n her
mother's dress.

"Go with this lady, Mary, my dear," said the mother.

"I'll show you some pretty pictures," said Mrs. Bungay, with the voice
of an ogress, "and some nice things besides; look here,"--and opening
her brown-paper parcel, Mrs. Bungay displayed some choice sweet
buscuits, such as her Bungay loved after his wine. Little Mary followed
after this attraction, the whole party entering at the private entrance,
from which a side door led into Mr. Bungay's commercial apartments.
Here, however, as the child was about to part from her mother, her
courage again failed her, and again she ran to the maternal petticoat;
upon which the kind and gentle Mrs. Shandon, seeing the look of
disappointment in Mrs. Bungay's face, good-naturedly said, "If you will
let me, I will come up too, and sit for a few minutes," and so the three
females ascended the stairs together. A second biscuit charmed little
Mary into perfect confidence, and in a minute or two she prattled away
without the least restraint.

Faithful Finucane meanwhile found Mr. Bungay in a severer mood than he
had been on the night previous, when two-thirds of a bottle of port,
and two large glasses of brandy-and-water, had warmed his soul into
enthusiasm, and made him generous in his promises towards Captain
Shandon. His impetuous wife had rebuked him on his return home. She
had ordered that he should give no relief to the Captain; he was a
good-for-nothing fellow, whom no money would help; she disapproved of
the plan of the Pall Mall Gazette, and expected that Bungay would only
lose his money in it as they were losing over the way (she always called
her brother's establishment "over the way") by the Whitehall Journal.
Let Shandon stop in prison and do his work; it was the best place for
him. In vain Finucane pleaded and promised and implored, for his friend
Bungay had had an hour's lecture in the morning and was inexorable.

But what honest Jack failed to do below-stairs in the counting-house,
the pretty faces and manners of the mother and child were effecting in
the drawing-room, where they were melting the fierce but really soft
Mrs. Bungay. There was an artless sweetness in Mrs. Shandon's voice, and
a winning frankness of manner, which made most people fond of her,
and pity her: and taking courage by the rugged kindness with which her
hostess received her, the Captain's lady told her story, and described
her husband's goodness and virtues, and her child'