One day she was sitting in a marketplace on a bench outside an inn, with her little wares for sale, when the deadness that she strove against came over her so heavily that the scene departed from before her eyes; when it returned, she found herself on the ground, her head supported by some good-natured market-women, and a little crowd about her.

“Are you better now, mother?” asked one of the women. “Do you think you can do nicely now?”

“Have I been ill then?” asked old Betty.

“You have had a faint like,” was the answer, “or a fit. It ain’t that you’ve been a-struggling, mother, but you’ve been stiff and numbed.”

“Ah!” said Betty, recovering her memory. “It’s the numbness. Yes. It comes over me at times.”

Was it gone? the women asked her.