She subscribes to Church and parish charities; and is a directress
of meritorious charitable institutions--of Queen Charlotte's Lying-in
Hospital, the Washerwomen's Asylum, the British Drummers' Daughters'
Home, &c.. She is a model of a matron.
The tradesman never lived who could say that he was not paid on
the quarter-day. The beggars of her neighbourhood avoid her like a
pestilence; for while she walks out, protected by John, that domestic
has always two or three mendicity tickets ready for deserving objects.
Ten guineas a year will pay all her charities. There is no respectable
lady in all London who gets her name more often printed for such a sum
of money.
Those three mutton-chops which you see entering at the kitchen-door will
be served on the family-plate at seven o'clock this evening, the huge
footman being present, and the butler in black, and the crest and
coat-of-arms of the Scrapers blazing everywhere. I pity Miss Emily
Scraper--she is still young--young and hungry. Is it a fact that she
spends her pocket-money in buns? Malicious tongues say so; but she has
very little to spare for buns, the poor little hungry soul! For the
fact is, that when the footmen, and the ladies' maids, and the fat
coach-horses, which are jobbed, and the six dinner-parties in the
season, and the two great solemn evening-parties, and the rent of the
big house, and the journey to an English or foreign watering-place for
the autumn, are paid, my lady's income has dwindled away to a very small
sum, and she is as poor as you or I.
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