"Well said," cried my father, when Mr. Webster, with many a sigh, brought his tale to an end: "well said, there spoke our George. There spoke the lad we used to be proud on, and he's in the right on it, and so folk will say for all time to come." "I urged him to forgive his enemies and to leave this sinful world in charity with all mankind." "An' what said he to that?" "He said he'd nought to forgive to anybody but Ben Walker." "Well, and him?" "I urged him to forgive even Walker. 'Vengeance is mine: I will repay, saith the Lord.'" "Well, did he?" "Nay, I found him obdurate on this point, though I pressed him hard. He reiterated that before he forgave Walker he'd like to give him something to forgive too. I could not but tell him he was entering the presence of his Maker in a most unchristian frame of mind." "Are yo' clear, Mr. Webster," asked my father, "that religion calls on George to forgive Ben Walker?" "There can be no question of it," was the answer. "Do we not pray 'Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive them that trespass against us?'" My father shook his head pensively. "It may be Scripture, parson, but it isn't Yorkshire. Hast ta never heard that a Yorkshireman can carry a stone in his pocket for seven years, then turn it and after another seven years let throw and hit his mark?" "It is an evil, an unforgiving, an unchristian frame of mind," quoth the parson. "That's as may be," replied my father, doggedly. "But what's born in the bone will out in the flesh. For my part I'st uphowd George, an' if he'd said he forgave that spawn o' the devil I should ha' thowt he met be a saint, but he wer' a liar an' a hypocrite for all that. It's agen natur, Mr. Webster, it's agen natur." Mr. Webster hastened to change the subject. "George sent a message for yo', Ben. He knows how it is between you and Mary and he wishes you all happiness, and asks you to forget and forgive the hasty words he spoke when last you parted. He said you would know what he meant." "God bless him, sir, I had forgiven them long ago." "And if it will not go too hard against the grain he wants you to be at the execution and to stand where his eye can fall upon you. He says he should like his last thoughts to be of Holme and the dear ones there. He seems strangely wrapped up in the old spot even to the exclusion of his own mother." "Aye," said my father. "George never got over Matty marryin' again. If 'oo'd never wed that John Wood but made a home for her own flesh an' blood this met never ha' happened. But what is to be will be, an' that's good Scripture anyway." "Foreseen and foreordained even from the beginning," assented Mr. Webster.