"Then, here and there, there are wide commons,
high up as if above the very tops of the
trees—"

"I am glad of that. I felt smothered like
down below. When I have gone for an exit,
I have always wanted to get high up and see
far away, and take a deep breath o' fulness in
that air. I get smothered enough in Milton,
and I think the sound yo' speak of among the
trees, going on for ever and ever, would
send me dazed; it's that made my head ache
so in the mill. Now on these commons I
reckon there is but little noise?"

"No," said Margaret; " nothing but here
and there a lark high in the air. Sometimes
I used to hear a farmer speaking sharp and
loud to his servants; but it was so far away
that it only reminded me pleasantly that
other people were hard at work in some
distant place while I just sat on the heather
and did nothing."

"I used to think once that if I could have
a day of doing nothing, to rest me— a day in
some quiet place like that yo' speak on— it
would maybe set me up. But now I've had
many days o' idleness, and I'm just as weary
o' them as I was o' my work. Sometimes
I'm so tired out I think I cannot enjoy
heaven without a piece of rest first. I'm
rather afeard o' going straight there without
getting a good sleep in the grave to set
me up."

"Don't be afraid, Bessy," said Margaret,
laying her hand on the girl's; " God can give
you more perfect rest than even idleness on
earth, or the dead sleep of the grave can do."

Bessy moved uneasily; then she said:

"I wish father would not speak as he does.
He means well, as I telled yo' yesterday, and
tell yo' again and again. But yo' see, though
I don't believe him a bit by day, yet by night
—when I'm in a fever, half-asleep and half-awake—
it comes back upon me—oh! so bad!
And I think, if this should be th' end of all,
and if all I've been born for is just to
work my heart and my life away, and to
sicken i' this dree place, wi' them mill-
noises in my ears for ever, until I could
scream out for them to stop, and let me
have a little piece o' quiet—and wi' the
fluff filling my lungs, until I thirst to death
for one long deep breath o' the clear air yo'
speak on—and my mother gone, and I never
able to tell her again how I loved her, and o'
all my troubles,— I think if this life is th' end,
and that there's no God to wipe away all
tears from all eyes— yo' wench, yo'! " said
she, sitting up, and clutching violently, almost
fiercely, at Margaret's hand, "I could go
mad, and kill yo', I could." She fell back
completely worn out with her passion.
Margaret knelt down by her.

"Bessy— we have a Father in heaven."

"I know it! I know it! " moaned she,
turning her head uneasily from side to side.
"I am very wicked. I have spoken very
wickedly. Oh! don't be frightened by me
and never come again. I would not harm
a hair of your head. And," opening her
eyes, and looking earnestly at Margaret,
"I believe, perhaps, more than yo' do o'
what's to come, i read the Book o' Revelations
until I know it off by heart, and I
never doubt when I'm waking, and in my
senses, of all the glory I'm to come to."

"Don't let us talk of what fancies come
into your head when you are feverish. I
would rather hear something about what
you used to do when you were well."

"I think I was well when mother died,
but I have never been rightly strong sin'
somewhere about that time. I began to
work in a carding room soon after, and the
fluff got into my lungs, and poisoned me."

"Fluff?" said Margaret, inquiringly.

"Fluff," repeated Bessy. " Little bits, as
fly off fro' the cotton, when they're carding
it, and fill the air till it looks all fine white
dust. They say it winds round the lungs,
and tightens them up. Anyhow, there's
many a one as works in a carding-room,
who falls into a waste, coughing and spitting
blood, because they're just poisoned by the
fluff."

"But can't it be helped?" asked Margaret.

"I dunno. Some folk have a great wheel
at one end o' their carding-rooms to make a
draught, and carry off th' dust; but that
wheel costs a deal o' money—five or six hundred
pound, maybe, and brings in no profit;
so it's but a few of th' masters as will put 'em
up; and I've heerd tell o' men who did not
like working in places where there was a
wheel, because they said as how it made 'em
hungry, at after they'd been long used to swallowing
fluff, to go without it, and that their
wage ought to be raised if they were to work
in such places. So between masters and men
th' wheels fall through. I know I wish there'd
been a wheel in our place, though."

"Did not your father know about it?"
asked Margaret.

"Yes! And he were sorry. But our factory
were a good one on the whole; and a
steady likely set o' people; and father was
afeared of letting me go to a strange place,
for tho' yo' would na think it now, many a
one then used to call me a gradely lass
enough. And I did na' like to be reckoned
nesh and soft, and Mary's schooling were to
be kept up, mother said, and father he were
always liking to buy books, and go to lectures
o' one kind or another— all which took
money— so I just worked on till I shall ne'er
get the whirr out o' my ears, or the fluff
out o' my throat i' this world. That's all."

"How old are you?" asked Margaret.

"Nineteen, come July."

"And I too am nineteen." She thought,
more sorrowfully than Bessy did, of the contrast
between them. She could not speak
for a moment or two for the emotion she was
trying to keep down.

"About Mary! " said Bessy. " I wanted to