When Mrs. Poole answered her knock at the house-door, Lydia said: 

’I hope you’ll like it.  I shall see you on Sunday, and you’ll tell me then.’

‘But where are you going?  Why won’t you come in?’

‘Oh, I have to buy something.’

‘Come in for a minute, then.’

‘No, thank you; not to-night.’

‘Do as I tell you!’ said the other, with good-natured persistence.  ’I believe you’re ashamed of your work, and that’s why you’re running away.  Come in at once.’

Lydia yielded, though seemingly with reluctance.  They went down into the kitchen, where the two young Pooles were at an uproarious game.

‘Now there’s been just about enough of that!’ exclaimed their mother, raising her voice to be heard.  ’Miss Trent ’ll think we have a bear-garden down here.  You must play quietly, or off you go to bed —­I mean it!’

The bonnet was taken forth and examined, with many ejaculations of delight from its owner.  The only article of attire upon which Mrs. Poole ever spent a thought was her bonnet, a noteworthy instance of the inconsequence of human nature, seeing that it was the rarest thing for her to leave the house, save when she ran out at night to make purchases, and then she always donned an object of straw, whose utility was its only merit.  Though as happy a woman as you could have found in Lambeth, she seldom had a moment of leisure from getting-up to bedtime.  Her kind are very numerous.  Such women pass through a whole summer without an hour of rest in the sunshine, and often through a married lifetime without going beyond the circle of neighbouring streets.

But the bonnet delighted her.  She tried it on, and, having placed a looking-glass on the table, went through the wonderful feat in which women are so skilled, that of seeing the back of her head.  Then, having constrained Lydia to sit down, she pursued multifarious occupations, talking the while.

‘I hope you don’t notice any bad smells in the house,’ she said; ’there’s Luke at his usual work, upstairs.  What pleasure he can find in that is more than I can understand.  I know he’s ruined my table with his chemicals.  There’s Jacky with him, too.  If I was Mr. Bunce I should be afraid to have the boy taught such things.  He’ll set the house on fire some day, will Master Jack, and burn himself and his little sister to death.’

‘But you see,’ said Lydia, ’Mr. Ackroyd does keep to it.  You didn’t think he’d persevere more than a week or two, and now it must be a good three months.’

’Well, yes, it does look as if it was going to be different from the other things,’ Mrs. Poole admitted, with a grudging laugh.  ’Well, he always had a liking for reading books of that kind.  Let’s hope he knows his own mind at last.  But then he can’t never do anything in moderation, can’t Luke.  He’s got an idea into his head that he’s going to invent a new kind of candle—­if you ever heard such a thing!