, though
he don't face ye again an' I lose my deal. Blood's blood, however ye
come by it; you may take that on the word of a breeder. An' you ought
to be ashamed, Sam Wilson--slingin' ye