She wore an old-fashioned, high-crowned cap, and a gown of bed-curtain chintz, with flowers on it the size of a saucer.

It was a curious gown, and very cheap, for Mrs.Grumbit was poor.

No one knew the extent of her poverty, any more than they did her age; but she herself knew it, and felt it deeply,--never so deeply, perhaps, as when her orphan nephew Martin grew old enough to be put to school, and she had not wherewithal to send him.

But love is quick-witted and resolute.

A residence of six years in Germany had taught her to knit stockings at a rate that cannot be described, neither conceived unless seen.