One day when he was walking home with little Dorrit a voice was heard calling, "Little Mother, Little Mother," and a strange figure came bouncing up to them and fell down, scattering her basketful of potatoes on the ground. "Oh Maggie," said Little Dorrit, "what a clumsy child you are!"
She was about eight and twenty, with large bones, large features, large hands and feet, large eyes and no hair. Little Dorrit told Mr. Clennem that Maggie was the grand-daughter of her old nurse, and that her grandmother had been very unkind to her and beat her. "When Maggie was ten years old, she had a fever, and she has never grown older since."
"Ten years old," said Maggie. "But what a nice hospital! So comfortable wasn't it? Such a Ev'nly place! Such beds there is there! Such lemonades! Such oranges! Such delicious broth and wine! Such chicking! Oh, AIN'T it a delightful place to stop at!"
"Then when she came out, her grandmother did not know what to do with her, and was very unkind. But after some time, Maggie tried to improve, and was very attentive and industrious, and now she can earn her own living entirely, sir!"
Little Dorrit did not say who had taken pains to teach and encourage the poor half-witted creature, but Mr. Clennem guessed from the name Little Mother, and the fondness of the poor creature for Amy.
Thanks to Mr. Clennem, a great change took place in the fortunes of the family, and not long after this wretched night, it was discovered that Mr. Dorrit was owner of a large property, and they became very rich.
When, in his turn, Mr. Clennem became a prisoner in the Marshalsea little Dorrit came to comfort and console him, and after many changes of fortune, she became his wife, and they lived happy ever after.
THE BLIND TOY-MAKER.
CALEB PLUMMER and his blind daughter lived alone in a little cracked nutshell of a house. They were toy-makers, and their house was stuck like a toadstool on to the premises of Messrs. Gruff & Tackleton, the Toy Merchants for whom they worked,—the latter of whom was himself both Gruff and Tackleton in one.