the score
waitin' till we grew old enough to be married. I can tell you there
was some smart fellers among 'em. Those were the times! Me sisters
made what is called swell matches, an' not bein' used to bein' cooped
up, their lives was failures. I was the only one married in me own
circle, and my life was a pattern to the others. I was the oldest an'
waited last, an' me mother was that disappointed in me that I had to
run away, an' I have me reasons for fearin' Dawn is on for a swell. I
seen me sisters' lives. I call them unwholesome marriages when girls
marries these fellers, an' their narrer-minded people sits on her an'
is that depraved they turn him agen her!" Mrs Clay was vehement.

"When Dawn's mother grew up she was Dawn's image, an' we was keepin' a
accommodation house too, that is Jim Clay an' me, and Dawn's mother
was reckoned the prettiest and best girl in them parts, an' had lovers
from far and near; but there came a feller up from Sydney to stay,
nothin' to blow about neither, but he was dreadfully gone on me
daughter. He seemed all right, but I was agen him--being a
swell,--till me daughter threatened she'd run away with him if I
didn't let her have him peaceful, an' rememberin' me own youth, I let
her have him in spite of me misgivin's. She went home with him, an' it
appears he was like these crawlin' fellers--couldn't do nothink, only
what their parents give them; an' w'en they found he'd married a fine,
good, wholesome girl, instead of one of their own style--one of the
Parrys for instance--they cut him off with a shilling, an' poor thing
she nearly starved, an' took to work to keep him, an' he always
growlin' at her like the coward he was, that only for her he'd have
been well off. A mess-alliance his people called it, but the mess
wasn't from poor Mary's side. Well, w'en it come that she was to be a
mother, his people took her in and told her, if you please, that if it
was a boy they'd take it theirselves and educate it fit for their
family, but if it was a girl they wouldn't. The poor thing, not bein'
able for anythink an' too proud to come home, stood their insults as
long as she could, an' at last she sneaked out at night and set off to
walk to me. It is pitiable to think of."

The poor old voice trembled.

"She had more'n a hundred miles to travel an' it took her days, but
some folk was good, an' one cold night about three hours before
daylight she startled me by comin' into my room. I remember