"Oh, father!" they cried, "mother has been so ill to-day, and neighbor Nancy says she will never get well without some wine to make her strong!"
The ploughman groaned at hearing this. "Ah," thought he, "where can I get money for wine? I can scarcely earn food enough for so many; and who will give me wine?"
Pet was greatly distressed at finding these painful thoughts throbbing through and through her. "At home in my palace," she said, "everybody drinks a bottle of wine a day, and they are not sick, and are all strong. I must see about this afterwards." Then she went into the cottage, and the first thing she did was to take the clock out of her pocket and wind it up with the little key, and hang it on a nail on the wall.
"What is that you have got?" said the poor woman from her straw bed.
"Oh, it is a clock that a gentleman made me a present of," said the ploughman.
The eldest girl now poured out some porridge on a plate and set it down before her father. Pet was very hungry, and was glad of anything she could get; but she did not like the porridge, and thought that it was very different indeed from the food she got at home. But while she was eating, the poor man's thoughts quite overwhelmed her.
"What is to become of them all?" he thought. "I have ten children, and my wages are so small, and food and clothing are so dear. When the poor wife was well, she used to look after the cow and poultry, and turn a little penny, but now she is not able, and I fear——"
"Oh, father! father! the cow is dead!" cried four boys, rushing into the cottage.
And the poor man bowed his head on the table and groaned.
"Why, this is dreadful!" thought Pet. "Is this really the sort of thing that poor people suffer. How I wish the month was up that I might do something for them!" And she tried to glance at the clock, but could not, because the man kept his eyes bent on the ground.