Tom, that's Will's father (you don't know Will,
but he's a sailor to foreign parts), had come to Manchester, and
sent word what terrible lots of work was to be had, both for lads
and lasses. So father sent George first (you know George, well
enough, Mary), and then work was scarce out toward Burton, where we
lived, and father said I maun try and get a place. And George wrote
as how wages were far higher in Manchester than Milnthorpe or
Lancaster; and, lasses, I was young and thoughtless, and thought it
was a fine thing to go so far from home. So, one day, th' butcher
he brings us a letter fra George, to say he'd heard on a place--and
I was all agog to go, and father was pleased like; but mother said
little, and that little was very quiet. I've often thought she was
a bit hurt to see me so ready to go--God forgive me! But she packed
up my clothes, and some of the better end of her own as would fit
me, in yon little paper box up there--it's good for nought now, but
I would liefer live without fire than break it up to be burnt; and
yet it is going on for eighty years old, for she had it when she was
a girl, and brought all her clothes in it to father's when they were
married.
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