"If that's the way you behave to your children, Mr. Morton, I vow you sha'n't have any more if I can help it. Don't come near me--don't touch me!" and Mrs. Morton assumed the resentful air of offended beauty. "Pshaw!" growled the spouse, and he reseated himself and resumed his pipe. There was a dead silence. Sidney crouched near his uncle, looking very pale. Mrs. Morton, who was knitting, knitted away with the excited energy of nervous irritation. "Ring the bell, Sidney," said Mr. Morton. The boy obeyed-the parlour- maid entered. "Take Master Sidney to his room; keep the boys away from him, and give him a large slice of bread and jam, Martha." "Jam, indeed!--treacle," said Mrs. Morton. "Jam, Martha," repeated the uncle, authoritatively. "Treacle!" reiterated the aunt. "Jam, I say!" "Treacle, you hear: and for that matter, Martha has no jam to give!" The husband had nothing more to say. "Good night, Sidney; there's a good boy, go and kiss your aunt and make your bow; and I say, my lad, don't mind those plagues. I'll talk to them to-morrow, that I will; no one shall be unkind to you in my house." Sidney muttered something, and went timidly up to Mrs. Morton. His look so gentle and subdued; his eyes full of tears; his pretty mouth which, though silent, pleaded so eloquently; his willingness to forgive, and his wish to be forgiven, might have melted many a heart harder, perhaps, than Mrs. Morton's. But there reigned what are worse than hardness,-- prejudice and wounded vanity--maternal vanity. His contrast to her own rough, coarse children grated on her, and set the teeth of her mind on edge. "There, child, don't tread on my gown: you are so awkward: say your prayers, and don't throw off the counterpane! I don't like slovenly boys." Sidney put his finger in his mouth, drooped, and vanished. "Now, Mrs. M.," said Mr. Morton, abruptly, and knocking out the ashes of his pipe; "now Mrs. M., one word for all: I have told you that I promised poor Catherine to be a father to that child, and it goes to my heart to see him so snubbed. Why you dislike him I can't guess for the life of me. I never saw a sweeter-tempered child." "Go on, sir, go on: make your personal reflections on your own lawful wife. They don't hurt me--oh no, not at all! Sweet-tempered, indeed; I suppose your own children are not sweet-tempered?" "That's neither here nor there," said Mr. Morton: "my own children are such as God made them, and I am very well satisfied." "Indeed you may be proud of such a family; and to think of the pains I have taken with them, and how I have saved you in nurses, and the bad times I have had; and now, to find their noses put out of joint by that little mischief-making interloper--it is too bad of you, Mr. Morton; you will break my heart--that you will!" Mrs. Morton put her handkerchief to her eyes and sobbed. The husband was moved: he got up and attempted to take her hand. "Indeed, Margaret, I did not mean to vex you."