Poor old home! There was all the well-used household furniture carried out and heaped together on the turf,--chairs and tables and beds,--looking so differently to what they did when arranged in their proper order.

The old man, with his grey head uncovered, was wandering to and fro in sore bewilderment; and little Nan had fallen asleep beside the furniture, with the trace of tears upon her rosy cheeks.

But the house was almost gone.

The door-sill, where Stephen had so often seen the sun go down as he rested himself from his labours, was already taken up; the old grate, round which they had sat all the winter nights that he had ever known, was pulled out of the rock; and all the floor was open to the mocking sunshine.

It is a mournful thing to see one's own home in ruins; and a tear or two made a white channel down the coal-dust on Stephen's cheeks; but he subdued himself, and spoke out to the labourers like a man.
'I know it's not your fault,' he said, as they stood round him, making explanations and excuses; 'but you know grandfather could not sell the place.