Mrs.Woodward was with her at the time, and she had suffered but little except that for three weeks she was unable to see her husband; then, in the teeth of all counsel, and in opposition to all medical warning, she could resist no longer, and carried the newborn stranger to his father.
'Poor little wretch!' said Alaric, as he stooped to kiss him.
'Wretch!' said Gertrude, looking up to him with a smile upon her face--'he is no wretch.

He is a sturdy little man, that shall yet live to make your heart dance with joy.' Mrs.Woodward came often to see her.

She did not stay, for there was no bed in which she could have slept; but the train put her down at Vauxhall, and she had but to pass the bridge, and she was close to Gertrude's lodgings.

And now the six months had nearly gone by, when, by appointment, she brought Norman with her.

At this time he had given up his clerkship at the Weights and Measures, and was about to go to Normansgrove for the remainder of the winter.