In a round-backed chair at a distance from the table sat an old man with a wooden leg, a fiddle on his knee.  His face was parchmenty, his cheeks sunken, his lips compressed into a long, straight line; his small grey eyes had an anxious look, yet were ever ready to twinkle into a smile.  He wore a suit of black, preserved from sheer decay by a needle too evidently unskilled.  Wrapped about a scarcely visible collar was a broad black neckcloth of the antique fashion; his one shoe was cobbled into shapelessness.  Mr. Boddy’s spirit had proved more durable than his garments.  Often hard set to earn the few shillings a week that sufficed to him, he kept up a long-standing reputation for joviality, and, with the aid of his fiddle, made himself welcome at many a festive gathering in Lambeth.

‘Give Mr. Hackroyd a cup o’ tea, Mary,’ said Mrs. Bower.  ’How you pore men go about your work days like this is more than I can understand.  I haven’t life enough in me to drive away a fly as settles on my nose.  It’s all very well for you to laugh, Mr. Boddy.  There’s good in everything, if we only see it, and you may thank the trouble you’ve had as it’s kep’ your flesh down.’

Ackroyd addressed the old man.

’There’s a friend of mine in Newport Street would be glad to have you do a little job for him, Mr. Boddy.  Two or three chairs, I think.’

Mr. Boddy held forth his stumpy, wrinkled hand.

’Give us a friendly grip, Mr. Ackroyd!  There’s never a friend in this world but the man as finds you work; that’s the philosophy as has come o’ my three-score-and-nine years.  What’s the name and address?  I’ll be round the first thing on Monday morning.’

The information was given.

‘You just make a note o’ that in your head, Mary, my dear,’ the old mam continued. ’’Taint very likely I’ll forget, but my memory do play me a trick now and then.  Ask me about things as happened fifty years ago, and I’ll serve you as well as the almanac.  It’s the same with my eyes.  I used to be near-sighted, and now I’ll read you the sign-board across the street easier than that big bill on the wall.’

He raised his violin, and struck out with spirit ’The March of the Men of Harlech.’

‘That’s the teen as always goes with me on my way to work,’ he said, with a laugh.  ‘It keeps up my courage; this old timber o’ mine stumps time on the pavement, and I feel I’m good for something yet.  If only the hand’ll keep steady!  Firm enough yet, eh, Mr. Ackroyd?’

He swept the bow through a few ringing chords.

‘Firm enough,’ said Luke, ’and a fine tone, too.  I suppose the older the fiddle is the better it gets?’

’Ah, ’taint like these fingers.  Old Jo Racket played this instrument more than sixty years ago; so far back I can answer for it.  You remember Jo, Mrs. Bower, ma’am?  Yes, yes, you can just remember him; you was a little ’un when he’d use to crawl round from the work’us of a Sunday to the “Green Man.”  When he went into the ’Ouse he give the fiddle to Mat Trent, Lyddy and Thyrza’s father, Mr. Ackroyd.  Ah, talk of a player!  You should a’ heard what Mat could do with this ‘ere instrument.  What do you say, Mrs. Bower, ma’am?’