swear, and say bitter and brutal things, which was certainly no proof of his manliness; but he had not the hardy determination and perseverance of will and nerve possessed by his wife; and though Sally quailed a little in her first dispute with him, she soon learned to laugh at him and at his most violent threats, and taught him to understand that she would never submit to be mastered by him.

One afternoon when Anthony had obtained leave from his master to stay at home, to work in his own garden, his mother called him into the house. His wife was already there. Margery shut the door, and turning to them both, with a voice and a look so quietly decided that they were astonished, she said, "I have been making myself very unhappy for the last week or two, in trying to find out the reason of the change which has come upon you both in your ways to me of late. I see nothing but a glum look in Sally's face, and get always a short and snappish answer from her; and you, Anthony, look almost as dull, and never say a word even at your meals, when I am present. Now, there's something under all this, I am certain; and all I have to say is this, that if I have given offence, I have not meant to do so, and I am heartily sorry, and beg both your pardons."-The tears rose into her son's eyes when he heard his mother speak thus; and even Sally looked disconcerted, and could not recover her composure for some few minutes. At last, however, Sally in a smooth and

roundabout way let the old woman know, "that though for the next quarter they should be sorry to part with her, yet that at the end of that time she was afraid her room would be wanted; indeed, that Anthony had written to promise the room to a person who was to pay a handsome sum for the use of it.""Indeed they were so poor," Anthony now grumbled out, "and times were so bad, that they could not afford to go on as they had done; and as Mrs. Giles had a little property of her own, and wished to give her daughter Sally the benefit of it, and had offered to pay handsome for bed and board, he had thought it his duty to promise her their spare room when she could come to it." "Her poor mother," Sally added, in a reproachful tone, was getting into years, and she had been a slave over the wash-tub (she was a washerwoman) till she had well nigh slaved herself to death. It would be a happy day for her when she could sell her mangle, and her row of tubs, and get away from Manchester, and come and live with her own child at Poynscourt. Mrs. Giles loved the country." -Margery heard them both out, and, deeply as she felt, she pitied both the husband and the wife at the bottom of her heart, for their cold and cruel meanness, but she could not all at once get over the shock which she had received. She turned deadly pale, and trembled from head to foot as she sat in her chair, and looked calmly and even kindly at her son and his wife. "You have done what

pleased you," she said mildly; "I have long felt myself a poor useless creature, and I must be ready to go a day or two before my room is wanted. I do not fear, no, I do not fear, that the Lord will forsake me." A few tears stole down her thin cheeks as she spoke, but she did not utter a complaint, or say one unkind word. She might have reminded them that it was not altogether to please herself that she had sold her few things, and given up her own little dwelling, and come to live with them; and that she had been over-persuaded by Sally to do so; but she was not one given to reproaches, and so she kept her grief to herself till she could get away to her quiet little chamber, and there commune with her own heart and her God. She rose up as soon as she felt she could do so without trembling, and she quietly walked to her chamber, and shut herself in with her Bible. When she came down to join the family again, her face was as calm, and her manner as mildly cheerful as

ever.

CHAPTER III.

"WELL, Sally, and what may thy business be at the parish pay-table," said one of the farmers; "thy husband has always a good strike of work, and thou hast but two children. What in the world can bring thee here?" Sally was not at all abashed by this address; she answered with a pertness of tone and manner which alone were enough to prejudice her hearers against her. "It is not to be expected that my husband and I can keep mother for nothing, and if you wont make her an allowance, all that I can say is, she must be taken into the poor-house."-" Hallo, misses," said old farmer Brown, a man of the old school, a rough, but truly kind-hearted Englishman: "Hallo! hallo! what nonsense are you talking? Not to be expected! is it not? that a son should support his own mother, his poor old mother! things are come to a sad pass,-why Sally, I should be ashamed to let such words come out of my lips.""Well, all I can say is," replied Sally, "that if

you can't and wont help the old woman, I shall go to the magistrates' meeting next Monday, and see what they have to say to it. We have never troubled a parish yet, and 'tis hard enough when the poor old thing has lost all her little savings, that you wont help her."-" We never refuse to help any one," said farmer Brown; "when they are brought to want, and have none to do for them; but Margery and her good man, when they were young, would as soon have thought of flying as of begging for their old father and mother at the parish pay-table; you have only one parent upon your hands, and can't you keep her off the parish. I am sure it don't cost much to feed her.”

"Yes, but it does," said Sally; "she feeds very heartily, and what's more, we have the law on our side."-" Only if you are too poor to support your mother, Sally," said Mr. Vaughan, who came in while Sally was speaking about the law: "and you can say, and speak the truth, that you really cannot afford to keep your old mother?" he continued. To be sure I can," cried Sally boldly, repeating his words; "I can say, and speak the truth, that we cannot afford to keep old Margery; and what's more, gentlemen, I won't have her at my house, since you dare me to it, pay or no pay; you mun look to her yourselves, and lodge her yourselves, for go she shall. So you may take her to the workhouse as soon as you please.'

In due time, Mrs. Giles came from Manchester,