"Look at your Bible, my boy; Jacob left home with nothing but his staff and the blessing, and came back with his children, his flocks, and his herds. 'Twas the blessing on Joseph that brought him from prison to palace, and made all things to prosper in his hand. David was hunted like the partridge on the mountains, but the blessing brought him at last to the throne." "Those lived in old times," cried John Carey; "but we don't look now for palaces or thrones, or, if we did, we shouldn't get 'em! What does the blessing do for us now?" "John, John, I'm an old pilgrim, and maybe I'm getting nigh the end of my journey, so I may speak the more boldly about it. I've found the blessing like a staff to lean on all the way through; and if I hadn't grasped it, there's many and many a time I'd just have lain down, and given myself up to despair." "I think you've had more troubles than most folk, mother," observed John, more gravely; "and if there was a blessing on dear good father, how was it that he suffered for years?" "There was a blessing on him, yes, in his illness, and through his illness," said Mrs. Carey, fervently, while the tears started to her eyes; "no one could have been with him day and night as I was, and not have seen that there was one! Your father had peace, and hope, and joy, and patience—oh! Wonderful patience! And hard as we were put to it sometimes, God always raised up some friend to help us, and opened a way before us when it seemed as if we could not got on. God's blessing was sought by my dear husband from his youth, and I'm sure it went with him wherever he went, prospered him in his honest labour, brought him through troubles, temptations, and trials, cheered him in sickness, made his deathbed at last like the very gateway of heaven! And now he's gone where all is blessing—for ever!" Mrs. Carey closed her sentence with a little stifled sob, as she looked at an empty chair which was now never moved from its place in the corner. "I didn't mean to make ye sad, mother," said John, laying his broad hand with rough kindliness upon the shoulder of the widow; "and I don't want to worry ye about either the public-house or the girl, but I can't look at matters just as ye do, and, ye see, about that there business with Dick Brace—I've made up my mind. Don't ye be a-vexing yourself about me—all will go right, never fear!" Then, turning and taking down his cap from its peg, John said, in a merrier tone, "I'm going to old Justice Burns, to get him to pay me uncle's legacy as he promised he would, and then I'm off to London to buy a few things as I want, but I hope to be back soon after dark." Mrs. Carey saw that expostulation was useless, so she made no further opposition. "You've a long trudge before you," said she, "take your father's good staff;" and she rose to bring it from its place in the corner just behind the arm-chair.