, Mrs. Peckover realised a handsome capital. She retired into
private life, having a strong sense of personal dignity, and feeling it
necessary to devote herself to the moral training of her only child.
    At half-past eleven Mrs. Peckover was arrayed in her mourning robes - new,
dark-glistening. During her absence Clem had kept guard over Mrs. Gully, whom it
was very difficult indeed to restrain from the bottles and decanters; the elder
lady coming to relieve, Clem could rush away and don her own solemn garments.
The undertaker with his men arrived; the hearse and coaches drove up; the Close
was in a state of excitement. »Now that's what I call a respectable turn-out!«
was the phrase passed from mouth to mouth in the crowd gathering near the door.
Children in great numbers had absented themselves from school for the purpose of
beholding this procession. »I do like to see spirited 'orses at a funeral!«
remarked one of the mourners, who had squeezed his way to the parlour window.
»It puts the finishin' touch, as you may say, don't it?« When the coffin was
borne forth, there was such a press in the street that the men with difficulty
reached the hearse. As the female mourners stepped across the pavement with
handkerchiefs held to their mouths, a sigh of satisfaction was audible
throughout the crowd; the males were less sympathetically received, and some
jocose comments from a costermonger, whose business was temporarily interrupted,
excited indulgent smiles.
    The procession moved slowly away, and the crowd, unwilling to disperse
immediately, looked about for some new source of entertainment. They were
fortunate, for at this moment came round the corner an individual notorious
throughout Clerkenwell as Mad Jack. Mad he presumably was - at all events, an
idiot. A lanky, raw-boned, red-headed man, perhaps forty years old; not clad,
but hung over with the filthiest rags; hatless, shoeless. He supported himself
by singing in the streets, generally psalms, and with eccentric modulations of
the voice which always occasioned mirth in hearers. Sometimes he stood at a
corner and began the delivery of a passage of Scripture in French; how, where,
or when he could have acquired this knowledge was a mystery, and Jack would
throw no light on his own past. At present, having watched the funeral coaches
pass away, he lifted up his voice in a terrific blare, singing, »All ye works of
the Lord, bless ye the Lord, praise Him and magnify Him for
