ay be sure that I thought it best too. We took the young
woman and the baby with us to the circus at once. She never asked any
questions; she didn't seem to care where she went, or what she did; she
was dazed and desperate--a sight, Ma'am, to make your heart ache.

"They were just getting tea in the circus, which was nearly finished.
We mostly have tea and dinner there, sir; finding it come cheaper in the
end to mess together when we can. Peggy Burke, I remember, was walking
about on the grass outside, whistling (that was one of her queer ways)
'The girl I left behind me.' 'Ah! Peck,' says she, 'what have you been
after now? Who's the company lady ye've brought to tea with us?' I told
her, sir, all I have told you; while Jemmy set the young woman down on
one of our trunks, and got her a cup of tea. 'It seems dreadful,' says
I when I'd done, 'to send such as her to the workhouse, don't it?'
'Workhouse!' says Peggy, firing up directly; 'I only wish we could
catch the man who's got her in that scrape, and put him in there on
water-gruel for the rest of his life. I'd give a shillin' a wheal out of
my own pocket for the blessed privilege of scoring the thief's face with
my whip, till his own mother wouldn't know him!' And then she went on,
sir, abusing all the men in her Irish way, which I can't repeat. At last
she stops, and claps me on the back. 'You're a darlin' old girl, Peck!'
says she, 'and your friends are my friends. Stop where you are, and let
me speak a word to the young woman on the trunk.'

"After a little while she comes back, and says, 'I've done it,
Peck! She's mighty close, and as proud as Lucifer; but she's only a
dressmaker, for all that.' 'A dressmaker!' says I; 'how did you find
out she was a dressmaker?' 'Why, I looked at her forefinger, in course,'
says Peggy, 'and saw the pricks of the needle on it, and soon made her
talk a bit after that. She knows fancy-work and cuttin' out--would ye
ever have thought it? And I'll show her how to give the workhouse the
go-by to-morrow, if she only holds out, and keeps in her senses. Stop
where you are, Peck! I'm going to make Jubber put his dirty hand into
his pocket and pull out some money; and that's a sight worth stoppin' to
see any day in the week.'

"I waited as she told me; and she called for Jubber, just as if he'd
been her servant; and he come out of the circus. 'I want ten shillings
advance of wages for that lady on the trunk,' says Peggy. He laughed at
he