Every night for ten years she had threatened them with a cold dinner while she served them a hot one.
With a child on either side of her, Gabriella sat down, and ladled the soup out of the old china tureen.

It was her consecrated hour--the single hour of her toiling day that she dedicated to personal happiness; and because it was her hour, her life had gradually centred about it as if it were the divine point of her universe--the pivot upon which her whole world revolved.

Nothing harsh, nothing sordid, nothing sad, ever touched the sacred precincts of her twilight hour with her children.
"I can beat any boy at school running, mother," said Archibald, watching his plate of soup hungrily as it travelled toward him.

"If my eyes won't let me be captain of a football team, I'm going to become the champion runner in America.

I bet I can, if I try." "I shouldn't wonder, dear.