“Ah! I dare say he will,” replied the lady pettishly, “on our victuals and our drink. I see no saving in parish children, not I; for they always cost more to keep, than they’re worth. However, men always think they know best. There! Get downstairs, little bag o’ bones.” With this, the undertaker’s wife opened a side door, and pushed Oliver down a steep flight of stairs into a stone cell, damp and dark: forming the anteroom to the coal-cellar, and denominated “kitchen”; wherein sat a slatternly girl, in shoes down at heel, and blue worsted stockings very much out of repair.

“Here, Charlotte,” said Mr. Sowerberry, who had followed Oliver down, “give this boy some of the cold bits that were put by for Trip. He hasn’t come home since the morning, so he may go without ’em. I dare say the boy isn’t too dainty to eat ’em⁠—are you, boy?”

Oliver, whose eyes had glistened at the mention of meat, and who was trembling with eagerness to devour it, replied in the negative; and a plateful of coarse broken victuals was set before him.