"What do you expect to do in the end ? " I
asked them. " You know you re growing older
every day."

"Work ouse," said he.

"Gawd blimey if I do," said she. " There s no
ope for me, I know, but I ll die on the streets. No
work ouse for me, thank you."

"No, indeed," she sniffed in the silence that fell.

"After you have been out all night in the streets,"
I asked, " what do you do in the morning for some
thing to eat?"

"Try to get a penny, if you aven t one saved
over," the man explained. " Then go to a coffee-
ouse an get a mug o tea."

"But I don t see how that is to feed you," I
objected.

The pair smiled knowingly.

"You drink your tea in little sips," he went on,
"making it last its longest. An you look sharp,
an there s some as leaves a bit be ind em."

"It s s prisin', the food wot some people leaves,"
the woman broke in.

"The thing," said the man judicially, as the
trick dawned upon me, " is to get old o the penny."

As we started to leave, Miss Haythorne gathered
up a couple of crusts from the neighboring tables
and thrust them somewhere into her rags.

"Cawn t wyste em, you know," said she, to which

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