He kept sayin', 'Oh, he could do
it,' an' sich like; but aw could see that he were fair killin'
hissel', just for the sake o' comin' to his own whoam ov a neet; an'
for th' sake o' savin' two or three shillin'; so at last aw turned
Turk, an' made him tak lodgin's theer. Aw'd summut to do to persuade
him at first, an' aw know that he's as whoam-sick as a chylt that's
lost its mother, just this minute; but then, what's th' matter o'
that,--it wouldn't do for mo to have him laid up, yo known. . . .
Oh, he's a very feelin' mon. Aw've sin him when he couldn't finish
his bit o' dinner for thinkin' o' somebody that were clemmin'."
Speaking of the hardships the family had experienced, she said, "Eh,
bless yo! There's some folk can sit i'th heawse an' send their
childer to prow eawt a-beggin' in a mornin', regilar,--but eawr
childer wouldn't do it,--an', iv they would, aw wouldn' let 'em,--
naw, not iv we were clemmin' to deeoth,--to my thinkin'."
The woman was quite right. Among the hard-tried operatives of
Lancashire I have seen several instances in which they have gone out
daily to beg; and some rare cases, even, in which they have stayed
moodily at home themselves and sent their children forth to beg; and
anybody living in this county will have noticed the increase of
mendicancy there, during the last few months.
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