Her few chairs and tables looked as if waxed; the paint was polished in places from her doors and window-casings; her window-glass gave out green lights like jewels; and all this she did with infinite pains and slowness, as there was hardly a natural movement left in her rheumatic hands.

But there was in her nature an element of stern activity that must have its outcome in some direction, and it took the one that it could find.

Jane had used to take in sewing before her hands were diseased.

In her youth she had learned the trade of a tailoress; when ready-made clothing, even for children, came into use, she made dresses.

Her dresses had been long-waisted and stiffly boned, with high, straight biases, seemingly fitted to her own nature instead of her customers' forms; but they had been strongly and faithfully sewed, and her stitches held fast as the rivets on a coat of mail.