Treats still further of Riches, Poverty, Babies, and Police.

When Mr and Mrs Twitter had dismissed the few friends that night, they sat down at their own fireside, with no one near them but the little foundling, which lay in the youngest Twitter’s disused cradle, gazing at them with its usual solemnity, for it did not seem to require sleep. They opened up their minds to each other thus:—

“Now, Samuel,” said Mrs Twitter, “the question is, what are you going to do with it?”

“Well, Mariar,” returned her spouse¹, with an assumption of profound gravity, “I suppose we must send it to the workhouse.”

“You know quite well, Sam, that you don’t mean that,” said Mrs Twitter, “the dear little forsaken² mite³! Just look at its solemn eyes. It has been clearly cast upon us, Sam, and it seems to me that we are bound to look after it.”

“What! with six of our own, Mariar?”

“Yes, Sam. Isn’t there a song which says something about luck in odd numbers?”

“And with only 500 pounds a year?” objected Mr Twitter.

“Only five hundred. How can you speak so? We are rich with five hundred. Can we not educate our little ones?”

“Yes, my dear.”

“And entertain our friends?”

“Yes, my love,—with crumpets and tea.”

“Don’t forget muffins and bloater paste, and German sausage and occasional legs of mutton, you ungrateful man!”

“I don’t forget ’em, Mariar. My recollection of ’em is powerful; I may even say vivid.”

“Well,” continued the lady, “haven’t you been able to lend small sums on several occasions to friends—”

“Yes, my dear,—and they are still loans,” murmured the husband.

“And don’t we give a little—I sometimes think too little—regularly to the poor, and to the church, and haven’t we got a nest-egg laid by in the Post-office savings-bank?”

“All true, Mariar, and all your doing. But for your thrifty⁴ ways, and economical tendencies, and rare financial abilities, I should have been bankrupt long ere now.”

分享到：