'And it was I had killed her, just as much as if I'd put the poison to
her lips. All because I thought myself such a wise fellow, because I'd
resolved to live more prudently than other men of my kind did. I wanted
to save money for the future--out of five-and-twenty shillings a week.
Many and many a day I starved myself to try and make up for expenses of
the home. Sidney, you remember that man we once went to hear lecture,
the man that talked of nothing but the thriftlessness of the poor, and
how it was their own fault they suffered? I was very near telling you
my story when we came away that night. Why, look; I myself was just the
kind of poor man that would have suited that lecturer. And what came of
it? If I'd let my poor Jenny go her own way from the first, we should
have had hard times now and then, but there'd have been our love to
help us, and we should have been happy enough. They talk about
thriftiness, and it just means that poor people are expected to
practise a self-denial that the rich can't even imagine, much less
carry out You know now why this kind of talk always angers me.'

Michael brooded for a few moments, his eyes straying sadly over the
landscape before him.

'I was punished,' he continued, 'and in the fittest way. The two of my
boys who showed most love for me, Edward and Robert, died young. The
eldest and youngest were a constant trouble to me. Michael was
quick-tempered and self-willed, like myself; I took the wrong way with
him, just like I had with his mother, and there was no peace till he
left home. Joseph was still harder to deal with; but he's the only one
left alive, and there is no need to bring up things against him. With
him I wasn't to blame, unless I treated him too kindly and spoilt him.
He was my favourite, was Jo, and he repaid me cruelly. When he married,
I only heard of it from other people; we'd been parted for a long time
already. And just about then I had a letter from Michael, asking me if
I was willing to go out and live with him in Australia. I hadn't heard
from him more than two or three times in twelve years, and when this
letter came to me I was living in Sheffield; I'd been there about five
years. He wrote to say he was doing well, and that he didn't like to
think of me being left to spend my old age alone. It was a kind letter,
and it warmed my heart. Lonely I was; as lonely and sorrowful a man as
any in England. I wrote back to say that I'd come to him gladly if