Emilia Alessandra Belloni! I was glad to see my name.
I got two pupils very quickly one, an old lady, and one, a young one.
The old lady--I mean, she was not grey--wanted a gentleman to marry her, and the landlady told me--I mean my pupil--it makes me laugh--asked him what he thought of her voice: for I had been singing.

I earned a great deal of money: two pounds ten shillings a week.

I could afford to pay for lessons myself, I thought.

What an expense! I had to pay ten shillings for one lesson! Some have to pay twenty; but I would pay it to learn from the best masters;--and I had to make my father and mother live on potatoes, and myself too, of course.

If you buy potatoes carefully, they are extremely cheap things to live upon, and make you forget your hunger more than anything else.
"I suppose," added Emilia, "you have never lived upon potatoes entirely?
Oh, no!" Wilfrid gave a quiet negative.
"But I was pining to learn, and was obliged to keep them low.