It had a plot
of garden-ground attached, which Barnaby, in fits and starts of working,
trimmed, and kept in order. Within doors and without, his mother
laboured for their common good; and hail, rain, snow, or sunshine, found
no difference in her.
Though so far removed from the scenes of her past life, and with so
little thought or hope of ever visiting them again, she seemed to have
a strange desire to know what happened in the busy world. Any old
newspaper, or scrap of intelligence from London, she caught at with
avidity. The excitement it produced was not of a pleasurable kind, for
her manner at such times expressed the keenest anxiety and dread; but it
never faded in the least degree. Then, and in stormy winter nights, when
the wind blew loud and strong, the old expression came into her face,
and she would be seized with a fit of trembling, like one who had an
ague. But Barnaby noted little of this; and putting a great constraint
upon herself, she usually recovered her accustomed manner before the
change had caught his observation.
Grip was by no means an idle or unprofitable member of the humble
household. Partly by dint of Barnaby's tuition, and partly by pursuing a
species of self-instruction common to his tribe, and exerting his powers
of observation to the utmost, he had acquired a degree of sagacity
which rendered him famous for miles round.
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