up a new one, as
shines all over like silver, and it'll stand hard work, and it's just as
if it were all of a piece--that's like my wife now. But you get hold of
an old yaller crooked pin, with point bent down to scratch you, and when
you try to make use of it, the head's in the wrong place, it's got
slipped down, and the thick end of the pin runs into your finger, and
makes you holler out--that's like what my wife _was_. But she's not a
bit like that now; she's like the new pin, bless her; and it's been
Tommy Tracks--I begs his pardon--it's been Mr Thomas Bradly, and the
Bible, and the temperance pledge as has been and gone and done it all.

"And then there's the children. Why, they used to have scarce a whole
suit of clothes between 'em, and that were made of nearly as many odd
pieces and patches as there's days in the year. And as for boots, why,
when they'd got to go anywheres, one on 'em, on an errand, and wanted to
look a bit respectable, he were forced to put on the only pair of boots
as had got any soles to 'em, and that pair belonged to the middlemost,
but they fitted the eldest middlin' well, as they let in plenty of air
at the toes. And what's the case now? Why, on a Saturday night you can
see a whole row of boots standing two and two by the cupboard door, and
they shines so bright with blacking, the cat's fit to wear herself out
by setting up her back and spitting at her own likeness in 'em. It's
the gospel and temperance as has done this.

"But that ain't all. I've knowed two of our lads fight over a dirty
crust as they'd picked out of the gutter, for their mother hadn't got
nothing for them to eat,--how could she, poor thing, when the money had
all gone down my throat? It's very different now. We've good bread and
butter too on our table every day, with an onion or two, or a red
herring to give it a relish, and now and then a rasher of bacon, or a
bit of fresh meat; and before so very long I've good hopes as we shall
have a pig of our own. Eh! Won't that be jolly for the children? I
told 'em I thought of getting one soon. Says our little Tom, `Daddy,
how do they make the pig into bacon?' `They rub it with salt,' says I.
Next day, at dinner-time, I watched him put by a little salt into a
small bag, and next day too, and so on for a week. So at last I says,
`What's that for, Tommy?' `Daddy,' says he, `I'm keeping it for the new
pig. Eh! Won't I rub it into him, and make bacon of him, as s