“Oh, my brother! My poor, dear, sweet, innocent little brother!” exclaimed Nancy, bursting into tears, and wringing the little basket and the street-door key in an agony of distress. “What has become of him! Where have they taken him to! Oh, do have pity, and tell me what’s been done with the dear boy, gentlemen; do, gentlemen, if you please, gentlemen!”

Having uttered those words in a most lamentable and heartbroken tone: to the immeasurable delight of her hearers: Miss Nancy paused, winked to the company, nodded smilingly round, and disappeared.

“Ah, she’s a clever girl, my dears,” said the Jew, turning round to his young friends, and shaking his head gravely, as if in mute admonition to them to follow the bright example they had just beheld.

“She’s a honour to her sex,” said Mr. Sikes, filling his glass, and smiting the table with his enormous fist. “Here’s her health, and wishing they was all like her!”