'Your mother's cruel death maddened me and I said what I may live to be sorry for, though at the best I shall not live long, for my heart is broken.

Perhaps I should have remembered that vengeance is in the hand of the Lord, who wreaks it at His own time and without our help.

Do not think unkindly of me, my boy, if we should chance to meet no more, for I love you, and it was but the deeper love that I bore to your mother which made me deal harshly with you.' 'I know it, father, and bear no grudge.

But if you think that you owe me anything, pay it by holding back my brother from working wrong to me and Lily Bozard while I am absent.' 'I will do my best, son, though were it not that you and she have grown so dear to each other, the match would have pleased me well.

But as I have said, I shall not be long here to watch your welfare in this or any other matter, and when I am gone things must follow their own fate.