Saint Mary-le-Bow.

"That's right!" said he. "I like to see a man punctual. Take this damp
cloth and rub the shelves."

"Clean!" said he to himself a minute after. "Have you ever rubbed
shelves before?"

"Not much," said Stephen.

"How much do you rub 'em?"

"Till they are clean."

"You'll do. Can you carry a tray on your head?"

"Don't know till I try."

"Best practise a bit, before you put any thing on it, or else we shall
have mud pies," laughed the baker.

When work was over, the baker called Stephen to him.

"Now," said he, "let us settle about wages. I could not tell how much
to offer you, till I saw how you worked. You've done very well for a
new hand. I'll give you three-halfpence a-day till you've fairly learnt
the trade, and twopence afterwards: maybe, in time, if I find you
useful, I may raise you a halfpenny more: a penny of it in bread, the
rest in money. Will that content you?"

"With a very good will," replied Stephen.

His wages as watchman at the Castle had been twopence per day, so that
he was well satisfied with the baker's proposal.

"What work does your wife do?"

"She has none to do yet. She can cook, sew, weave, and spin."

"I'll bear it in mind, if I hear of any for her."

"Thank you," said Stephen; and dropping the halfpenny into his purse, he
secured the loaves in his girdle, and went back to the small
screened-off corner of the garret which at present he called home.

It was not long before the worthy baker found Stephen so useful that he
raised his wages even to the extravagant sum of threepence a day. His
wife, too, had occasional work for Ermine; and the thread she spun was
so fine and even, and the web she wove so regular and free from
blemishes, that one employer spoke of her to another, until she had as
much work as she could do. Not many months elapsed before they were
able to leave the garret where they had first found refuge, and take a
little house in Ivy Lane; and only a few years were over when Stephen
was himself a master baker and pastiller (or confectioner), Ermine
presiding over the lighter dainties, which she was able to vary by
sundry German dishes not usually obtainable in London, while he was
renowned through the City for the superior quality of his bread.
Odinel, the fat baker, who always remained his friend, loved to point a
moral by Stephen's case in lecturing his journeymen.

"Why, do but look at him," he was wont to say; "when he came