“If he has, it is you that have helped to send him away. No man was prouder than your father that no vagabond ever belonged to him; and many a time of late has he prophesied that you would turn out a vagabond;— many a time, I can tell you, Adam, when he has heard of your being missed from your work. I hope you will take it to heart, Adam.” “Mother! mother! this is not the time,” said Effie, in a terror lest Adam should quit the cottage, never to return. “Mother, my father never spoke harshly about Adam, I am sure.” “Harshly! no. He never spoke harshly to anybody in his life, and always let any one talk him over, and do what they would with him; and that is the case now, I’ll answer for it. I thought I had brought up my sons free from his fault; and now they are to break my heart in another way, I suppose. Well! among one and another, I shall soon be in my grave.” “How is Cuddie to break your heart, mother? I wonder what is the matter with him, good lad!” said Adam, with an affectation of coolness. Effie cast an imploring look at him, and at the same moment Tim began to make his voice heard,— “O, don’t go! don’t go! Sir, sir; don’t go!” “I must, my dear boy. I will come back again when——” “When my mother does not insult me before you, sir,” said Adam. “But you will hardly find me here next time, after what you have heard to-day.” “Yes, Adam, I trust I shall. I shall forget what I have heard, because it was said in a moment of irritation; and you will remember, I trust, that your mother is in deep affliction, and that her words should not be reckoned too strictly against her,—least of all by her son.” “I cannot be spoken of in this way,” cried Mrs. Eldred. “I have been accustomed to have people against me, all my days; but I cannot hear myself so spoken of to my children, by anybody, Mr. Severn.” “Tell us, then, how we shall think of you,—how we shall pray for you in your sorrow?” “As one that was able to bear whatever it might please God to lay upon her,” she replied. Her violent weeping did not interrupt her declarations that she could go to the pit-mouth, and work for her living, and preserve the independence and good name she had always sought for herself and her children. She spoke proudly of her family, though she had just before been bitter against them. She talked of her strength, though she had so lately declared herself worn out. She did not want any comfort but what her own mind could supply her with, well as people meant, she did not doubt, by coming to comfort her. She forgot how she had complained, just before Mr. Severn entered, that nobody cared for her, and that she might bear her troubles as well as she could, without sympathy.