difficulty in half-a-dozen hours) exchanged a remark with him about

his work, the child could not help noticing that he did so with an

impatient kind of pity for his infirmity, as if he were himself the

strongest and heartiest man alive.

'I'm sorry to see there is this to do,' said the child when she

approached. 'I heard of no one having died.'

'She lived in another hamlet, my dear,' returned the sexton. 'Three

mile away.'

Was she young?'

Ye-yes' said the sexton; not more than sixty-four, I think. David, was

she more than sixty-four?'

David, who was digging hard, heard nothing of the question. The

sexton, as he could not reach to touch him with his crutch, and was

too infirm to rise without assistance, called his attention by throwing

a little mould upon his red nightcap.

What's the matter now?' said David, looking up.

How old was Becky Morgan?' asked the sexton.

Becky Morgan?' repeated David.

Yes,' replied the sexton; adding in a half compassionate, half irritable

tone, which the old man couldn't hear, 'you're getting very deaf, Davy,

very deaf to be sure!'

The old man stopped in his work, and cleansing his spade with a piece

of slate he had by him for the purpose - and scraping off, in the

process, the essence of Heaven knows how many Becky Morgans - set

himself to consider the subject.

'Let me think' quoth he. 'I saw last night what they had put upon the

coffin - was it seventy-nine?'

'No, no,' said the sexton.

'Ah yes, it was though,' returned the old man with a sigh. 'For I

remember thinking she was very near our age. Yes, it was seventy-

nine.'

'Are you sure you didn't mistake a figure, Davy?' asked the sexton,

with signs of some emotion.

The Old Curiosity Shop