f quarrelling in the court. Mrs. Brown quarrelled with Mrs. Jones
about something, and Ann Turner would not speak to Mrs. Smith because
she had offended her about something else, and once or twice there were
angry voices in the court, which troubled the poor sick woman. And when
the neighbours came in to see her they would pour out the history of
their grievances, and this worried and distressed her a good deal.

The babies, too, felt the hot weather very much. They were seven months
old now, but they were poor sickly little creatures, quite unable to
roll about the floor like other babies of that age, and needing almost
as much nursing and care as they had done when they were first born.
Poppy did her very best for them and for her mother, but she was only a
child after all, and she could not keep them as clean as they ought to
have been kept, nor the house as tidy and free from dirt as it used to
be when her mother was able to look after it, and sometimes poor Poppy,
brave though she was, felt almost inclined to give up in despair.

There was one day when she was very much cast down and troubled. It was,
if possible, a hotter day than the ten very hot days which had gone
before it. And it was everybody's washing-day. The court was filled with
clothes, steaming in the hot sun, and shutting out what little air might
possibly have crept down to the rooms below. But there seemed to be no
air anywhere that sultry day.

Poppy's mother was very much worn and exhausted, and Enoch and Elijah
did nothing but cry. Hour after hour they cried, not a loud, angry
scream, such as strong babies might give, but a weak, weary wail, which
went on, and on, and on, till Poppy felt as if she could bear it no
longer.

She left them on the bed for a few minutes beside her mother, and ran
downstairs to make a cup of tea and a piece of toast for mother's
dinner. They lived on bread and tea now, for they had nothing but what
they got from the parish, and if the neighbours had not been very kind,
and brought them in little things from time to time, even the parish
money would not have been enough to keep them from starving.

When Poppy went downstairs she had a little quiet cry. There was so much
to do, and somehow that hot day it seemed impossible to do it. She knew
that the house was untidy, and the babies needed washing, and there were
dirty clothes waiting to be made clean, and cups and plates and basins
standing ready to be washed up. An