"I wanted to finish a shock. Then there was the feeding, and the wood to cut. And I had to warm my room up a little before I could wash." "Is it going to snow?" "It's hard to say. The weather looks very unsettled and threatening. That's one reason why I wanted to finish my shock." There was silence for a while. David was too ravenous to talk; and his mother's habit was to utter one sentence at a time. "I got three fresh eggs to-day; one had dropped from the roost and frozen; it was cracked, but it will do for the coffee in the morning." "Winter must be nearly over if the hens are beginning to lay: THEY know. They must have some fresh nests." "The cook wants to kill one of the old ones for soup to-morrow." "What an evil-minded cook!" It was with his mother only that David showed the new cheerfulness that had begun to manifest itself in him since his return from college. She, however, did not understand the reasons of this and viewed it unfavorably. "We opened a hole in the last hill of turnips to-day." She spoke with uneasiness. "There'll be enough to last, I reckon, mother." "You needn't pack any more chips to the smoke-house: the last meat's smoked enough." "Very well, then. You shall have every basketful of them for your own fire." "If you can keep them from the negroes: negroes love chips." "I'll save them while I chop. You shall have them, if I have to catch them as they fly." His hunger had been satisfied: his spirits began to rise. "Mother, are you going to eat that piece of biscuit? If not, just hand it over to me, please." She looked dryly down at the bread in her fingers: humor was denied her--that playfulness of purest reason. David had commenced to collect a plateful of scraps--the most appetizing of the morsels that he himself had not devoured. He rose and went out into the porch to the dog. "Now, mother," he said, reentering; and with quiet dignity he preceded her into the room adjoining. His father sat on one side of the fireplace, watching the open door for the entrance of his son. He appeared slightly bent over in his chair. Plainly the days of rough farm-work and exposure were over for him, prematurely aged and housed. There was about him--about the shape and carriage of the head--in the expression of the eye most of all, perhaps,--the not wholly obliterated markings of a thoughtful and powerful breed of men. His appearance suggested that some explanation of David might be traceable in this quarter. For while we know nothing of these deep things, nor ever shall, in the sense that we can supply the proofs of what we conjecture; while Nature goes ever about her ancient work, and we cannot declare that we have ever watched the operations of her fingers, think on we will, and reason we must, amid her otherwise intolerable mysteries. Though we accomplish no more in our philosophy than the poor insect, which momentarily illumines its wandering through the illimitable night by a flash from its own body.