“There is plenty of wrong without that, Jock. While you never heed anything but fun and amusement I do not see how you are to come to anything worth having; and you will soon get betrayed into something unworthy. Don’t let me have to take you away in disgrace, my boy; it would break my heart.” “You shan’t have to do that, mother.” “But don’t you think it would be wiser to be somewhere with fewer inducements to idleness?” “Leave Eton? O no, mother! I can’t do that till the last day possible. I shall be in the eight another year.” “You will not be here another year unless you go on very differently. Your tutor will not allow it, if I would.” “Has he said so?” “Yes; and the next half is to be the trial.” Jock applied himself to extracting a horsehair from the stuffing of the elbow of his chair; and there was a look over his face as near sullenness as ever came to his gay, careless nature. Would he attend? or even could he? When his bills came in Caroline feared, as before, that he was the one of all her children whom Belforest was most damaging. Allen was expensive, but in an elegant, exquisite kind of way; but Jock was simply reckless; and his pleasures were questionable enough to be on the borders of vices, which might change the frank, sweet, merry face that now looked up to her into a countenance stained by dissipation and licence! A flash of horror and dismay followed the thought! But what could she do for him, or for any of her children? Censure only alienated them and made them worse, and their love for her was at least one blessing. Why had this gold come to take away the wholesome necessity for industry? CHAPTER XIX. -- THE SNOWY WINDING-SHEET. Cold, cold, ‘tis a chilly clime That the youth in his journey hath reached; And he is aweary now, And faint for lack of food. Cold! cold! there is no sun in heaven. Southey. Very merry was the party which arrived at the roughly-built hotel of Schwarenbach which serves as a half-way house to the Altels. Never had expedition been more enjoyed than that of Mrs. Brownlow and her three boys. They had taken a week by the sea to recruit their forces, and then began their journey in earnest, since it was too late for a return to Eton, although so early in the season that to the Swiss they were like the first swallows of the spring, and they came in for some of the wondrous glory of the spring flowers, so often missed by tourists. In her mountain dress, all state and ceremony cast aside, Caroline rode, walked, and climbed like the jolly Mother Carey she was, to use her son’s favourite expression, and the boys, full of health and recovery, gambolled about her, feeling her companionship the very crown of their enjoyment.