u."

"Nor I you; what do you mean by cly-faking?"

"Lor, dear! no harm; only taking a handkerchief now and then."

"Do you take me for a thief?"

"Nay, dear! don't make use of bad language; we never calls them thieves
here, but prigs and fakers: to tell you the truth, dear, seeing you
spring at that railing put me in mind of my own dear son, who is now at
Bot'ny: when he had bad luck, he always used to talk of flinging himself
over the bridge; and, sure enough, when the traps were after him, he did
fling himself into the river, but that was off the bank; nevertheless,
the traps pulled him out, and he is now suffering his sentence; so you
see you may speak out, if you have done anything in the harmless line,
for I am my son's own mother, I assure you."

"So you think there's no harm in stealing?"

"No harm in the world, dear! Do you think my own child would have been
transported for it, if there had been any harm in it? and what's more,
would the blessed woman in the book here have written her life as she has
done, and given it to the world, if there had been any harm in faking?
She, too, was what they call a thief and a cut-purse; ay, and was
transported for it, like my dear son; and do you think she would have
told the world so, if there had been any harm in the thing? Oh, it is a
comfort to me that the blessed woman was transported, and came back--for
come back she did, and rich too--for it is an assurance to me that my
dear son, who was transported too, will come back like her."

"What was her name?"

"Her name, blessed Mary Flanders."

"Will you let me look at the book?"

"Yes, dear, that I will, if you promise me not to run away with it."

I took the book from her hand; a short thick volume, at least a century
old, bound with greasy black leather. I turned the yellow and
dog's-eared pages, reading here and there a sentence. Yes, and no
mistake! _His_ pen, his style, his spirit might be observed in every
line of the uncouth-looking old volume--the air, the style, the spirit of
the writer of the book which first taught me to read. I covered my face
with my hand, and thought of my childhood--

"This is a singular book," said I at last; "but it does not appear to
have been written to prove that thieving is no harm, but rather to show
the terrible consequences of crime: it contains a deep moral."

"A deep what, dear?"

"A--but no matter, I will give you a crown for this volume."

"No, dear, I wil