It was quite true that the grains of it were hard and sharp, so as to give one an idea that it would make good eating neither for women nor children. The millers and dealers, who of course made their profits in these times, did frequently grind up the whole corn without separating the grain from the husks, and the shell of a grain of Indian corn does not, when ground, become soft flour. This woman had reason for her complaints, as had many thousands reason for similar complaints.
"Don't be throubling the ladies, Kitty," said an old man standing by; "sure and weren't you glad enough to be getting it."
"She'd be axing the ladies to go home wid her and cook it for her after giving it her," said another.
"Who says it war guv' me?" said the angry mother. "Didn't I buy it, here at this counter, with Mike's own hard-'arned money? and it's chaiting us they are. Give me back my money." And she looked at Clara as though she meant to attack her across the counter.
"Mr. Fitzgerald is going to put up a mill of his own, and then the corn will be better ground," said Emmeline Fitzgerald, deprecating the woman's wrath.
"Put up a mill!" said the woman, still in scorn. "Are you going to give me back my money; or food that my poor bairns can ate?"
This individual little difficulty was ended by a donation to the angry woman of another lot of meal, in taking away which she was careful not to leave behind her the mess which she had brought in her handkerchief. But she expressed no thanks on being so treated.
The hardest burden which had to be borne by those who exerted themselves at this period was the ingratitude of the poor for whom they worked;—or rather I should say thanklessness. To call them ungrateful would imply too deep a reproach, for their convictions were that they were being ill used by the upper classes. When they received bad meal which they could not cook, and even in their extreme hunger could hardly eat half-cooked; when they were desired to leave their cabins and gardens, and flock into the wretched barracks which were prepared for them; when they saw their children wasting away under a suddenly altered system of diet, it would have been unreasonable to expect that they should have been grateful. Grateful for what? Had they not at any rate a right to claim life, to demand food that should keep them and their young ones alive? But not the less was it a hard task for delicate women to work hard, and to feel that all their work was unappreciated by those whom they so thoroughly commiserated, whose sufferings they were so anxious to relieve.
It was almost dark before they left Berryhill, and then they had to go out of their way to pick up Aunt Letty at Mr. Townsend's house.
"Don't go in whatever you do, girls," said Herbert; "we should never get away."