"Old feud! Old disgrace!" cried the fisherman, throwing away the worm he was about to impale on his hook, to see it snapped up at once by a good fish; and standing his rod in the water, like a staff to lean on, as he went on talking, with the cold water swirling about over his knees, and threatening to wet his feather-stuffed breeches. "I'm ashamed of your father and Ralph's father. Call themselves Christian gentlemen, and because a pair of old idiots of ancestors in the dark ages quarrelled, and tried to cut one another's throats, they go on as their fathers did before them, trying to seize each other's properties, and to make an end of one another, and encouraging their sons to grow up in the same vile way." "My father is a gentleman and a knight, sir," cried Mark Eden hotly; "and I'm sure that he would never turn cut-throat or robber if he was left alone." "Of course; and that's what Sir Morton Darley would say, or his son either; and still the old feud is kept up. Look here, boy; suppose you were to run against young Ralph now, what would happen?" "There'd be a fight," cried the lad, flushing up; and he drew in his breath with a hiss. "Of course!" sneered the old man. "Well, he never sees me without insulting me." "And you never see him without doing the same." "But--" "But! Bah! I haven't patience with you all. Six of one; half a dozen of the other. Both your families well off in this world's goods, and yet miserable, Fathers, two Ahabs, longing for the other's land to make a garden of herbs; and if they got it, a nice garden of herbs it would be! Why, Mark Eden, as I'm a scholar and a gentleman, my income is fifty pounds a year. My cottage is my own, and I'm a happier man than either of your fathers. Look about you, boy--here, at the great God's handiwork; wherever your eyes rest, you see beauty. Look at this silvery flashing river, the lovely great trees, the beautiful cliffs, and up yonder in the distance at the soft blues of the mountains, melting into the bluer skies. Did you ever see anything more glorious than this dale?" "Never," cried the lad enthusiastically. "Good, boy! That came from the heart. That heart's young and soft, and true, as I know. Don't let it get crusted over with the hard shell of a feud. Life's too great and grand to be wasted over a miserable quarrel, and in efforts to make others wretched. And it's so idiotic, Mark, for you can't hurt other people without hurting yourself more. Look here, next time you, spring boy, meet the other spring boy, act at once; don't wait till you are summer men, or autumn men. When you get to be a winter man as I am, it will be too late. Begin now, while it is early with you. Hold out your hand and shake his, and become fast friends. Teach your fathers what they ought to have done when they were young. Come, promise me that." "I can't, sir," said the boy, frowning. "And if I could, Ralph Darley would laugh in my face."