The neighbours had told him that she had smiled on Halsey, and the abuse of the Smithites, in which his mother indulged in the blindness of religious party-spirit, had fallen from his lips as soon as his own passion had been touched.

Had his former candour, then, been the thing his mother called it, _indifference_ to, rather than reverence for truth?
This was the travail of soul that Susannah could have as little thought of as he had of hers.

It held Ephraim in its fangs for many days..