to lie upon, but without even a coat. He turned his back upon his father’s house with a bitterness that was indescribable. He could remember the time when it was delightful to him to go home; but that was long ago, when he was a boy and knew no better. Even then, what had his father been to him? a terror even in his lighter moods, which might turn into fury at any moment. His mother? oh, his mother had been kind enough, poor soul! For a woman she had done what she could; but at the best what could a woman do? Poor thing! yes she had been kind. But it is very difficult for the young to see anyone, even when dear to them, systematically undervalued without getting to share the sentiment in one shape or another. Sometimes it rouses a generous mind to hot partizanship; but Harry had never got that length. He had been indignant sometimes and conscious, with a little pride, that he was the one who stood up for his mother--but he had not gone further. And now he could not help despising her as everybody else did. Just when it was essential she should stand by him, she had failed him. Call this the consequence of force which she could not resist, of natural bodily weakness--all that was very well to say; but a mother worth anything will never run the risk of bodily force in such an emergency. She will find some way of getting out of it. She will stand by her son when he needs her, whatever happens. And Harry’s mother had not done so--just at the critical moment when he had been driven wild by opposition, when his future career had been to all appearance cut short and his path shut in before him, she had failed him! She was as weak as water; there was no faith to be put in her. A woman like that, Harry reflected, is almost as bad as if she were not a good woman. Oh, yes; she was a good woman! but what advantage was it to anyone? What did it matter being good if you were of no use to those belonging to you? Being good just for yourself, selfishly, that was a poor sort of business. For her children she was no good. What had she ever done for any of them? Made a fuss, as Joan said. She was very good at doing that, was mother! But what more? These were the angry thoughts that were surging through his mind as he turned his back upon his home. His father’s image swept across him now and then, raising his angry despair into momentary rage; but it was not his father, who had always been hard upon him, but his mother, who had always been so tender to him, whom Harry assailed with all these bitter thoughts. In her silly dislike to the only poor little amusement he had, she had turned against him at the decisive moment. It was just like a woman! Because he would not tie himself to her apron-strings; because he would not spend his evenings sitting with her and Joan--a pretty sort of position for a young man, Harry said to himself, with a curl of his lip.