The Garret and the Garden | Page 4

little head that has bent over the boxes of earth, which constitute her landed property; her pretty little fingers which have trained the stems and watered the roots and cherished the flowers until the barren house-top has been made to blossom like the rose. And love, as usual, has done it all--love to that very ugly old woman, chimney-pot Liz, who sits on the rustic chair in the midst of the garden enjoying it all.
For Liz has been a mother to that motherless bairn from her earliest years. She has guarded, fed, and clothed her from infancy; taught her from God's Book the old, old story of redeeming love, and led her to the feet of Jesus. It would be strange indeed if Susy did not love the ugly old woman, until at last she came to regard the wrinkles as veritable lines of beauty; the nut-cracker nose and chin as emblems of persistent goodness; the solitary wobbling tooth as a sign of unconquerable courage; and the dark eyes--well, it required no effort of imagination to change the character of the old woman's eyes, for they had always been good, kindly, expressive eyes, and were at that date as bright and lively as when she was sweet sixteen.
But chimney-pot Liz was poor--desperately poor, else she had not been there, for if heaven was around and within her, assuredly something very like pandemonium was underneath her, and it not unfrequently appeared as if the evil spirits below were surging to and fro in a fierce endeavour to burst up the whole place, and hurl the old woman with her garden into the river.
Evil spirits indeed formed the dread foundation of the old woman's abode; for, although her own court was to some extent free from the curse, this particular pile of building, of which the garden formed the apex, had a grog-shop, opening on another court, for its foundation-stone. From that sink of iniquity, literal and unmitigated-- though not unadulterated--spirits of evil rose like horrid fumes from the pit, and maddened the human spirits overhead. These, descending to the foundation-den, soaked themselves in the material spirit and carried it up, until the whole tenement seemed to reek and reel under its malign influence.
But, strange to say, the riot did not rise as high as the garden on the roof--only the echoes reached that little paradise.
Now it is a curious almost unaccountable fact, which no one would ever guess, that a teapot was the cause of this--at least a secondary cause-- for a teapot was the chief instrument in checking, if not turning, the tide of evil. Yes, chimney-pot Liz held her castle in the very midst of the enemy, almost single-handed, with no visible weapon of offence or defence but a teapot! We say visible, because Liz did indeed possess other and very powerful weapons which were not quite so obvious--such as, the Word of God in her memory, the love of God in her heart, and the Spirit of God in her soul.
To the outside world, however, the teapot was her weapon and shield.
We have read of such a weapon before, somewhere in the glorious annals of city missions, but just now we are concerned only with the teapot of our own Liz of chimney-pot notoriety.
Seated, as we have said, in a rustic chair, gazing through the foliage at the busy Thames, and plying her knitting needles briskly, while the sun seemed to lick up and clear away the fogs and smoke of the great city, chimney-pot Liz enjoyed her thoughts until a loud clatter announced that Susy had knocked over the watering-pot.
"Oh! granny" (thus she styled her), "I'm so sorry! So stupid of me! Luckily there's no water in it."
"Never mind, dear," said the old woman in a soft voice, and with a smile which for a moment exposed the waste of gums in which the solitary fang stood, "I've got no nerves--never had any, and hope I never may have. By the way, that reminds me--Is the tea done, Susy?"
"Yes, not a particle left," replied the girl, rising from her floral labours and thereby showing that her graceful figure matched well with her pretty young face. It was a fair face, with golden hair divided in the middle and laid smooth over her white brow, not sticking confusedly out from it like the tangled scrub on a neglected common, or the frontal locks of a Highland bull.
"That's bad, Susy," remarked old Liz, pushing the fang about with her tongue for a few seconds. "You see, I had made up my mind to go down to-night and have a chat with Mrs Rampy, and I wouldn't like to visit her without my teapot. The dear old woman is so fond of a cup of tea, and she don't often