nd
Violet couldn't go? You wanted to go, didn't you?"

"Nonsense, Jem. I never thought of such a thing seriously. Why, it
would have taken more than the whole of papa's salary to send us both!"

"But that is just what I said. Why should not papa be able to send you,
as well as Ned Hunter's father to send him?"

"It comes to the same thing," said David, loftily. "I know more Latin
and Greek, too, than Ned Hunter, though he has been at M--; and as for
Violet--people can't have everything."

"And you have grown humble as well as contented, it seems," said Jem;
"just as if you didn't care! You'll care when mamma has to send Debby
away, and keep Violet at home from school, because she can't get papa a
new great coat, and pay Debby's wages, too. You may say what you like,
but I wish I were rich; and I mean to be, one of these days."

"But it is all nonsense about Debby, Jem. However, mamma would not wish
us to discuss it now, and we had better go to sleep."

But, though there was nothing more said, none of them went to sleep very
soon, and they all had a great many serious thoughts as they lay in
silence in the dark. The brothers had often had serious thoughts
before; but to Francis they came almost for the first time--or rather,
for the first time he found it difficult to put them away. He had been
brought up very differently from David and Jem. He was the son of a
rich man, and the claims of business had left their father little time
to devote to the instruction of his children. The claims of society had
left as little to his mother--she was dead now--and, except at church on
Sundays, he had rarely heard a word to remind him that there was
anything in the world of more importance than the getting of wealth and
the pursuit of pleasure, till he came to visit the Inglises.

He had been ill before that, and threatened with serious trouble in his
eyes, and the doctor had said that he must have change of air, and that
he must not be allowed to look at a book for a long time. Mr Inglis
had been at his father's house about that time, and had asked him to let
the boy go home with him, to make the acquaintance of his young people,
and he had been very glad to let him go. Mr Inglis was not Frank's
uncle, though he called him so; he was only his father's cousin, and
there had never been any intimacy between the families, so Francis had
been a stranger to them all before he came to Gourlay. But he soon made
friends