LITTLE DORRIT AND MAGGIE.
"SHE HAS NEVER GROWN OLDER SINCE."
"Yes, I am afraid I am very little indeed," returned the child, and began to sob, so that the milliner was touched, and took her in hand and made her a clever workwoman.
But the father could not bear the idea that his children should work for their living, so they had to keep it all secret. Fanny became a dancer, and lived with a poor old uncle, who played the clarionet at the small theatre where Fanny was engaged. Amy, or little Dorrit as she was generally called, her father's name being Dorrit, earned small sums by going out to do needlework. She got Edward into a great many situations, but he was an idle, careless fellow, and always came back to be a burden and care to his poor little sister. At last she saved up enough to send him out to Canada.
"God bless you, dear Tip" (his name had been shortened to Tip), "don't be too proud to come and see us when you have made your fortune," she said.
But Tip only went as far as Liverpool, and appeared once more before his poor little second mother, in rags, and with no shoes.
In the end, after another trial, Tip returned telling Amy, that this time he was "one of the regulars."
"Oh! Don't say you are a prisoner, Tip. Don't, don't!"
But he was—and Amy nearly broke her heart. So with all these cares and worries struggling bravely on, little Dorrit passed the first twenty-two years of her life. Then the son of a lady, Mrs. Clennem, to whose house Amy went to do needlework, was interested in the pale, patient little creature, and learning her history resolved to do his best to try and get her father released, and to help them all.