'But I think you found him serve you badly enough,' said Mr. Pennycomequick, from his berth, 'to walk off with your savings and leave you with nothing.'
'Nay, not exactly,' answered Anne. 'There wor this pipe for wun, he left; and,' after a pause, 'there wer Jozeph. T'bairn came varra comfortin' when I wer i' a tew aboot loising ma' brass. Besides, t' lad, Joe, ha' been ov use to me as much as I paid a lad afore seven shilling a week, and he hev a' been t'same to me for six years. If tha comes ta reckon at fifty-two weeks i't year, that's eighteen pound ten per hannum; and for six year that mounts up to nigh on a hundred and ten pound, which is a scoering off of t' account.'
'And that is his pipe you are smoking?'
'Ees, for sartaen. I sed I'd keep't aleet, and if he comes back at t' end o' seven more year, I'll say, "There, Earle, is t'pipe burning, and as for't account, Joe hev a' scored it off, interest and principal."'
CHAPTER XVI.
WHO? WHAT?
It is hateful—hateful as poison—the packing, the turning out of drawers, and then the tilting of the drawers to get out the dust and grit and flue that has accumulated in the corners; the arranging of correspondence, the discrimination between valuables and things that may become valuable, and things that are not, but were valuable; the throwing away of rubbish, the consideration as to what things are to be disposed of, and if disposed of, how to be disposed of, and to whom, and all the business and care and misery of change of quarters.
And yet, how out of thorns spring roses, and out of troubles virtues come into bloom! Never, probably, in our whole career did charity, the bond of all virtues, so luxuriate, throw out such all-embracing tendrils, emit such fragrance, ripen into such fruit, as on the occasion of change of quarters. Old boots, slightly damaged bonnets, heavy battered pieces of furniture, for which a dealer would not give sixpence; articles that would fetch nothing in a sale, antiquated school-books, magazines five years old, novels that have lost their backs, games, deficient in one or two pieces, odd gloves, iron bedsteads minus their brass knobs, and that have to be tied together with wire; cracked dishes, snipped tumblers, saucepans corroded with rust—with what lavish and lordly magnificence we distribute them to all who will accept such alms.
And then—what a lesson does change of quarters teach us, to discriminate between the worthless and the valuable; and with equanimity to endure separation from things which have become interesting to us, but which we cannot remove. When the author was a boy, his life was spent in travelling on the Continent; in rambles from the Pyrenees to the plains of Hungary, from the Mediterranean to the Baltic, and wherever he went, he made collections of objects of curiosity, crystals, petrifactions, dried flowers, butterflies, mediæval armour, books. Before quitting any place of sojourn for a winter, or halt for a night, his father explored every pocket and crevice of the carriage, and turned out the treasures there secreted, on which his son's heart were set and his pocket-money had been expended.
Nothing escaped his eye, nothing melted his heart. The author came to a place bringing nothing with him, and left it, carrying nothing with him away, all he acquired he was forced to leave. It was an excellent discipline for life, and yet hardly attained; even to this day he finds that he clings to trifles.