“To-day,” he continued, at length, “My poor dear girl is pining away for the fresh air. I heard yesterday that Zack Baldwin had an old horse that he was going to kill. I might have known that I would be refused, but I was thinking only of my poor dear girl, and I went and begged him to let me have the old horse. I promised him it should never do anything but draw the poor girl the little way she is able to ride.” “Didn’t he let you have it?” asked Mrs. Wycliff, full of sympathy. “Of course not. It wouldn’t make any big sound, you know, like giving a half a million dollars to a library. It might, possibly, have saved my daughter’s life. He ordered the horse taken out and shot before my eyes. I felt as if those shots sounded my daughter’s doom. I might have known that a man who would discharge me for getting the policemen’s pay raised, would refuse me an old horse which might save my daughter’s life.” “Did he discharge you for that?” “Surely. He came to me after town-meeting, and said:--‘A man who works against my interests in town-meeting will never get another day’s work from me. I have no use for such men as you and Wycliff. He got offended at me once before. It was a year ago. Fifty of us were making a lawn for him. He paid us only a dollar and a half a day, although everybody else about here was paying a dollar and three-quarters for that kind of work. I circulated a petition, which most of the workmen signed, asking for one dollar and seventy-five cents per day, and presented the petition to Zack Baldwin. He finally agreed to split the difference with us, and pay us a dollar and sixty-two and a half cents a day, but he was revenged on us. Those who refused to sign the petition were given work much longer than the rest. That is the Baldwin brand of Christianity,--paying lower wages than other employers pay, and discharging those who ask for fair wages; and at the same time making princely gifts to public libraries and other institutions. It was because outside work was dull, just then, that Zack Baldwin took advantage of us, to get our work at less than market price.’” “But I thought,” said Mrs. Wycliff, “that Zechariah and David Baldwin were in company.” “They are,--in the mills. Congressman Baldwin isn’t a bit better than Old Zack, the old Shylock. The man who shuts his eyes to tyranny isn’t a bit better than the tyrant. Since town-meeting I’ve had to walk three miles up to the Wendell Farm, for work. These little hands were not made for handling heavy stone.” And he exhibited a pair of hands almost as small and fine as a lady’s. “You look like a light and feeble man to walk six miles and handle stone all day, and you must be getting a little too old for hard work. How old are you, Uncle Jerry?”