I wished he had not said this of my coat. I was in a heroic temper, and the sarcasm bit cruelly, but I did as I was bid. He went to the corner, and picked up a rattan cane. To whip fellows of nineteen or twenty was not then by any means unusual. What would have happened I know not, nor ever shall. He said, “There, I hear thy mother’s voice. Put on thy coat.” I hastened to obey him. The dear lady came in with eyes full of tears, “What is this, John, I hear? I have seen Gainor. I could not wait. I shall go with thee.” “No,” he said; “that is not to be.” But she fell on his neck, and pleaded, and I, for my part, went away, not sorry for the interruption. As usual she had her way. I remember well this spring of ‘73. It was early by some weeks, and everything was green and blossoming in April. My father and mother were not to sail until the autumn, but already he was arranging for the voyage, and she as busily preparing or thinking over what was needed. When next I saw my Aunt Gainor, she cried out, “Sit down there, bad boy, and take care of my mandarin. He and my great bronze Buddha are my only counsellors. If I want to do a thing I ask Mr. Mandarin--he can only nod yes; and if I want not to do a thing I ask Buddha, and as he can neither say no nor yes, I do as I please. What a wretch you are!” I said I could not see it; and then I put my head in her lap, as I sat on the stool, and told her of my last interview with my father, and how for two days he had hardly so much as bade me good-night. “It is his way, Hugh,” said my aunt. “I am sorry; but neither love nor time will mend him. He is what his nature and the hard ways of Friends have made him.” I said that this was not all, nor the worst, and went on to tell her my latest grievance. Our family worship at home was, as usual with Friends in those days, conducted at times in total silence, and was spoken of by Friends as “religious retirement.” At other times, indeed commonly, a chapter of the Bible was read aloud, and after that my father would sometimes pray openly. On this last occasion he took advantage of the opportunity to dilate on my sins, and before our servants to ask of Heaven that I be brought to a due sense of my iniquities. It troubled my mother, who arose from her knees in tears, and went out of the room, whilst I, overcome with anger, stood looking out of the window. My father spoke to her as she opened the door, but she made no answer, nor even so much as turned her head. It brought to my memory a day of my childhood, when my father was vexed because she taught me to say the Lord’s Prayer. He did not approve, and would have no set form of words taught me. My mother was angry too, and I remember my own amazement that any one should resist my father.