ful to Providence when old Mrs.
Prichard upstairs giv' leave for the children to come and play up in her
room. She was the only other in-dweller in the house, living in the
front and back attics with Mrs. Burr, who took jobs out in the
dressmaking, and very moderate charges. When Mrs. Burr worked at home,
Mrs. Prichard enjoyed her society and knitted, while Mrs. Burr cut out
and basted. Very few remarks were passed; for though Mrs. Burr was
snappish now and again, company was company, and Mrs. Prichard she put
up with a little temper at times, because we all had our trials; and
Mrs. Burr was considered good at heart, though short with you now and
again. Hence when loneliness became irksome, Mrs. Prichard found Dave
and Dolly a satisfaction, so long as nothing was broke. It was a
pleasant extension of the experience of their early youth to play at
monarchs, military celebrities, professional assassins, and so on, in
old Mrs. Prichard's room upstairs. And sometimes nothing _was_ broke.
Otherwise one day at No. 7, Sapps Court, was much the same as another.

Uncle Mo's residence in Sapps Court dated many years before the coming
of Aunt M'riar; in fact, as far back as the time he was deprived of his
anchorage in Soho. He was then taken in by his brother, recently a
widower; and no question had ever arisen of his quitting the haven he
had been, as it were, towed into as a derelict; until, some years later,
David announced that he was thinking of Dolly Tarver at Ealing. Moses
smoked through a pipe in silence, so as to give full consideration; then
said, like an easy-going old boy as he was:--"You might do worse, Dave.
I can clear out, any minute. You've only got to sing out." To which his
brother had replied:--"Don't you talk of clearing out, not till Miss
Tarver she tells you." Moses' answer was:--"I'm agreeable, Dave"; and
the matter dropped until some time after, when he had made Dolly
Tarver's acquaintance. She, on hearing that her union with David would
send Mo again adrift, had threatened to declare off if such a thing was
so much as spoke of. So Moses had remained on, in the character of a
permanency saturated with temporariness; and, when the little boy Dave
began to take his place in Society, proceeded to appropriate--so said
the child's parents--more than an uncle's fair share of him.

Then came the tragedy of his mother's death, causing the Court to go
into mourning, and leaving Dave with a sister, too young to be c