And we 'ad to go on up and down the river as usual, for it was our livin', you see, and we couldn't get away from the place where everybody knew the slight that had been put upon my Pretty. You'd think p'raps that was as bad as might be, but it wasn't the worst.

We was beginnin' June then, and by the end of August I knew that what my Pretty 'ad gone through at the church was nothin' to what she'd got to go through. Her face got pale and thin, and she didn't fancy 'er food.

I suppose I ought to 'ave bin angry with her, for we'd always kept ourselves respectable; and I know if you spare the rod you spoil the child, and I felt I ought to tell her I didn't 'old with such wickedness; so one night when 'er father, 'e was up at the Rose and Crown, and she, a-settin' on the bank with 'er elbows on 'er knees and 'er chin in 'er 'ands, I says to 'er, 'You can't 'ide it no longer, my girl: I know all about it, you wicked, bad girl, you.'

And then she turned and looked at me like a dog does when you 'it it. 'O mother,' says she, 'O mother!' And with that I forgot everything about bein' angry with 'er, and I 'ad 'er in my arms in a minute, and we was 'oldin' each other as hard as hard.

'It was the night before the weddin',' says she, in a whisper. 'O mother, I didn't think there was any harm in it, and us so nearly man and wife.'

'My Pretty,' says I, for she was cryin' pitiful, 'don't 'e take on so, don't: there'll be the little baby by-and-by, and us 'ull love it as dear as if you'd been married in church twenty times over.'

'Ah, but father,' says she; 'he'll kill me when 'e knows.'

Well, I put 'er to bed and I made 'er a cup of strong tea, and I kissed 'er and covered 'er up with my heart like lead, and nobody as ain't a mother can know what a merry-go-round of misery I'd got in my head that night. And when my old man come 'ome I told 'im, and 'Don't be 'ard on the girl, for God's sake,' says I, 'for she's our own child and our only child, and it was the night before the weddin' as should 'ave bin.'

''Ard on 'er?' says 'e, and I'd never 'eard 'is voice so soft, not even when 'e was courtin' me, or when my Pretty was a little un, and 'e hushin' her to sleep. ''Ard on 'er? 'Ard on my precious lamb? It ain't us men who is 'ard on them things, it's you wimmen-folk; the day before 'er weddin', too!'

Then 'e was quiet for a bit—then 'e takes 'is shoes off so as not to make a clatter on the steps near where she slept, and 'e comes out in a minute with my Bible in 'is 'and.