The coldness between uncle Bryan and Jessie did not diminish with time. As a matter of necessity they were compelled to speak to each other occasionally, but they did so with coldness and reluctance, and a distinct avoidance of the subject which had broken the bond between them. I say that they were compelled to speak to each other as a matter of necessity, but I may be mistaken; they may have spoken not out of consideration for themselves, but for my mother. Thinking over the matter since that time, I have understood how those two, if they had been alone, might have lived in the same house for years, and might have performed their separate duties conscientiously, without a word passing between them. For the sake of peace Jessie would have yielded, but uncle Bryan would have remained implacable. Results proved this. In vain did my mother strive to bring them together in a more amiable spirit; in vain did she speak separately to each of the other's good qualities, magnifying their merits, ignoring their faults. Her labour upon uncle Bryan was entirely lost; but it was different with Jessie, not because she thought she was wrong, nor for uncle Bryan's sake, but out of her love for my mother. 'You are a child, my dear,' said my mother to her, 'and he is an old man. If for that reason alone, you should yield.' 'It would be useless,' was Jessie's rejoinder; 'I have known him for a much shorter time than you, but I know his nature better than you do. I judge of it by my own.' 'You do both him and yourself injustice, my dear,' pleaded the peacemaker; 'if he were all wrong and you were all right, it would be your duty to give in.' 'Love and duty do not always go together,' said Jessie obstinately. 'But we must make sacrifices, my child; what a miserable thing this life would be if some of us did not yield!' 'If I thought,' said Jessie, softening, 'that I should not be insulted I would do as you wish willingly, most willingly--not for my sake, but for yours.' 'Try, then, for my sake.' 'I will; and you will see what will come of it.' And Jessie tried, in her best manner and in good faith, with the result for which she was prepared. 'Can you not see now how it is?' she asked, with tears in her eyes. 'I have brought trouble into this house. How much better would it have been for you if I had never entered it! But it wasn't my fault. Ah, if I were a man I wouldn't stop in it for another hour! But I have no friends; and if it were not that I love to live, I might wish that I had never been born.' 'Then you do not regard me as a friend, my dear child?' But Jessie, with cruel determination, refused to respond to the tender appeal, and turned rebelliously away. All this I learnt from my mother, who hid nothing from me, and it did not tend to make me happier. 'Be patient, my darling,' my mother said; 'all will come right in the end.'