It a'n't much that I would say, neither, but a kind of letting out how I set all the world by her, and want her to be just so much better than other folks as I am worse.
Something would slip in that shouldn't, if I was to try; I know there would.

But you can write for me.

You would know just how to put it.

She says she yearns after me when I'm gone, and would be so full of joy if she could once have a letter from me, all her own, to read over and over when she can't throw her arms round my neck and put her little loving face close up to mine.

Will you write for me, boy, something for the dear girl to read over, and think the right kind of a father is talking to her, a man she wouldn't be ashamed of before the company her mother keeps _up there_ ?" The last words were spoken reverently, and formed a strange contrast to much that had gone before.