from behind her, between the letter and her
eye, and gripped her fast by the wrist in an
instant.

She turned with a shriek of terror; and found
herself face to face with old Mazey.

AN ACT OF MERCY.
IN TWO PARTS.

PART 1. THE NECESSITY FOR THE ACT.

SOME time since, an article appeared in this
periodical in which an attempt was made to give
its readers some idea of a terrible disaster which
befel certain men whose business it was to dig
out of the heart of the earth, the fuel which we
use every day of our lives.* It is now proposed
in like manner to put before the reader another
case a little analogous to that just spoken of—
another instance of another kind of mischance
overtaking a large company of our fellow-men
and women who were engaged in providing us
with what is almost as necessary to us as the
coals we burn or the food we eat. If the present
disaster be less horrible than that which befel the
Hartley colliers, and so has less claim on certain
of our emotions, it must be remembered, on the
other hand, that it is much more widely diffused.
If the wretchedness of the sufferers in Lancashire
be less in degree than that of the sufferers in
Northumberland, it makes up for this in being
infinitely greater in amount.

* See volume vi., page 492.

The Lancashire distress— the distress in the
cotton districts—the cotton famine— the starving
operatives—these and the like terms are so
continually before people's eyes just now, that
one is almost inclined to be fearful in writing on
the subjects which are usually discussed under
these heads, lest the reader should turn away
from any fresh attempt to illustrate the painful
theme, convinced that he knows enough about
it already, and that there can be no new thing
to be said, but only a continual reiteration
of what has been before stated over and over
again. But the reader is entreated to listen yet
once more, while an attempt is made, by one
who was eye-witness of what he describes, to
tell a plain tale about a great trouble patiently
endured, and a great Act of Mercy, done without
grudging.

Is it possible by mere words to convey to
those who have never seen any abjectly poor
place, an idea of the utter bareness, and
ugliness, and horror, of a room in one of the
byways of Manchester— a room from which, by
degrees every article has been removed except a
small, dirty, rickety table of blackened deal,
and a receptacle in a corner for holding one or
two cracked plates and teacups? A chair with
the bottom out can hardly be called a piece of
furniture, nor a strap nailed against the wall, with
one black-handled knife and one black-handled
fork stuck into it. A heap of shavings— by no
means a large one— in a corner, is as little
worthy of the name of a bed, as the bottomless
framework of wood and rushes near it, is to be
called a chair. A boy, about eight years old,
with bare feet, stands awkwardly by the table.
His face would be white as a sheet, if it were
not black with dirt. He is occupied in desperately
cramming a pewter spoon into his mouth.
There is nothing in the spoon, but he sucks it,
almost gnaws it, as if the next best thing to
having something to eat was to come in contact
with an object which had been used in connexion
with eating in more prosperous days. A
very little child, whose white face is even
dirtier than that of the boy with the spoon, and
whose poor little arms and legs are blacker than
its face, is sitting on the bare floor, in the very
middle of the room, with an oblong black object
in each hand, which at first it is difficult to
make anything of. On very close inspection,
however, these objects turn out to be playing-
cards. This miserable little skinny creature,
half naked, pale, and dirty, is said, by its mother,
a slatternly woman herself, to be almost as fond
of cinders as bread. It is a frightfully wide-
awake and thin infant, and sitting there on the
floor, with a playing-card in each hand, looks
like a precocious gamester involved in
premature ruin by a passion for play.

I don't know that the grim horror of this,
could, by any means, have been exceeded.
Everything in that room was of a blackish-
grey tint—and the blackest grey of all was the
flesh-colour of that poor little cinder-wallowing
gamester. It was a thing to laugh at, and to
cry over, at once—a thing to see— and to
commemorate. A thing never to be forgotten, never,
by rights, to lose its influence in making one
grateful and contented. Remember, there was
no bed nor bedding in the room— the heap of
shavings did duty for both, and a few thin
miserable rags were the only representatives of
quilt, blankets, and sheet.

I am not in the least prepared to say
that this is what is called a very " deserving
case." I do not at this moment remember
what the husband of the slatternly woman was,
though I think he was a weaver, out of employment.
I dare say he had been improvident; (I
dare say you have been so, Reader; I dare
say you have been so, Writer). I am pretty
sure the woman was a slattern, and I am
quite sure that she made no attempt to rally
against her trouble, and to try to keep her room
and her children clean. Still I hold that such a
state of things as this, is deserving of
commemoration, and of early attention. I know of no
animal set so little store by, so lightly valued,
so ill kept, as the human animals here described.
They may be counted by hundreds in these
manufacturing districts just now.

And yet of cases such as this, one is told—
and perhaps with justice— that they are not
the fairest specimens of the distress actually
resulting from the mill-stoppages in
Lancashire. Such extreme cases exist at all times,
and under all circumstances, and are rarely,
if ever, found unconnected with improvidence
and mismanagement. Let us turn our
attention, then, in another direction.