Which of us wouldn't subscribe a shilling for poor Katy to
put into the first trouser pockets that ever she will wear? I remember
even yet, as a personal experience, that when first arrayed, at four
years old, in nankeen trousers, though still so far retaining
hermaphrodite relations of dress as to wear a petticoat above my
trousers, all my female friends (because they pitied me, as one that
had suffered from years of ague) filled my pockets with half-crowns, of
which I can render no account at this day. But what were my poor
pretensions by the side of Kate's? Kate was a fine blooming girl of
fifteen, with no touch of ague, and, before the next sun rises, Kate
shall draw on her first trousers, and made by her own hand; and, that
she may do so, of all the valuables in Aunty's repository she takes
nothing beside the shilling, _quantum sufficit_ of thread, one
stout needle, and (as I told you before, if you would please to
remember things) one bad pair of scissors. Now she was ready; ready to
cast off St. Sebastian's towing-rope; ready to cut and run for port
anywhere. The finishing touch of her preparations was to pick out the
proper keys: even there she showed the same discretion. She did do no
gratuitous mischief. She did not take the wine-cellar key, which would
have irritated the good father confessor; she took those keys only that
belonged to _her_, if ever keys did; for they were the keys that
locked her out from her natural birthright of liberty.
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