Sketches by Boz | Page 5

till he was black in the face--it was in vain. He
respired with difficulty--it was equally ineffectual in awakening
sympathy. Seats are once again to be had in any part of our parish
church, and the chapel-of-ease is going to be enlarged, as it is crowded
to suffocation every Sunday!
The best known and most respected among our parishioners, is an old
lady, who resided in our parish long before our name was registered in
the list of baptisms. Our parish is a suburban one, and the old lady lives
in a neat row of houses in the most airy and pleasant part of it. The
house is her own; and it, and everything about it, except the old lady
herself, who looks a little older than she did ten years ago, is in just the
same state as when the old gentleman was living. The little front
parlour, which is the old lady's ordinary sitting-room, is a perfect
picture of quiet neatness; the carpet is covered with brown Holland, the
glass and picture-frames are carefully enveloped in yellow muslin; the
table-covers are never taken off, except when the leaves are turpentined
and bees'- waxed, an operation which is regularly commenced every
other morning at half-past nine o'clock--and the little nicknacks are
always arranged in precisely the same manner. The greater part of these
are presents from little girls whose parents live in the same row; but
some of them, such as the two old-fashioned watches (which never
keep the same time, one being always a quarter of an hour too slow,
and the other a quarter of an hour too fast), the little picture of the
Princess Charlotte and Prince Leopold as they appeared in the Royal
Box at Drury Lane Theatre, and others of the same class, have been in
the old lady's possession for many years. Here the old lady sits with her
spectacles on, busily engaged in needlework--near the window in
summer time; and if she sees you coming up the steps, and you happen
to be a favourite, she trots out to open the street-door for you before
you knock, and as you must be fatigued after that hot walk, insists on
your swallowing two glasses of sherry before you exert yourself by
talking. If you call in the evening you will find her cheerful, but rather
more serious than usual, with an open Bible on the table, before her, of
which 'Sarah,' who is just as neat and methodical as her mistress,
regularly reads two or three chapters in the parlour aloud.

The old lady sees scarcely any company, except the little girls before
noticed, each of whom has always a regular fixed day for a periodical
tea-drinking with her, to which the child looks forward as the greatest
treat of its existence. She seldom visits at a greater distance than the
next door but one on either side; and when she drinks tea here, Sarah
runs out first and knocks a double- knock, to prevent the possibility of
her 'Missis's' catching cold by having to wait at the door. She is very
scrupulous in returning these little invitations, and when she asks Mr.
and Mrs. So-and-so, to meet Mr. and Mrs. Somebody-else, Sarah and
she dust the urn, and the best china tea-service, and the Pope Joan
board; and the visitors are received in the drawing-room in great state.
She has but few relations, and they are scattered about in different parts
of the country, and she seldom sees them. She has a son in India, whom
she always describes to you as a fine, handsome fellow--so like the
profile of his poor dear father over the sideboard, but the old lady adds,
with a mournful shake of the head, that he has always been one of her
greatest trials; and that indeed he once almost broke her heart; but it
pleased God to enable her to get the better of it, and she would prefer
your never mentioning the subject to her again. She has a great number
of pensioners: and on Saturday, after she comes back from market,
there is a regular levee of old men and women in the passage, waiting
for their weekly gratuity. Her name always heads the list of any
benevolent subscriptions, and hers are always the most liberal
donations to the Winter Coal and Soup Distribution Society. She
subscribed twenty pounds towards the erection of an organ in our
parish church, and was so overcome the first Sunday the children sang
to it, that she was obliged to be carried out by the pew-opener. Her
entrance into church on Sunday is always the signal for a little bustle in
the side aisle, occasioned by a general rise among the poor people, who
bow and curtsey until the