The room they occupied was
cold and cheerless; the warmth of the scanty fire being scarcely
felt; yet the floor, and every article of furniture, mean as they
were, were scrupulously neat and clean.
The appearance of this family indicated that they were very poor.
They were all thin and pale, really for want of proper food, and
their clothes had been patched until it was difficult to decide what
the original fabric had been; yet this very circumstance spoke
volume in favour of the mother. She was, a woman of great energy of
character, unfortunately united to a man whose habits were such,
that, for the greater part of the time, he was a dead weight upon
her hands; although not habitually intemperate, he was indolent and
good-for-nothing to a degree, lying in the sun half his time, when
the weather was warm, and never doing a stroke of work until driven
to it by the pangs of hunger.
As for the wife, by taking in sewing, knitting, and spinning for the
farmers' families in the neighbourhood, she managed to pay a rent of
twenty dollars for the cabin in which they lived; while she and
Johnny, with what assistance they could occasionally get from Jerry,
her husband, tilled the half acre of ground attached; and the
vegetables thus obtained, were their main dependance during the long
winter just at hand.
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