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257
Cranford
·
Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
237
I
had
a
busy
life
while
Martha
was
laid
up.
I
attended
on
Miss
Matty,
and
prepared
her
meals;
I
cast
up
her
accounts,
and
examined
into
the
state
of
her
canisters
and
tumblers.
I
helped
her,
too,
occasionally,
in
the
shop;
and
it
gave
me
no
small
amusement,
and
sometimes
a
little
uneasiness,
to
watch
her
ways
there.
If
a
little
child
came
in
to
ask
for
an
ounce
of
almond-comfits
(and
four
of
the
large
kind
which
Miss
Matty
sold
weighed
that
much),
she
always
added
one
more
by
“way
of
make-weight,”
as
she
called
it,
although
the
scale
was
handsomely
turned
before;
and
when
I
remonstrated
against
this,
her
reply
was,
“The
little
things
like
it
so
much!”
There
was
no
use
in
telling
her
that
the
fifth
comfit
weighed
a
quarter
of
an
ounce,
and
made
every
sale
into
a
loss
to
her
pocket.
So
I
remembered
the
green
tea,
and
winged
my
shaft
with
a
feather
out
of
her
own
plumage.
I
told
her
how
unwholesome
almond-comfits
were,
and
how
ill
excess
in
them
might
make
the
little
children.
This
argument
produced
some
effect;
for,
henceforward,
instead
of
the
fifth
comfit,
she
always
told
them
to
hold
out
their
tiny
palms,
into
which
she
shook
either
peppermint
or
ginger
lozenges,
as
a
preventive
to
the
dangers
that
might
arise
from
the
previous
sale.
Altogether
the
lozenge
trade,
conducted
on
these
principles,
did
not
promise
to
be
remunerative;
but
I
was
happy
to
find
she
had
made
more
than
twenty
pounds
during
the
last
year
by
her
sales
of
tea;
and,
moreover,
that
now
she
was
accustomed
to
it,
she
did
not
dislike
the
employment,
which
brought
her
into
kindly
intercourse
with
many
of
the
people
round
about.
If
she
gave
them
good
weight,
they,
in
their
turn,
brought
many
a
little
country
present
to
the
“old
rector’s
daughter”;
a
cream
cheese,
a
few
new-laid
eggs,
a
little
fresh
ripe
fruit,
a
bunch
of
flowers.
The
counter
was
quite
loaded
with
these
offerings
sometimes,
as
she
told
me.
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