Part 2

The daylight increased every instant, and Willy saw that the sides of the tunnel as well as the arch overhead were built of bricks.

"Just like the brick walls of a house," said he; "if I had known that, I should not have been afraid of the hill falling upon us and crushing us. I thought the tunnel was only a hole made through the ground."

"In some places," said his father, "that is really the case; but then it is where the ground is made of hard rock, so that it is as strong and even stronger than a brick wall."

"It is like building a house of stone, like our country house, instead of bricks, like our house in London."

"Yes," replied his father, "only the stone walls of a tunnel are not built, they are there all ready made; you have only to cut a road through them."

"How hard it must be to dig through the solid rock! they cannot do it with a spade, can they?"

"No; sometimes they work with a pickaxe, and sometimes they blow up pieces of the rock with gunpowder; but that you are too young to understand."

Just then the train came out of the tunnel, and Willy was quite delighted to see daylight once more. He now began to feel very hungry, and inquired of his Mamma when he should dine?

"We shall very soon arrive at a station," replied she, "where the train will stop for ten minutes, and as I do not think you can eat your dinner in so short a time, I believe that you must dine with us when we reach Derby; you may eat a luncheon at the station, and then you will be able to wait for a late dinner."

To dine in the dining-room with Papa and Mamma was a treat Willy had never yet known, and he could not help jumping about for joy; then recollecting the old lady, he stopped suddenly, fearful of disturbing her; but she observed his forbearance, and said, "Jump on, my lad, in your own corner; I like to see children happy when they are good." But if Willy had not disturbed the old lady, he had awakened the young one, and she awoke in very bad humour; her eyes were so swelled with crying, that Willy scarcely knew her again, and thought she looked ugly rather than pretty. She too was hungry, and said the carriage must turn about and go home to have dinner; her mother promised she should have her dinner very soon, the first time they stopped; so then Harriet made up her mind to grumble and whine until that time arrived. Willy looked at her, and thought what a sad thing it was to be a spoiled child.

OLD AND YOUNG.

The train now arrived at the Wolverton station, where most of the passengers alighted to take some refreshment. There was a large room, and tables covered with good things for travellers to eat. Willy would have filled his pockets with sweet cakes and fruit; but his mother knew that would not be good for him, so she allowed him to take a large bun, and then gave him some sandwiches. He had hardly finished eating them, when the little bell was heard ting-a-ring-a-ring; and every body understood what it meant. "It seems to say," cried Willy, "come away, ladies, come away, gentlemen, from all those nice things, or you will lose your places; we are going to set off." A great bustle there was, to be sure, with the crowd of people who were pushing their way out of the room door, and then hurrying to their carriages.

When Willy and his Papa got into their carriage, they found neither the old lady nor the spoiled child and her mother, but some gentlemen had taken their places. And in another minute the train began to move.

"Oh dear!" cried Willy, "they will be left behind; what will they do?"

"They have no doubt come to the end of their journey, and are gone to the town, in which they live, in one of those little carriages called flies."

"Flies, Papa," repeated Willy, "why are they called flies? for they are not a bit like one."

"The carriage is not like the shape of a fly," said his father; "but it is like one by the quickness of its motion. Flying is quicker than trotting or galloping, and these carriages are called flies because they go so fast." They were all glad to have got rid of the spoiled child. Their new fellow travellers talked among themselves, and Willy and his parents did so too. Willy felt very grateful to the old lady for all she had shown him; "yet still, Mamma," said he, "it was rather hard, I think, to throw my ball out of the window; for we did not hit her bonnet on purpose. And then, as for laughing, to be sure that was very wrong; but it was so funny, how could we help it?"

"Do you think, if the same thing were to happen again, you would laugh?"

"Oh no, certainly, I should be more careful now that I know I should lose my ball."

"The old lady gave you warning; and you see that the lesson has not been lost."

"But I am sure _you_ would not have done so, Mamma, if you had been the old lady."

"We ought, my dear, to make some allowance for the infirmities of old people, which often make them peevish and irritable."

"What are infirmities, Mamma?" asked Willy.

"Old people can neither see nor hear so well as young ones, because their eyes and their ears become worn out."

"Yes," said Willy, "the old lady was obliged to put on her spectacles when she read in her book; and she made me repeat what I said often, because she could not hear me till I spoke louder."

"That," continued his mother, "is owing to her eyes and her ears being a good deal worn out; and that is the case, I dare say, also, with her limbs; her legs begin to feel that her body is a great weight to carry about; and she cannot run, nor even walk so quickly as you can. Then often old people cannot sleep at night, which makes them tired in the day time; all these complaints, though not exactly illnesses, are called infirmities, and are very wearisome to bear; it is therefore the duty of the young to do all in their power to make the old as comfortable as they can, and to put up with a little fretfulness and ill temper on their part, without being angry."

"Oh, poor lady!" exclaimed Willy; "well, when I meet with a cross old man or woman, I will think of those infirmities you have been telling me of. I am sure if I had known about them, I should never have laughed at the old lady when she looked so funny with the ball stuck in her bonnet."

"That's right, my dear," said his mother; "and on the other hand, I think the old lady might have had a little more indulgence for the weakness of children--for children," continued she, "have their infirmities as well as old people."

"Why what, Mamma?" cried Willy, with surprise; "I am sure I can run and walk, ay, and skip and jump as well as any body, and see and hear too."

"The infirmities of childhood are not in general of the same nature as those of old age; and yet there is often a great resemblance between the two. A child is feeble, because it has not grown up to its strength; an old person is feeble, because she has lost strength. Little Sophy is often obliged to be carried in her nurse's arms, because she is tired of walking; Grandmamma can only walk a little way either, and wants a stick to support her. Sophy suffers from tooth-ache, because she is cutting her teeth, which means that her teeth are growing; Grandmamma has the tooth-ache, because her teeth are grown old and decayed. Sophy is fed with pap and soft food, because she has no teeth to chew with; and Grandmamma is obliged to mince her meat, because the few teeth she has are too much worn out to be able to chew meat."

"Well," said Willy, "I never should have thought Sophy and Grandmamma had been so much alike! I am sure they do not look alike at all, Mamma."

"No; in looks, youth has all the advantage."

They now passed a luggage train which was stopping at one of the stations, and Willy was very much amused with seeing the number of cattle, and sheep, and pigs that were closely lodged in the waggons. "I think those poor creatures are too crowded to be comfortable," observed he; "I dare say they would like better travelling on foot, as the flocks of sheep often do."

"I doubt it," said his Mother, "for all along the road the dogs and men are worrying them to keep them together, and then they are sadly tired before the day is over: don't you think you would be tired?"

"Oh, that I am sure I should, but then I have only two legs to walk on, and they have four; so it must be much easier for them. I wish old people had four legs," continued he, "then they would not feel the weight of their bodies so great: I know a poor old man who makes himself two legs of wood besides his own live legs, and that is old Carter, who walks on crutches; and then Grandmamma has three legs, when she walks with a stick."

THE THIRD CLASS CARRIAGES, OR THE MARKET GIRL.

Willy's Papa told him that as he had been so long travelling in the coach which was a close carriage, he would take him to another part of the train where the carriages were open, as he had promised to do.

Willy was much pleased at this, and when the train stopped at a station, they got out, and walked to another part of it.

He saw nothing like the open carriages he had been used to; there was neither phaeton, nor gig, nor caleche; there were, it is true, a number of immensely large carts full of people carrying baskets, and they sat down on plain wooden seats in long rows. Willy with his Papa and Mamma sat next to a rosy-cheeked young woman, who had a large basket of live fowls, and a smaller one of eggs and butter.

"I am sure you could not carry those heavy baskets?" said Willy.

"No, that I could not indeed," replied the young woman; "I am obliged to get some one to help me to take them from the station to market, or else pay the omnibus for doing so. But before we had a railroad, I did not go so far as Derby; I sold my things at Kegworth, and I could get no price for fowls there; so I only took butter and eggs to market."

Willy had already made an acquaintance with the fowls in the basket, the young woman having placed it under his feet as a footstool, for his little legs were too short to reach the ground. Now Willy having a piece of the bun in his hand, the remains of the luncheon, which he was only nibbling because he was no longer hungry, some of the crumbs fell into the basket and were greedily picked up by the chickens; and finding it very good, they tried to put their beaks between the twigs of the wicker to catch some more. Willy, seeing this, every now and then fed them; but there was one old hen who, being stronger than the chickens, pushed them away, in order to get all the crumbs for herself. "No, no," said Willy, "get away, and let the chickens have their share." However, the hen at last contrived to thrust her head through the bars of the basket, but there she was caught, for she could not get it back again. This made Willy laugh. "It serves you right," said he, "I am sure you cannot swallow anything now you are caught in a trap;" but when he saw that the hen was really choking in struggling to get her head free, he was sorry for her, and the young woman opened the basket, and got the head of the hen back again, but she was a good deal hurt, and lay at the bottom of the basket very sulky.

"She is well punished for her greediness," said the girl, "but she will have time to come round again before I get to market, or else I should not be able to sell her; folks would fancy there was something the matter with her, and I want to get a good price for my fowls, that I may have something more than my mother reckons on: and then I shall be able to spend that in tea and sugar; for tea, she says, comforts her more than any thing."

"Is anything the matter with your mother," asked Willy, "that she wants to be comforted?"

"Oh dear, she is blind," said the girl, "and I am sure that's uncomfortable enough. Stone blind! and yet she is not an old woman neither, but she has got what the doctors call a cataract, and they say it can be cured, but that the time is not yet come to cure it; but when it does, we are to take her to Derby to the hospital, and there the doctors will do something to her eyes. Oh, I don't like to think of it," said she, shuddering, "but then they say she will see again, just as she did years ago."

"You need not be afraid of the operation for your mother," said Willy's mother; "I assure you it is not painful."

"Why, sure you have not had it done to your eyes, Ma'am?"

"No; but I know from those who have: it is called _couching_, and if the eyes are carefully bound up afterwards till they get strong, she may see as well as ever."

"But," said Willy, "I suppose you will stay with her at the hospital to take care of her."

"No; I shall not be able," replied the market girl, "I must stay at home to take care of the house, and of my younger brother and sister, Johnny and Betsey, who go to school."

"Then," asked Willy, "does no body stay with your poor blind mother when you go to market?"

"It's lucky enough that one of the market days is of a Saturday, when there is a holiday at school, and on Thursdays, that's to-day, the little girl stays at home on purpose to attend to mother. Then, as for the hospital, she will want for no care there, for we have a grandmother living at Derby, and though she is old, she makes as good a nurse as anyone; and she will be sure to take care of her own daughter. Besides, there are plenty of doctors and nurses at the hospital," said she. "Oh, Derby's a famous place for poor folks; I suppose you know all about the fine gardens Mr. Joseph Strutt has made for the people to walk about and amuse themselves in?"

"No, indeed," replied Willy's mother; "we do not know Mr. Joseph Strutt."

"Not know him!" cried the girl, lifting up her hands with astonishment, "I thought every body knew Mr. Joseph Strutt. Well, you are going to Derby, where he lives; so pray go and see him and his house full of curiosities."

"But as we are not acquainted with him, we cannot take the liberty of going to his house, or walking in his gardens."

"Oh, but you may," said the girl, "house and gardens are open to everybody, gentle or simple; but the gardens, I assure you," added she, with a look of self-satisfaction, "were made for the poor more than for the rich; you rich people have gardens of your own, but you may come and see the Arboretum, that is its name, and welcome, and then I am sure you will say that none of the gardens of the rich can compare with this. And if you chance to meet Mr. Joseph Strutt there, it will do your heart good even to look at him; he is so gentle and so kind, and from his looks you might think that instead of doing good to all the people about him, they were doing good to him."

"Oh, do let us go and see him," said Willy, "and all his curiosities and the gardens too." His father said they would try to get introduced to him, for he liked to see good people, extremely. When they reached Derby, they took leave of the market girl. Willy helped her to lift the basket of chickens, and he bid them good by, too; and he was very sorry to think he should see her no more. "I should have liked to have seen her little brother and sister, too," said he.

"I am afraid you have not much chance of that," said his mother; "but who can tell?"

THE INN.

In the mean time they went to an inn at Derby. Willy had never been at an inn, and knew not what it meant. He supposed it was the house of one of his father's friends, to whom they were to pay a visit. The landlady was extremely civil, and asked them what they would like to have for dinner. She said she had a nice young chicken and some green peas, and a gooseberry tart, with a custard, which she thought would please little master. Willy replied, "Oh, yes, that it will, thank you, Ma'am;" and when she went away, he asked why she did not sit down and stay with Mamma?

"She is not a friend of mine," replied his mother, "I never saw her before."

"Then why do you come to her house, if you don't know her, Mamma? You said you could not go to Mr. Strutt's, because you did not know him."

His mother then explained to him, that this landlady kept a large house called an inn, or hotel, on purpose to receive travellers, and then made a bill, and that they paid her for all they ate or drank, and for the use of the room they sat in, and the bed rooms they slept in. "This house," said she, "cost her a great deal of money, and she has besides to pay for all we eat and drink."

"Oh yes," said Willy, "the nice dinner we are going to have must cost her a great deal of money, and she would not have enough if we did not pay her."

"So you see, Willy, she takes money out of her pocket to spend for us, and we put money into her pocket to pay her back again."

Willy was thoughtful for a minute or two, and then asked his Mamma whether she paid the landlady just as much money as she spent for her?

"Her bill comes to a little more," said his mother, "for if I paid her only just what she spent for us, she would gain nothing by us."

"But she would not lose either," said Willy; "if she spent a sovereign for us, and you paid her a sovereign, she would neither gain nor lose."

"I am glad to find you understand accounts so well," said his mother. "But you must know that this landlady keeps an inn on purpose to gain money; she wants money to pay for all she and her children eat and drink, and for their clothing and their schooling, and I know not how many things besides; now all that I pay her more than she spends for me she puts in her pocket, and keeps to spend for her own family."

"And does everybody who comes to the inn," asked Willy, "pay her a little more?"

"Yes, certainly."

"Then all the little mores must make a great deal," observed Willy. "Oh, how nicely that is contrived! We get good dinners and beds, and all we want, when we go to the inn, and the landlady gets the money she wants to spend for her family; so everybody gets something good."

He then ran about, examining all the furniture, which was new to him: he admired the flowers on the carpet, and was amused with the spring blinds, and the round dumb waiters, laughing heartily when he was told that they were called dumb waiters because they could not speak; and when dinner came he got one placed beside him, and then whispering to his Mamma, begged she would send away the live speaking waiter, and make use of the dumb one. So the knives and forks and plates were placed on the dumb waiter, and then Willy, who had heard his father and mother ask the waiter for a knife or a plate, said in joke, "Come, waiter, bring me a plate," and then added, "The waiter is deaf as well as dumb, and besides that, he cannot move."

"Oh yes, he can," said his Mamma; "at least, if he cannot walk, he can run, for the dumb waiter runs on castors;" and she pushed it towards Willy.

"Oh, but I mean it cannot move of itself, like an animal; then it cannot feel, but I am sure it can make other people feel, for when you pushed it, it gave me a good blow upon the shoulder."

Willy was to sleep in a little bed in his Mamma's room: that was a great pleasure, and the new bed was another treat. Then everything was new to him in the room, and it was a long time before he could go to sleep, so much was he taken up with the hangings of the bed, which, instead of being plaited full like the flounce of a gown, were drawn up in festoons and bordered by a fringe; then it was red damask, not white, like his own little bed at home; and the paper, instead of having green and white stripes like that of his nursery, was covered all over with flowers, which seemed to him much prettier, and there was an odd sort of wash-handstand which stood like a naughty boy in the corner; but one after another all these things seemed to fade away, he saw nothing distinctly, and at last he fell asleep.

The next morning, while they were at breakfast, the landlady came again, and said she hoped they liked their breakfast, that the eggs were quite fresh, for her little daughter had brought them in from the hen-house that morning.

Willy could not help looking at the landlady's pockets, to see if they were big enough to hold all the money that was paid her, but he saw nothing but a bunch of keys hanging by her side; then he thought so much money would be too heavy for her to carry about, 'so I dare say she keeps it in a lock-up drawer, as Mamma does, and that the keys on that bunch lock up the drawer;' however, he said nothing. Then, he thought, this little girl she talks about is one of those she buys clothes and food for with the money that is paid her. 'I wish I could see her.' After breakfast his Mamma told him he might go and play in the garden of the inn, if he would not meddle with any thing. It was a pretty garden, with a great deal of ripe fruit and many gay flowers in it; but what pleased him most was the sight of a little girl gathering gooseberries in a small basket; he asked her whether she was the little girl who had brought in the eggs that morning, and when she said that she was, they soon got acquainted. Willy asked her whether she would let him help her. "That I will," said Anna (for that was her name), "if you will not eat any of the fruit; can you be trusted?"

"To be sure," answered Willy, a little offended that he should not be thought trustworthy; "why I am very nearly as old as you are, and have as good a right to be trusted."

"Ay, that you may be," said Anna, "but I have known boys a great deal older than you are come and steal apples in our orchard, and only call it fun. But stealing can't be fun any way, I'm sure. Now, Mamma knows me and trusts me; but I don't know you, so I don't know whether I ought to trust you; however, if you promise not to eat any of the fruit you gather, I will."

This was agreed upon, and Willy gathered the gooseberries so fast that the basket was soon full; but when Anna came to examine them, she found a great many of them were not ripe. "Look here," said she, "here is one, and another, and another, quite green!"

"Why they are all green," cried Willy, "they are not red, but green gooseberries."

"Yes, but when green gooseberries are ripe they are soft, and look rather yellowish, like these," said she, showing him some ripe ones: "well, I am afraid I shall be scolded!"

Willy felt very sorry, and said, "But I will tell your Mamma that it was I who gathered them, and then she will scold me, and not you."

"Yes," said Anna, "she will scold me for letting you gather fruit when you did not know which were ripe and which unripe."

The two children looked rather dismal, till at length a bright thought struck Anna. "I remember," said she, "Mamma told me to gather some unripe green gooseberries, if I could find any, to make some gooseberry fool; now perhaps we may just find enough in the basket if we pick them out;" so they emptied the gooseberries into a large leaf, and picked out all those which were unripe; and Willy learnt to distinguish a ripe from an unripe gooseberry, and he said, "I shall never forget it; I was so much vexed for fear of getting you scolded."

"But take care," said Anna, "if you pinch them so hard to feel if they are ripe, you will hurt the gooseberries."

"Hurt them," said Willy, smiling, "why they cannot feel."

"Well," said Anna, "I mean spoil them;" and just as she said so Willy showed her a beautiful large gooseberry, which he held between the tips of his fingers, saying, "I am sure I need not pinch this to know whether it is ripe, it is so large and yellow, and looks as if you could see through it."

"But take care," said Anna, "you do not let it fall by holding it so slightly, for it is so ripe that if it fell on the ground I dare say it would burst, the skin is so thin."

So Willy grasped it tighter between his fingers to prevent it from falling, but he did not consider that if he squeezed it tight the skin might break; and so it happened; his finger and thumb met together in the middle of the gooseberry all wet and sticky!