, I was able to let her into the hall without attracting
much attention, and then went down to the cook on my errand. I forget
what was done, except that I know a good meal was given to the 'mother'
and some milk to the baby. Just then an elder sister of mine came into
the hall, and was attracted as I had been to the infant; but observing
the woman she suddenly called out: 'Why, you are the woman I have spoken
to twice before, and this is a different baby; this is the third you
have had!'

"And so it came to pass that I had my first experience of a beggar's
shifts. The child was not hers; she had borrowed it, or hired it, and it
was, as my sister said, the third in succession she had had within a
couple of months. So I was somewhat humiliated as 'mother' and infant
were quietly, but quickly, passed out through the hall door into the
street, and I learned my first lesson that the best way to help the poor
is not necessarily to give money to the first beggar you meet in the
street, although it is well to always keep a tender heart for the
sufferings of children."

"Hire babies! Borrow babies!" I interrupted.

"Yes," replied the Doctor, "and buy them, too. I know of several
lodging-houses where I could hire a baby from fourpence to a shilling a
day. The prettier the child is the better; should it happen to be a
cripple, or possessing particularly thin arms and face, it is always
worth a shilling. Little girls always demand a higher price than boys. I
knew of one woman--her supposed husband sells chickweed and
groundsel--who has carried a baby exactly the same size for the last
nine or ten years! I myself have, in days gone by, bought children in
order to rescue them. Happily, such a step is now not needful, owing to
changes in the law, which enable us to get possession of such children
by better methods. For one girl I paid 10s. 6d., whilst my very first
purchase cost me 7s. 6d. It was for a little boy and girl baby--brother
and sister. The latter was tied up in a bundle. The woman--whom I found
sitting on a door-step--offered to sell the boy for a trifle,
half-a-crown, but not the mite of a girl, as she was 'her living.'
However, I rescued them both, for the sum I have mentioned. In another
case I got a poor little creature of two years of age--I can see her
now, with arms no thicker than my finger--from her drunken 'guardian'
for a shilling. When it came to washing the waif--what clothes it had on
consisted of nothing