And why?
It reproved her for not providing warmer clothes for the child; and hurt her penurious spirit with the too palpable conviction that before many weeks had passed they would be compelled to lay out some money for "the brat," as she had begun frequently to designate him to her husband, especially when she felt called upon to complain of him for idleness, carelessness, dulness, stupidity, wastefulness, uncleanliness, hoggishness, or some other one of the score of faults she found in a child of ten years old, whom she put down to work as steadily as a grown person.
A single month made a great change in his external appearance; such a change as would have made him unfamiliar even to his mother's eye.
While under her care, his clothes, though poor, had always been whole and clean--his skin well washed, and his hair combed smoothly.
Now, the color of his thin jacket and trowsers could scarcely have been told for the dust and grease which had become imbedded in their texture.

His skin was begrimed until it was many shades darker, and his hair stood stiffly about his head, in matted portions, looking as if a comb had not touched it for weeks.

One would hardly have imagined that so great a change could have passed upon a boy in a few weeks as had passed over him.

When he left his mother's humble abode, there was something about him that instantly attracted the eye of almost any one who looked at him attentively, and won for him favorable impressions.

His skin was pure and white, and his mild blue eyes, with their expression of innocent confidence, looked every one in the face openly.