No--that was not it, she said; but someone had arrived late, a son who was sixteen years old, and who had been absent for some days on a visit to relations in another county.

When they gathered round him to hear his news he confessed that while away he had learnt to smoke, and he now wished them to know that he had well considered the matter, and was convinced that it was not wrong nor harmful to smoke, and was determined not to give up his tobacco.

They had talked to him--father, mother, brothers, and sisters--using every argument they could find or invent to move him, until it was day and time for the woodman to go to his woods, and the others to their several occupations.

But their "all-night sitting" had been wasted; the stubborn youth had not been convinced nor shaken.

When, after morning prayers, they got up from their knees, the sunlight shining in upon them, they had made a last appeal with tears in their eyes, and he had refused to give the promise they asked.