brethren,
ye have done it unto Me;' and thereupon she took heart, and made up her
mind that it was right to tend the sick lad; and that even if she should
bring trouble and want on herself and her children, it would be a Heaven-
sent trial that would be good for them.

So she made up her resolution to a winter of toil, anxiety, and trouble,
and to Lady Jane's withdrawal of favour; and thinking her ungrateful,
which, to say the truth, grieved her more than anything else, excepting
of course her forebodings for Alfred.

Ellen was in great distress about my Lady's displeasure. Not that she
dreamt of her mother's giving up Paul on that account; but she was very
fond of her little foster-sister, and of many of the maid-servants, and
her visits to the Grange were the chief change and amusement she ever
had. So while Mrs. King was busy between the shop, her work, and Paul,
Ellen sat by her brother, making the housekeeper's winter dress, and
imagining all sorts of dreadful things that might come of my Lady being
angry with them, till Alfred grew quite out of patience. 'Well, suppose
and suppose,' he said, 'suppose it was not to happen at all! Why,
Mother's doing right would be any good for nothing if she only did it to
please my Lady.'

Certainly this was the very touchstone to shew whether the fear of man
were the guide. And Ellen was still more terrified that day, for when
she went across to the farm for the evening's supply of milk and butter,
Mrs. Shepherd launched out into such a torrent of abuse against her and
her mother, that she came home trembling from head to foot; and Mrs. King
declared she should never go thither again. They would send to Mrs.
Price's for the little bit of fresh butter that was real nourishment to
Alfred: the healthy ones would save by going without any.

One word more as to the Shepherds, and then we have done with him. On
the Sunday, Mr. Cope had an elder brother staying with them, who preached
on the lesson for the day, the second chapter of the Prophet Habakkuk;
and when he came to the text, 'Woe to him that coveteth an evil
covetousness to his house,' he brought in some of the like passages, the
threats to those that 'grind the faces of the poor,' that 'oppress the
hireling in his wages,' and that terrible saying of St. James, 'Behold,
the hire of the labourers who have reaped down your fields, which is of
you kept by fraud, crieth; and the cries of them which have reaped are
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